In business as he was in music
By 
Third-rate faux-country singer/songwriter and lynching advocate Toby Keith died yesterday, and whether apocryphal or not this story is certainly true in essence.
His passing did make me realize that the huge Keith-themed restaurant that was attached to one of the rundown mid-strip walkthrough casinos in Vegas no longer seemed to exist. I was curious about whether the chain itself was a thing anymore, and…turns out he put his name on what was essentially a massive grift:
Toby Keith’s I Love This Bar and Grill has generated a country song’s worth of grief in cities nationwide — along with nearly $30 million in lawsuits, liens, judgments and accusations of unscrupulous business practices against a Phoenix-based restaurant chain.
Boomtown Entertainment is accused in lawsuits of taking millions of dollars from mall owners and developers to build new locations and then walking away with the money, often leaving projects unfinished.
Boomtown closed most of its restaurants this year amid allegations that it stiffed landlords, contractors and suppliers, as well as racked up hundreds of thousands of dollars in liens for failing to pay sales taxes.
An Arizona Republic investigation found Boomtown recently accelerated its restaurant closures, shutting down 10 since May with little or no warning to employees and customers. All told, Boomtown has closed 17 of its 20 Toby Keith restaurants in the past 18 months, including three in metro Phoenix and one in Tucson.
Sounds about right!
The chain is down to locations in one state, and that state should not be surprising.