When Jason Perkins, managing partner at Parish Entertainment Group, which owns Brick & Mortar and The New Parish, concluded that the management of a San Francisco Travelodge refused a band whose rooms he had booked lodging booked because they were black, it was the band itself — namely, The Meters’s founder and guitarist Leo Nocentelli — who consoled him. We spoke to Perkins on Friday night, still in a state of shock about what had happened.
Nocentelli (a 2013 Rock and Roll Hall of Fame nominee), Bill Dickens (Stevie Wonder’s bass player), and session drummer Felix “D-Kat” Pollard were allegedly refused lodging at the Travelodge Central in the Mission District on Thursday, Oct. 18, after they tried to check in post-soundcheck at nearby Brick & Mortar.
The Meters’s founder and guitarist Leo Nocentelli, who was refused lodging at an SF Travelodge for being black A post about the incident on The New Parish’s Facebook page resulted in 200+ comments
“Leo called me and said ‘they won’t let me check in,'” said Perkins.
