A long-lasting love for music took a young man’s dream and made it into a 18-year career and business venture named in his daughter’s honor. Rolla native Jesse Garcia was a self-proclaimed “military brat” who, like other children of parents in the armed forces, spent most of his early years moving across America. These years would serve to be the most crucial in his development as a musician because of the exposure to the music of different cultures across the country.

Now, Garcia is determined to unite various music platforms under one roof, and with prior knowledge, he’s confident Roxy’s can find a comfortable place among other established music venues in Columbia.

“If you’ve been working in an industry long enough, you have a leg up on how things should operate,” Garcia says. “I’ve been lucky enough to work with some great talents in the music venue world.”

Throughout the years, Garcia has seen great businesses flourish and inferior businesses come and go. Learning from other people’s successes and mistakes gives him the confidence to make something successful on his own, he says. Specifically, it was the time spent working with The Blue Note owner Richard King for more than four years that makes him believe it is possible to establish a venue that appeals to all demographics.

“It’s a blue-collar music venue with a wide array of talent, but we always strive to provide a slightly more sophisticated feel and at the same time offering blue-collar prices,” Garcia says.

The atmosphere at Roxy’s is very similar to Sideshow, Garcia’s old music venue. Aside from a change in location and name, the only other big change is exposing Columbia to various types of music. DJs from all over the country take the stage on Wednesdays and Saturdays while local and national talent fill out the rest of the week’s schedule.

“We modeled what we did with Roxy’s off of what we thought was missing in Columbia’s music scene,” Garcia says. “We saw a niche.”

When Garcia worked for the club Shattered in the 1980s, he witnessed the building of a niche that offered both a music venue and a neighborhood bar. In a town filled with sports-crazed college students, Shattered became a fortress for people just looking for a night out on the town and away from the sports bars. During the same time, Mojo’s and The Blue Note offered premier talent, but the people with not-so-deep pockets often found themselves at Shattered enjoying the local and regional talent.

“I try to be eclectic as I can be,” Garcia says. “I’ve entertained so many different kinds of bands from rock and folk, jazz and blues to punk and metal.”

Where there is major competition, individuality is a means of survival. One way Garcia hopes to be a strong contender is by creating different house and specialty drinks that reflect well on the type of business he is running.

“You’ll be able to get the drink that you want, but we also have some great bartenders with our recipes that we created that can vary night to night,” Garcia says.

Holding benefit concerts for local charities is Garcia’s way of giving back to a community that has been good to him over the years. Recently he’s worked with the Dream Factory and is going to continue to support the local high school competition Battle of the Bands at Roxy’s.

Garcia is on to greener pastures, where he believes Roxy’s has better soil to grow.