BoondoxXx BBQ & Juke Joint

What happened after

Renamed 'The Pit & Barrel' after its (unintentionally-aired) Nov 2013 Bar Rescue episode. Two months after the episode, owner Chris Ferrell fatally shot country musician Wayne Mills at the venue (Nov 23, 2013). The building was demolished by July 2016.

Closure date on record: 2016-07

What happened on the show

This was the rare Bar Rescue episode overtaken by real-world tragedy. BoondoxXx BBQ and Juke Joint in Nashville was run by a self-described country-music snob with an explosive personality who had turned to Taffer for help, and the makeover reopened the room as The Pit and Barrel. But on the day the episode was set to air, owner Chris Ferrell was arrested over the fatal shooting of country singer Wayne Mills after an argument at the venue. The network, then Spike, pulled the 9 p.m. broadcast and ran a rerun in its place, only for an oversight to let the intended midnight encore air as scheduled, drawing complaints from viewers who caught it. The on-show story of an eruptive owner and a barbecue rebrand was, by the time it reached screens, inseparable from the killing that had happened at the bar two months earlier.

After the cameras left

BoondoxXx and its Pit and Barrel rebrand did not survive the fallout. The venue closed, and the building itself was demolished by July 2016. Saving Country Music, an established independent music-industry outlet, tracked the aftermath and the teardown, with Nashville Scene also covering the case, putting the closure at high confidence. Owner Chris Ferrell's arrest for the fatal shooting of Wayne Mills, which took place at the bar in November 2013, defined the venue's end far more than anything the rescue changed.