This location is the current home home of iO West (previously known as the Improv Olympic West). Affiliated with the iO Chicago (which was previously known as Improv Olympic Theatre), the iO method is to treat improvisation as its own art form, rather than the as a form of sketch comedy.

iO West has three theaters, daily performances, and classes for those interested in taking up improv.

Chris Farley's Hollywood star (#2,289) is outside this theater- a fitting tribute since he honed his skills at the Improv Olympic Theatre in Chicago.

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The Village Studio has recorded several artists, bands, soundtracks and voiceovers (partial list here) since its founding in 1968.

Originally built as a Masonic Temple in 1922, the building was converted into a center for Transcendental Meditation by Maharishi Mahesh Yogi in the mid 60's. In 1968, the building was reinvented as The Village Studio by Geordie Hormel.

Some of the albums recorded here include Aja by Steely Dan, Joe's Garage by Frank Zappa, and Planet Waves by Bob Dylan.

On Jim Morrison's birthday on December 8, 1970, he rented this studio for several hours to record his poetry. Portions of this session were used in the 1979 release, An American Prayer.

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This was the former location of Elektra Sound Recorders Studio.

The Doors recorded the albums Morrison Hotel and The Soft Parade here.

From May 11-25, 1970, the Stooges recorded the tracks for Fun House here. The first day consisted of sound checking and run-throughs of the songs prepared. The entire band used headphones with the bass and drums isolated by baffles while Iggy Pop sang his vocals through a condensor microphone on a boom.

The band hated the way it sounded, stripped the studio of its attire, gave Iggy a hand-held microphone, and put the guitar and bass amps by each other to create a sound similar to their live shows.

The studio is still a recording facility and is now named Discovery Studios.

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In 1979's Roger Corman B-movie Rock 'n' Roll High School, exteriors of the Rockatorium, where Riff camps out for tickets and the Ramones arrive in their pink Cadillac, were shot at the Mayan Theatre in Los Angeles. The Ramones concert itself was filmed at the Roxy Theatre on Sunset Strip in Hollywood.

The Mayan opened in 1927 and first showed live musicals, then movies, then in the 1940s it was a burlesque house, back to movies in the 1950s, was a porn theatre in the 1970s and is now a nightclub. You can also see the Mayan, inside and out, in The Bodyguard starring Kevin Costner.

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If you guessed that Vince Lombardi High School from the Roger Corman-produced Rock 'n' Roll High School was in Wisconsin, you would be wrong, since it doesn't exist. The movie was filmed at the Mount Carmel High School in Los Angeles, an all boys Catholic high school that had been closed for several years by the time the movie came out in 1979. This is the former site of the school. I don't know if there is any truth to the rumors that the explosion at the end was part of the building's demolition. I believe the building was actually demolished around '82 or '83.

Todd Rundgren, Cheap Trick and Tom Petty were supposedly all considered for the movie before the Ramones got the part.

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