Monday Night Video Is Eulogistic
John at Crooks & Liars posted a Ramones vid tonight to mark the closing of CBGB’s.
Roy Edroso has a narrative of his foundational CBGB’s moment, in 1977.
Wolcott’s is here.
I came along later, and remember it more like this:
That girl in the red shirt was always doing that. I used to know her name, but we Jersey kids stayed a bit aloof from the nyXhc social scene, such that we had our own designated hangout area across the street from CBGB’s.
Here I must mention the great bottle-rocket battle of ’83, in which New Jersey and New York traded fire from hardened Dumpster-positions across the mock Hudson of The Bowery. The exchange was inconclusive and resumed at A7, where Jersey forces made use of the terrain, gathering in the shadows of Tompkins Square Park, and bottle-rocketed the shit out of the silly New York punks across 7th Street who totally didn’t see it coming.
Fear teh power, New York cobagz1!!!11
That is PUNK.
I really missed out on my greatest opportunity to frequent CBGB’s, and it woulda been a helluva time to do it, too: the early ’80s. I was going to school in ‘Jersey, so NYC was a natural entertainment destination. A certain subset of my fellow students were punks, but I didn’t get on too well with them. So, no live Blondie or Richard Hell for me. I was kinda timid back then. At the time, the drinking age in NY and NJ was 19, so I was old enough to get into gay bars down in the Village. And, being a studious little kweer, I certainly knew where all that stuff was, even though I didn’t know where the gay parts of Chicago were at the time (it was in the midst of migrating out of Old Town to the more Northerly environs of Boy’s Town [vicinity of Halstead and Addison], though in recent years, it seems to be shifting away again. But, back to ’80s NYC, I was too intimidated to go in to any of the bars. It was very novel to walk around an area where the gay population probably outnumbered the straights, to see actual walking hand-in-hand and other overt public displays of affection. One of the reasons I was intimidated was that there were groups of men hanging out in front of some of the bars, and these tended to be leatherboys and guys in military drag. It all looked a little rough for me (yeah, yeah–times change). So, I wound up missing out on all that as well. Finally got to do a bit of bar hopping in 2000, when I was seeing a guy who lived in DC and shortly after new year’s he got a bee in his bonnet to take a road trip up to NY. The places we hit were much
yuppierguppier than I remembered. Ah, well… if I had it all to do over again, I’d be bolder.Well, any Talking Heads fan has been expecting CBGB to close now that we’re at war . . .
“This ain’t no party, this ain’t no disco
this ain’t no fooling around
This ain’t no mudd club, or C. B. G. B.
I ain’t got time for that now”
was the Jersey HQ where Manahatta is now? That place is teh ghey.
Place was a dump, stage was too small. I imagine lots of famous folks did things elsewhere too.
I had friends play there a few times but it was always late on a monday or tuesday night.
They were really open to letting those with passion and a little talent if not skill on stage.
I did get to see JSBX play there.
They didn’t let you in the bar so you shot rockets at them? That’s terrorism.
They didn’t let you in the bar so you shot rockets at them?
Yes, that’s a narrative that has several nouns in common with the actual story as related.
Another might be, ‘We didn’t let them shoot the bar at them, so you let you into rockets.’
My sentence structure displeases you?
Cuz my sentence kind of sums up your life, don’t it, Gavin?
It leaves out the end, where I spend the rest of my days cackling while lounging on a pile of jewel-encrusted skulls.
Annie, I realize that expecting much reading comprehension from you is stupid, but go read the story again.
….
Done? Ok, this time, did you notice that there is no mention of not being allowed in a bar?
If my sentence structure displeases you, try this one: Punks shoot bottle rockets at each other for fun, while entering a bar only requires the cover charge.
The bit about terrorism is just too damn stupid to talk about, however.
wow, i consider it a bit of a strech to go from a comical joke about an iconic venue, to assertions that someone is wrongly living their life…
Jewels? Shiny ones?
Ahhhhh, jersey kids.
If it hadn’t been taken down, I’d link to an ep of the state on youtube starting off with the setting of a new world record for standing in front of CBGB’s smoking cigs.
Why do the yuppies have to take the east village and lower east side, too?
We gave them everything above 14th, that should have been enough.
Mmmmm….skulls….
The decline of quality….mmmmmmmm…….
annie, annie, annie,
I love you as I love all my children.
But please shut up.
You are helping Satan by making Christians look stupid and intolerant and, worst of all, humorless.
You are not nearly as bad as the majority of fundamentalists and creationists who do Satan’s bidding, but every little bit hurts.
Jesus loves all of his children. But some of the people who act and speak most loudly in my name make it really hard.
annie made the baby jesus cry.
Knock knock!
You know, I think I’d put more stock in organized religion if more deities took a more active role in explaining to their followers when they’re making asses of themselves. Allah, Jesus, Buddha, L. Ron Hubbard, whomever…”Look, my child, I know you mean well, but really…you’ve missed the entire point and, what’s more, you’re making me look bad.”
But what do we get? Pat Robertson, Jerry Falwell, Osama bin Laden, all those extremely wound-tight mullah characters…living a ripe old age and far too many in the lap of luxury. Maybe Billy Joel was right, or maybe, if there is indeed order to the Universe and a meaning behind life, we haven’t found the right deity yet. Wouldn’t that be a helluva note.
And on-topic, I find it a bit amusing the number of heartfelt tributes to CBGB’s amongst the blogerati. Just how punk rock is nostalgia, anyway?
Hey babe, remember that day, in 1976ixix, when London-town was boring, until along came this!!!!
Nostalgia beats the minimal effort of writing new punk songs, always has.
Take Sadly, No! Add annieangel and whaddaya get? A Superfund Site…
mikey
Bad Brains, punk as fuck.
HR could lay it down. and that drummer was the shit.
why then, Annie/dear lord, did they let ocasek record the first album?
I dunno, why? Is this a joke? Were they Polish “they?”
The pics need more smoke.
And what PiPu(NK0)2 said.
It’s true, you know? Then again, I have been known to lie. Only, I’m not this time, just to fuck with you. Hee hee! (Damn my laugh! Oops–too late!)
Cheers, for now–I’ve got to go coax Curt Weldon into saying something stupid. Shouldn’t take long.
I met Tuli Kupferberg at CBs when I was 16 or so.
(And I’m also from NJ — oi! oi! oi!)
Buzzcocks:
I bet that you love me like I love you
But I should know that gambling just don’t pay
So I look up to the sky
And I wonder what it’ll be like in days gone by
As I sit and bathe in the wave of nostalgia for an age yet to come
I always used to dream of the past
But like they say yesterday never comes
Sometimes there’s a song in my brain
And I feel that my heart knows the refrain
I guess it’s just the music that brings on nostalgia for an age yet to come
Ah nostalgia for an age yet to come
Nostalgia for an age yet to come
About the future I only can reminisce
For what I’ve had is what I’ll never get
And although this may sound strange
My future and my past are presently disarranged
And I’m surfing on a wave of nostalgia for an age yet to come
I look I only see what I don’t know
All that was strong invincible is slain
Takes more than sunshine to make everything fine
And I feel like I’m trapped in the middle of time
With this constant feeling of nostalgia for an age yet to come
Ah nostalgia for an age yet to come
About the future I only can reminisce
For what I’ve had is what I’ll never get
And although this may sound strange
My future and my past are presently disarranged
And I’m surfing on a wave of nostalgia for an age yet to come
I look I only see what I don’t know
All that was strong invincible is slain
Takes more than sunshine to make everything fine
And I feel like I’m caught in the middle of time
And this constant feeling of nostalgia for an age yet to come
Ah nostalgia for an age yet to come
Nostalgia for an age yet to come
Nostalgia for an age yet to come