ProFile: WC Social Club • West Chicago
WC Social Club in West Chicago
Entrepreneur, concert promoter, and club owner, Chris Triebes, has been booking national music acts and promoting his own concerts in our city for over two decades now. Triebes started promoting shows when he was just 18 years old before owning and running his own venue in Joliet called Mojoes, which was the predecessor to what is now The Forge. Currently, Triebes has been running the new state-of-the-art venue WC Social Club in West Chicago (at the junction of Roosevelt Road and Route 59) for four months before Covid-19 started (November 2019). In hindsight, it was probably not the best possible time to open a concert venue.
“It’s been a bit of a rocky road,” Triebes admits during a recent phone interview. “But we’ve gotten through Covid-19, and I’m proud to say now I am just working on building this room up, getting the word out, and letting people know about it. It’s a great space in the suburbs and extremely convenient.”
The WC Social Club is a bar/restaurant/concert venue with flexible and comfortable space. Some upcoming highlight events at WC include the reggae legends, The Original Wailers (Bob Marley’s band) on August 6, alt-rock stalwarts Nashville’s Framing Hanley on August 26 (“Hear Me Now”), and horror punk/metal greats Wednesday 13 on their 20th anniversary Fear Part 2 tour on Oct 12.
King Iso on stage at WC Social Club, June, 2022.
Triebes also owns another venue in Indianapolis and also promotes shows in Ohio, Michigan, Iowa, Minnesota, and Kentucky.
Although Triebes has no formal business degree or financial training, he’s learned the ropes of the concert scene throughout the years on his own. Confined to a wheelchair, Triebes has spinal muscular atrophy type three — a neuromuscular disease. Triebes was recently featured in a docuseries called Born for Business about disabled entrepreneurs, the same production company that produced shows such as the Kardashians and Project Runway.
Since Chicago is blessed as being a great musical city, it means a lot to Triebes to be able to bring quality acts to his venue. Of course, as a businessman, Triebes usually looks to at least break even on these events or even make a profit. But his ultimate goal as a labor of love is to create a sense of community. “Promoting concerts is a lot more than just a job,” Triebes confesses. “I think it’s necessary and extremely important for the function in society to put on live events, particularly music. I think there’s nothing quite like live music that just gives a lot of people a place (to gather). So, I consider it an honor to be able to put on concerts for my community and find it a really important function of my community. I find it an amazing and fun career choice to be able to do that for a living, something I love. To give artists a chance to create a culture and then have a stage through which they can convey that. I think that that’s really vital to a successful society.”
Local venues such as Double Door, The Forge, Reggie’s, and other area concert venues have been staples in this city for many years. With a new venue to cater to the suburbs, Triebes doesn’t see these other well-established venues as direct competition but rather as part of the same team that can bring great acts to the area.
“Within music, you’re always going to have your competitive forces,” he says. “But at the end of the day, I think what we all strive to do as a community is to just bring a ton of great talent on offer to Chicago. I think we’re all just proud to be a part of such a robust entertainment culture and market like this.”
WC prides itself on being a diverse entertainment facility boasting a diverse calendar that provides entertainment for everyone possible.
“I just want people to know that there’s a good solid place to check out and see concerts,” Triebes concludes. “I look at WC as just another place in this area that’s going to bring even more talent. I have a particular focus on certain kinds of talent, and I think that I can bring my own unique flavor to the suburbs. I also think we’re the most central and most convenient venue I’ve ever seen in this area.”
-Kelley Simms
