In this wake of this post, this pairing seemed like a no brainer.
East 14th Street between Irving Place and 3rd Avenue, 1988:
East 14th Street between Irving Place and 3rd Avenue, 2010:
Of course, beyond being a location in the afore-cited "Bright Lights, Big City" - as well as the unfortunate host of MTV's abortive dance program, "Club MTV" - The Palladium had a long history. Initially called the Academy of Music, the building always had an affiliation with live music. It opened as a concert venue in the early 70's and was rechristened as the Palladium in 1976. In its run as same, it hosted a slew of notable acts. Arguably its most fabled moment was as the site of what became the cover shot of The Clash's seminal London Calling.
My first trip inside the building was in 1982 to see Devo perform on the Oh No! It's Devo tour. If you think the street looks gritty in that shot from "Bright Lights..." above, you should've seen it then. The venue was turned into the prototypical 80s megaclub in 1985. In the wake of that transformation, I did go back for the odd show. I saw Public Image Ltd. there on the tour for the Bill Laswell-produced, Album (their opening number was a vocal-free cover of "Kashmir" by Led Zeppelin). I saw Digital Underground (with Tupac) and the 2 Live Crew there in 1990. Probably my favorite ever show there was Cop Shoot Cop and the Unsane opening for Foetus, which was lovably loud and endearingly ugly.
The era of the big club came and went and the Palladium closed its doors in 1999, later to meet with a wrecking ball. For a little while, it was a vacant lot before N.Y.U. erected a massive dormitory in its footprint (see below)
Whenever I walk down that strip of 14th street, I still catch myself looking up to search for the massive mural that used to adorn the edifice. I miss that.
Sad news this morning: Peter "Sleazy" Christopherson of Flaming Pablum favorites COIL, Psychic TV and Throbbing Gristle passed away in his sleep yesterday. Go put on a copy of Horse Rotorvator and wake the neighbors up.
It’s Thanksgiving Eve, so to speak. Tomorrow morning, we’re bound for my mom’s place out on the Island of Length. We’re travelling via the Hampton Jitney, which promises to be (more of) a massive headache for all parties concerned (than usual), but whatever – welcome to the holidays. In any case, I’ll post again in the next few days, but in the interim, please have a safe and happy Thanksgiving!
Below is a telling example of the ridiculously inane trivia that seemingly rules my ever waking hour.
People constantly dump on MTV, myself included (although, having fleetingly worked there a few years back, I may have more reason than most). But back in the day, as the hip kids say, MTV had a few things to recommend it (y’know … way back when they actually played music). When I was a sullen teen, MTV may not have been playing videos by my favorites at the time like The Misfits, Black Flag or the Circle Jerks*, but the channel did introduce me to the odd band here and there that I might have been hard pressed to discover on my own. One such outfit was Los Angeles’ Wall of Voodoo.
Mention their name to anyone in their late 30’s/early 40’s now, and the reply is almost an immediate given: “Mexican Radio.” That breakout single by the willfully bizarre, artsy band catapulted them out of the L.A. punk scene and into fleeting fame almost overnight. The strikingly strange visuals of the video clip (an iguana on a spit, a pinata filled with lizards, a face submerged in refried beans, etc.) matched the uncompromising oddness of their music perfectly, and the combined elements left an indelible impression on viewers of the era. I was no exception. I loved it.
Captivated by the endearing wrongness of the band, I immediately went out in search of all the Wall of Voodoo records I could get my hands on. Along with the obligatory copy of Call of the West (the album from whence “Mexican Radio” sprang), I picked up a copy of the ominous Wall of Voodoo e.p. and the 12” single of “Mexican Radio” (appended with a suitably strangle b-side called “There Is Nothing On This Side”). While a few of the tracks on the Wall of Voodoo e.p. were endearingly weird to the point of unsettling, the most markedly strange thing about these records was the sleeve art to the “Mexican Radio” e.p. Featuring a creepy collection of rotting doll heads impaled on wooden stakes in what looks like a murky peat bog, the image seemed entirely incongruous to … well… anything. I remember my mom finding it on the coffee table in the living room one summer afternoon and being actively put off by it (not that I could really blame her). Adding to the eeriness, there was absolutely no explanation as to what the image meant or why they chose it to grace their sleeve.
In time, Wall of Voodoo slid back out of the limelight, but continued to make excellent music. Lead singer Standard Ridgway departed the ranks to pursue and equally excellent solo career (my favorite moments being his collaboration with Stewart Copeland, “Don’t Box Me In” and the rifftastic “Drive She Said.”) Wall of Voodoo filled his big shoes with San Francisco’s Andy Prieboy, who did an admirable job before the band broke up for good. Prieboy went onto to release a series of truly awesome and sorely undersung solo records that you should all go seek out. The legacy of Wall of Voodoo seems now sadly relegated to being a “one hit wonder,” to most people’s minds.
So, why, exactly, am I discussing any of this in November 2010??
Well, yesterday, when I was perusing Salon.com, I came across a compelling gallery called Fascinating Urban Mysteries, Explained. Sure enough, four slides in, I discovered their item on the Isla de las Muñecas. Evidently, on the canal of Xochimilco near Mexico City, there’s this bizarre little sanctuary populated by “dolls – in varying states of decay, disarray and dismemberment – tied to trees.” Want to creep yourself out? Do a Google image search for “Isla de las Muñecas” and check it out. Given its geographical location (Mexico, duh!), I guessing that this strange, far-flung little plot of weirdness is the source of the image on the sleeve of “Mexican Radio.” Mystery solved.
*To be entirely fair, hardcore-wise, MTV did occasionally play clips by Kraut (the gloriously low-budget “All Twisted”), the Cro-Mags (I remember seeing “We Gotta Know” on “Headbangers’ Ball”) and the perennial classic, “Institutionalized” by Suicidal Tendencies.
I can't remember how it started, but at some recent point my wife mentioned that she'd never seen the film adaptation of Jay McInerney's 80's yuppie touchstone, "Bright Lights, Big City," starring the preternaturally youthful Michael J. Fox. I had seen it upon its 1988 release, but couldn't really remember all that much about the experience. Figuring that it would at least feature a cool shot or two of era-appropriate NYC, I found a five dollar copy of same at that cut-rate DVD shop on Broadway between 11th and 12th streets. Last night, we popped it in and watched.
I remember dutifully reading "Bright Lights..." back in the 80s -- along with its evil twin, Bret Easton Ellis' "Less Than Zero,".... which I inexplicably have a first edition copy of -- but was never especially wowed by either. When the inevitable film versions of both came to pass, I checked them both out. The only takeaway I've retained is that the soundtrack to "Less Than Zero" had more to recommend it (Slayer's version of Iron Butterfly's "Inna Gadda DaVida," LL Cool J's "Goin' Back to Cali," Public Enemy's "Bring the Noise," the Bangles' cover of "Hazy Shade of Winter" and an obscure Danzig track called "You and Me," which I don't believe is available anywhere else). "Bright Lights, Big City," meanwhile, left precious little impression on me, so I was indeed curious to check it out again.
If you haven't seen it, let me save you five bucks, `cos it's fucking awful.
I don't know if I should blame McInerney (who also wrote the screenplay) or director James Bridges, but it's a thinly-written, cliche-riddled string of poorly-composed gobbledegook. The protagonist is unsympathetic, self-absorbed, stupid, utterly unlikeable and a strikingly poor judge of character. The circumstances are flimsily sketched out. The period-specific details are laughable (even in the mid-80's, Michael J. Fox's Jamie Conway lives in an apartment vastly beyond the means of the tenuously competent magazine fact-checker/abjectly failed writer he aspires to be). The entire endeavor is botched, boring, trite and pointless. It even manages to make chemical dependency look deathly dull. I have a hard time understanding how it ever got made.
Honestly speaking, the only redeeming factor I was able to yank out of the film's tepid execution was the fleeting scene of the late-80s incarnation of East 14th Street (Michael J. Fox stumbling out of the Palladium in the early morning hours.... see above). Beyond that, the DVD will make a fine coaster. If you're looking for a telling slice of what 80's Manhattan was like, you shan't find it here.
I don't mean to sound like Scrooge or nothing, but .... actually, fuck that, yes I do. Listen, people, I've moaned about it before, but it's STILL GODDAMN NOVEMBER! Thanksgiving has NOT arrived yet. As such, THERE IS NO REASON TO START CRANKING THE CHRISTMAS CAROLS! I was just downstairs doing our laundry in the basement where -- for some infernal reason -- the radio is always tuned to our local "lite fm" station, and they've started playing the non-stop "holiday music" cycle EVEN BLOODY EARLIER this year. I realize that the economy's still relatively anaemic and we all have to pitch in and whatnot, but .... really .... there is NO reason to be starting yet. We haven't even finished our damn Halloween candy here.
Over at the job, meanwhile, I composed a couple of items this week that I might as well post here as well. One was about a gaggle of teens in Forks, Washington who incurred the disciplinary wrath of their high school by wearing Sex Pistols t-shirts (how timely of them) and a nice beefy post about the perils of strollerphobia (a topic I've written about here before). Do check'em all out, won't you?
Technically, the building is still there, but it’s just not The Ritz anymore. Today – and for the past several years – it’s a club called Webster Hall (actually, I think the venue was always called Webster Hall – the name dates back to the building’s origins in the 1880s.) Regardless, from 1980 until 1989, the address at 124 East 11th Street was The Ritz. I’ve waxed rhapsodic about it here many times, but a friend of mine from high school put up a clip on Facebook yesterday that brought the memories flowin’ back.
I’m not sure why, but I wasn’t able to attend the show captured in the clip below. By this point, I believe Elizabeth was going to NYU whilst I was sequestered off in Ohio at Denison University. In any case, Elizabeth braved the angry hordes to witness the mighty Slayer tread the boards of the Ritz. Below is her brave preamble.
Went to this very concert with Caitlin and Liz, and of all the life threatening situations I have been in (car accidents, gun point muggings, ocean undertows), this was by far the scariest thing I have ever encountered. Within 40 seconds of the show opening we were knocked to the ground and stomped on unknowingly by some seriously possessed fans. Thank God for Gavin Van Vlack for pulling us off the floor!! Slayer mosh pits are no joke. It was still awesome!
Evidently, shortly afterwards (recounts a friend of Liz’s) Tom Araya stopped singing, looked down and said “Uhh, babes? If you can’t stand the heat, GET THE HELL OUT OF THE KITCHEN!”
Enjoy a little slice of Slayer … at the Ritz in `86.
Been a crazy week already and it’s only Wednesday. In any case, I just wanted to shoot up a note for you to go check out my favorite, potty-mouthed parenting blog Dadwagon. I’m guest blogging (albeit in a very slack and punctually-delinquent fashion) this week. I’ve got twopieces up thus far, but there will be more. Tell’em I sent’cha.
While my lovely wife was in dear ol' Blighty last week, she happened to be passing by a bookstore off Piccadilly wherein Keith Richards was signing copies of his new memoir Life. Gamely, Peg got on line on my behalf and waited two plus hours for a signed copy, which was damn cool of her. I'm only about 35 pages in, but it's entirely entertaining. In any event, I've been on a bit of an unsurprising Stones kick ever since. This afternoon, I was running off to The Container Store to fetch a few items (not a recommended mission for a Sunday, by the way) and I walked by an address that always reminds me of the Stones, which prompted me to dig up the clip below.
In 1975, the band held a press conference here in New York City to announce the details of their impending world tour. The event was held at 24 Fifth Avenue just off the northwest corner of 9th Street (I've tried divining the name of the eatery at the time, albeit with no success. You can spot it in the photo below). The press summarily gathered inside, awaiting the arrival of Messrs. Jagger, Richards, Watts et al. In typically spectacular fashion, though, the band rented a flat bed truck, climbed aboard and performed as the truck slowly cruised down Fifth Avenue. I remember seeing a clip of it somewhere (I was about 8-years-old at the time, living about eighty-someodd blocks to the northeast) and being very intrigued. I think about the Stones cruising around in that flat bed truck every time I walk by it. A cool stunt indeed. U2, of course, ripped off the idea a couple of decades after for the video for "All Because of You." I guess, technically, so did Dokken about fifteen years before U2. Oh, and so did Bjork. Alright, maybe it's not that original an idea. Still, the Stones did it best.
You can read a bit more about the episode here. I did manage to find this fleeting clip of it below. Today, the establishment is split in two. The space closer to 9th Street is now fancy Thai restaurant. The space closer to 10th is up for rent. Enjoy.
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