I know it's going to sound like a big pile of horse hockey, but I was standing right behind the guy who filmed the above footage. My colleague-in-noise, Drew convinced me to go see Pissed Jeans and the Eddie Current Suppression Ring at the Cake Shop on Ludlow Street last Friday. I'd initially written off the former given their indefensibly dumb name and the fact that they rather shamelessly rip off the Jesus Lizard. That all said, though, they put on a riotously good show. For those who've never been, Cake Shop with a capacity crowd (as it was that night) makes the interior of old CBGB seem as expansive as Grand Central Station. It was a total sweat lodge. I believe I dropped about fifteen pounds. Anyway, below are a couple of the blurry shots I squeezed off, my fingers slick with beer & sweat.
An old colleague of mine posted this article from a transplanted Italian expat named Andrew Z. Giacalone on Facebook today, titled "10 Reasons to Hate New York." Personally speaking, I didn't find it especially insightful, given that virtually all ten of his points could easily be leveled at practically every major city on the planet (so, why don't you fuck right off back to Palermo, Andrew?) As a follow-up, another friend posted a way wittier rumination on same from a "Shouts & Murmurs" in a relatively recent issue The New Yorker. Anyway, thought you'd be amused.
ADDENDUM: This just in. I just heard from the mercifully good-humored Andrew Z Giacalone himself, and he graciously pointed out that he is actually a native New Yorker. There ya go.
The above legend is not, alas, from here in NYC. This photo was snapped by a fellow Gatherer named Eve on a wall in her native England, but I believe the message is as applicable & relevant here as it is there.
Many probably consider 1982 to be a golden year in music. There were indeed some great singles that year, ranging from Soft Cell's now iconic cover of "Tainted Love" and the Human League's breakout anthem, "Don't You Want Me" through Frank Zappa's wry "Valley Girl" and Queen & David Bowie's "Under Pressure." Under the mainstream pop radar, meanwhile, some amazing records were being released as well, notably the original ROIR cassette by Bad Brains, The Record by Fear, If I Die, I Die.. by the Virgin Prunes, Number of the Beast by Iron Maiden, Wild in the Streets by the Circle Jerks, Black Metal by Venom, Under the Big Black Sun by X, the Skins, Brains & Guts e.p. by 7Seconds and the eponymous debut by The Lords of the New Church (to name but a tiny few of my favorites). It was a great time to be a young, music-obsessed teen.
But not every record that came out that year was gold. A prime example of this was "Don't Put Another Dime in the Jukebox" by a trashy, prefabricated pop trio called The Flirts. Essentially a callow rip-off of the vastly superior Go-Gos, the Flirts made a couple of cloying little singles before fading into justifiable oblivion. "Don't Put Another..." was their "big single," though, and I abhorred it as much then as I do today. So why I am bothering to bring it up now? Well, I happened on the video on YouTube this evening, and marveled at its images of the downtown New York City of the era. Manhattan record store die-hards will doubtlessly recognize the House of Oldies on Carmine Street, where the Flirt ladies are depicted vengefully pawning their philandering pretty boy's vinyl 45s. Ladies, he may indeed have been a greasy, unfaithful scumbag, but selling the man's singles? That's some cold shit.
I'm not entirely sure of the pizzeria the girls are seen walking by a few times. Also on Carmine Street? I can't tell, but it's invariably gone today. Anyway, as lame as the song and the sentiments may be, turn the sound down and enjoy a fleeting taste of downtown NYC circa 1982.
Inspired by EV Grieve's recent entry featuring a picture of Avenue A in 1990, I simply typed "NYC 1990" into the search field on Flickr (once again) and uncovered yet another great collection. In a set titled "New York 1990 & 2003," one Analog Berliner captures a clutch of images of the great C of NY that are in many instances nigh on unrecognizable to their contemporary incarnations (as typified by the above Soho image and a couple of pictures of Astor Place from well before that horrible, priapic condo was erected ). Click on over to check'em out.
Hey there, y'all. A big happy Father's Day to all my fellow dads out there. Under normal circumstances -- being a big music geek -- I like to post a holiday-suitable song here (as I slavishly beat the joke of posting Danzig's "Mother" into the ground every Mother's Day). In any event, the only "dad"-centric songs that come to mind are invariably songs about absentee fathers (Jane's Addiction's "Had a Dad"), brutal abuse (NoMeansNo's harrowing "Dad") and bitter, repressed teenage resentment ("Gimme the Car" by the Violent Femmes, "My Dad Sucks" by the Descendents). None of them seem really that appropriate, under the circumstances. So, herewith a quick little rumination from Dennis Leary on fatherhood. Enjoy. Happy Father's Day. Give your old man a call.
It occurred to me while watching those fab high definition time lapse videos how friggin' lame Times Square is. Let's review, shall we?
It's endlessly lionized in movies, television shows and countless, formulaic hip hop videos, but when was the last time you voluntarily set foot in Times Square? I'm a native New Yorker of forty-two years and I have YET to meet a fellow lifer that can actively stand the place. In fact, I don't know a single Manhattanite that spends any time there unless they absolutely, positively have to under pain of death. When I fleetingly worked at MTV News Online a few years back at 1515 Broaday (right in the veritable crotch of Times Square), having to claw my way in and out of the teeming ant heap twice a day was easily the toughest part of the gig (well, that and the whole getting unceremoniously laid off part). It's a bitch to move through (even with the re-designed plazas). It's lousy with slow-moving human cattle. It's a garish eyesore of retina-immolating advertisements and cheap-ass touristy shit. Honestly speaking, what can you get in Times Square that you cannot find in practically every shitty mall across the damn country (other than a whopping great headache)?
Sure, we all remember the endearingly gritty Times Square the way it used to be. I remember watching the fabled cable access porn program, "Midnight Blue" on channel J as a youth and seeing scary images of Times Square and "the Deuce" (the old nickname for 42nd Street) when it was a roiling hotbed of cheap smut, drugs and prostitution. But even when I got older, I never harbored any desire to stroll on Times Square's byways. Maybe it was the "center of it all," but big whoop. There was nothing there for me that I couldn't find elsewhere in the city for a fraction of the hassle.
The Times Square of "Taxi Driver" and "Midnight Cowboy" is long gone, of course. Hell, even the Times Square depicted in Hall & Oates' "One on One" video is gone. All that's left now is a squeaky clean approximation of what residents of the Midwest think New York City is all about, when the truth of the matter is that as it stands now, there is positively nothing inherently "New York" about Times Square. Want to celebrate New York City? Great, but next time, let's focus on another location, shall we?
Alright, I'm totally ripping off Gothamist with this, but it was too cool to not re-post (cheezy soundtrack notwithstanding). And since Gothamist posted part one, I figured I'd post part two. Check out this high definition time-lapse of NYC. To see part one, click here (which Gothamist took from here). Please enjoy.
There's a curious scene in Jim Jarmusch's "Mystery Train" wherein one of the youthful Japanese tourists visiting Memphis takes pictures of seemingly banal elements in his hotel room. When his traveling companion asks why, he remarks that while he'll probably always remember his visit to Graceland and Sun Studios, it's the little things (i.e. the seemingly meritless minutia of his hotel room's bathroom fixtures) that he'll invariably forget, hence his need to preserve them in pictures.
While I'm not quite as obsessive as that character, you may remember a melancholy little post of mine from last week about my never-ending quest for pictorial documentation of since-vanished things like quasi-notable landmarks or age-old storefronts. It may seem bizarre to some why I'd ever need a picture of such things, but for some people, those images have resonance. To my delight, a reader named Douglas Manchee wrote in to express a similar fascination. Doug routinely photographs the vanishing ranks of independent book stores. That's his image at the top of this post of the since-closed Skyline Bookshop that stood for many years on West 18th Street. Check out the rest of Doug's great photos by clicking right here.
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