How Scout Smissen, a former lead singer used her experience to create an inclusive venue in Bellingham

By: Milo Whitman

Scout Smissen was the lead singer in a house show band for two years. She loved the punk rock atmosphere that surrounded the house show scene, but she started noticing issues with the culture that were more apparent from her perspective as a woman. During sound checks, she consistently wouldn’t be able to hear herself. When she asked to be turned up, she’d be met with reluctance. She once heard a man in charge of sound say, “what a diva,” under his breath after her request. After performances, audience members would approach her and say, “you’re actually not that bad,” as if they were surprised, then turn to her male bandmates and say, “you’re so talented.”

“If that was my experience as a cisgendered white woman, I literally could not imagine what it would have been like for any other marginalized individual who was just trying to make their way into the scene,” Smissen said. As she encountered these sexist insults, she began to wonder if a venue specifically for femme, queer and BIPOC musicians was possible. As Smissen has found with her living-room-turned-venue, Garden Palace, “It absolutely was.”

In July 2023, Smissen and her bandmates decided to take a break from performing because of scheduling conflicts that were becoming more common with school and work. Weeks after, she threw her first show in her living room. Over a year later, Garden Palace has succeeded in its aim: Amplifying the voices of musicians who often don’t get equal opportunities in the male-dominated house show scene.

Smissen’s living room is dimly lit by warm yellow lamps and candles. The smell of honey rose incense fills the air. Art drawn by her father, grandmother, friends and Smissen line the walls. Worn books are stacked on shelves around the room. A guitar and ukulele are nestled in a corner. The room has high ceilings that create a false sense of space. For most house shows, this lack of space would be a problem, but the limited seating is conducive to one of Garden Palace’s biggest draws: The relationship between the musician and audience is closer and more casual than most house shows because the audience is capped at 25. When at capacity, little room is left. The couches and chairs seat 10, leaving 15 people to choose between standing or taking a seat on the rug that sits only feet from the musicians. Many attendees prefer the latter option – rarely do they get to sit so close to the music.

“I think Garden Palace has built itself a really wonderful reputation of being really intimate and vulnerable,” Smissen said. “Because it still has the label of a house show, people who have never been here before don’t know anything about what it is here. Their interpretation is that it’s like a crazy, wild, typical house [show] setting.”

She does not charge attendees at the door. She takes a unique approach to paying artists by requiring that attendees pay the musicians directly through Venmo. She doesn’t typically have an issue with getting the audience to pay the musicians, but occasionally she will have to raise her warm, welcoming voice to a more assertive tone to remind the audience to give the musicians payment, even if it’s only a few dollars. Smissen accepts donations for hosting, but if it’s between her or the musicians, she’d rather it goes their way. 

Gabe Sodl, a guitarist in the Bellingham band Jennifer What, performed a show at Garden Palace in February with one of his bandmates Kellen Murphy. The two rearranged some of their band’s songs into acoustic renditions to fit the venue’s quiet atmosphere. The band typically plays at more “rowdy” house shows, which require their playing to be louder and more hardcore. 

Playing at other house shows can feel procedural and rushed, Sodl said. He feels like he has to get ready, play and get offstage quickly, but at Garden Palace “it’s nice to just sit back and it’s very relaxed. You’re equal with the audience.”

Sodl recalls a chain of events from his February show that ended with his hair catching on fire while performing. Halfway through their set, Sodl and Murphy had just begun playing a cover of “My Life in Art” by Mojave 3 when a Bluetooth speaker in another room loudly and unexpectedly announced a device had been disconnected. Laughs broke out in the audience as Smissen rushed to mute the speaker. She apologized several times and obviously felt bad about the interruption, urging the musicians to restart. Sodl was unbothered by the delay and had a laugh himself. After a minute of joking with the audience, Sodl readjusted his guitar’s capo and moved his seat. As he leaned back in his chair, he unknowingly dipped a lock of his long, wavy hair into a lit candle sitting on the TV stand behind him.

“Your hair’s on fire!” an audience member shouted. Sodl quickly swatted the brown, burning lock, pinning it to his neck as if there were a bug creeping up it. The flame was extinguished. The audience broke into laughs once again. Sodl breathed a sigh of relief when he realized his hair was unscathed. Sodl made a point of scooting his chair forward, away from the candle, before he and Murphy played the rest of their set smoothly. Sodl looks back on the event in high spirits. Weirdly enough, Sodl’s grandmother caught her hair on fire during her 70th birthday party. After his performance at Garden Palace, he called his mom to tell her he had “pulled a ‘grandma.’” 

“You can't really get upset at it, because, looking at it from an audience member's perspective, if I was seeing a band and some guy's hair caught on fire for a second, it's never going to not be funny, you know?” Sodl said. “It's fine to laugh at yourself and just be like, ‘Oh, my gosh, I can't believe that just happened.’”

Ramya Rajasekhar, who goes by the stage name Girl Parallel, is a Bellingham musician who performed her debut show at Garden Palace in July 2023. 

“[I’m] grateful to have a safe space to start out as an artist of color,” Rajasekhar said. “Welcoming spaces for people like me is something that I’m really grateful for.”

Rajasekhar has since played at bigger venues such as The Blue Room and Karate Church.

“I think it’s really important to have these kinds of specific dedicated spaces for queer and BIPOC musicians. Because, I mean, there's no getting around the fact that it is a pretty white-dominated space here,” Rajasekhar explained. “A lot of musicians of color and queer musicians aren't really getting access to the kinds of opportunities that their white, Caucasian counterparts are.”

When Smissen named her venue, she didn’t know it would be as successful as it has been, nor did she know that a rent increase would cause her to move from her place on Garden Street. Although Smissen is moving to Humboldt Street in Bellingham this fall, she plans to keep hosting shows using the name Garden Palace.

Last winter, Smissen began extending her venue’s influence to host art markets, virtual shows and “femme nights-in,” for anyone who identifies as feminine on the spectrum. These additional shows give her more opportunities to create safe spaces for femme, queer and BIPOC artists. Upcoming events and updates can be found on the Garden Palace Instagram. 

“Spaces like [Garden Palace] are crucial so we can feel comfortable,” Rajasekhar said. “I don’t think I would have felt comfortable putting myself out there in the Bellingham music scene if it weren’t for Garden Palace.”