The Zoo Bar on 14th Street is the most important blues venue in the Great Plains — a dark, narrow room with a stage barely large enough for a quartet, where the music has been going six nights a week since 1973. The walls are layered with photographs of performers who have played here over fifty years, and the list reads like a roll call of American blues: Junior Wells, Muddy Waters, Koko Taylor, Bobby Blue Bland. National acts still tour through regularly.
The bar is small and gets crowded, which is half the point. The cover charge is modest, the beer is cold, and the sound system is surprisingly good for the room's size. Live music starts most nights around 9 or 10. If you are in Lincoln on a weekend, checking what's on at the Zoo Bar should be among the first things you do.