Flaming Pablum

Massachusetts, Give It to The Modern Lovers

The story’s been making the rounds for a little while now -– specifically that “Roadrunner,” the lead track off of the debut LP by The Modern Lovers –- was in the running to become “the official rock song of Massachusetts.” I’m not really sure how much that really means to anyone, but when I heard it, I nodded in approval. For whatever that accolade is worth, it’s damn nice to see The Modern Lovers get some damn recognition at last. This was being spearheaded by a state representative named Marty Walsh.

But, of course, idiots like to fuck things up. When word got around that “Roadrunner” might be crowned as such, a pair of other representatives launched a counter-strike by making moves to give the honor to Aerosmith’s hackneyed hesher warhorse, “Dream On,” with one of them telling SouthCoastToday.com: “With all due respect, Aerosmith is the best-selling American rock band of all time. No band is more closely associated with Massachusetts.”

I’m sorry… I don’t live in Massachusetts, never have and probably never will. But with all due respect, Rep. Cantwell, fuck that and fuck you.

For a start, “Dream On” has about as much to do with Massachusetts as “Walk Like an Egyptian” does, so let’s get that right out of the way from the onset.

Secondly, since when does the fact that Aerosmith is the “best-selling” American rock band mean anything at all? Sales are zero indication of quality (take a look at the top of the pop charts if you’d care to beg to differ with me). And before I proceed, I should point out that I genuinely love a few (early) Aerosmith records. “Seasons of Wither”? “Back in the Saddle”? “Draw the Line”? These are damn classics.

But, honestly, does Aerosmith really need to be further celebrated? Do we really need to give Steven Tyler another reason to feel good about himself? Haven’t they had enough? Haven’t we all?

Full disclosure: Back in 1997, I came within arguable squinting distance of a book deal to write the authoritative story of the Modern Lovers’ front man, Jonathan Richman. By my logic, Richman was a tremendously influential figure in contemporary music, but precious few people knew his name, or his impact on what would become Punk Rock (and everything in the wake of that). And given his notorious eccentricity, it seemed like something of a no-brainer that an illuminating book on him would make for a great read.

Well, long story short: Two things scuttled that plan. For a start, someone had beaten me to the punch but a year earlier with a somewhat joyless, workmanlike tome on the subject, albeit one that Jonathan Richman himself did not authorize or contribute to. The second crucial factor is that Richman is stridently evasive about these things, and richly enjoys his privacy. And without the man’s own input, a book on his life and music would, by that point, have only been duplicative of that earlier book. So, I abandoned the idea. For a much lengthier discussion about my appreciation of Jonathan Richman, the Modern Lovers and the book that was not-to-be, click here to read a practically book-length post on it from 2008.

So, yeah, I’m incredibly biased in this case. For my money, The Modern Lovers is one of the finest solitary examples of rock n’ roll played properly. You can keep your precious copies of Pet Sounds and Horses and Songs from Big Pink and  ____________ (insert tired sacred cow here). The Modern Lovers is the real keeper.

Which brings me back to Massachusetts: Hey Bay State! Get your head of your ass and do the right thing! Make “Roadrunner” your state’s official rock song.

Manhattan is Movietown

I spend what some might consider an inordinate amount of time here trying to track down the precise locations of various photos of rocker-types loitering around the city, but every now and then, I deviate from this and pick from the world of film (as I’m currently obsessed with this single frame, but enough about that already). In any case, two of my favorite fellow bloggers have recently published posts that are well worth your time and perusal if you are similarly fascinated by this stuff.

My regular co-conspirator Bob Egan of PopSpots has a sprawling new post on his site that pinpoints the precise locations of several iconic films – from “Breakfast at Tiffany’s” to “Death Wish” and all points in between (including a Flaming Pablum favorite, “The Warriors”…see ablove). True to his signature aesthetic, the esoteric minutia is rich and plentiful. Check it out here.

On a similar tip, the equally scrupulous Scouting New York has posted another installment in a series of posts that go into slavish detail about key New York films. This time he’s concentrating on Billy Wilder’s “The Apartment.”

Enjoy! Tell’em I sent’cha.

Art in the Streets

The university I attended didn't offer a journalism program, so I was an "English [Writing]" major, for whatever that was worth. To balance out all my fiction-writing classes (which, incidentally, were a colossal waste of time -- fiction is a discipline I have absolutely zero aptitude for), I signed myself up for a slew of studio art classes. I'd toyed with becoming an art major at one point, but an art degree from the particular college I attended probably wouldn't have meant very much. If I'd been serious about art, I would have chosen a different school.

In any case, during the final two years of my college days, I found myself spending huge amounts of time in Cleveland Hall, the old art building. A huge, hulking converted gymnasium on the edge of the campus, Cleveland Hall felt very much apart from the rest of the school, and was endearingly slathered in colorful splashes of paint on the inside. I was such a regular, in fact, that I was given a key in due course, and accordingly spent lots of time there in the small hours, painting and cranking music on Cleveland Hall's weathered, paint-splattered communal boombox. A true road-test of any new album for me was whether it sounded good coming out of that boombox in the vast space of the painting room (a former basketball court).

As far as my actual art was concerned, I'm afraid it wasn't much better than the fiction-writing I'd been struggling with. Overwrought, pretentious and dubiously-executed (not unlike this blog, actually), my paintings may have demonstrated a tenuous grasp of the medium, but none of them really meant anything. I lived off campus during my senior year, and my housemates were generous enough put one of my paintings -- a huge canvas featuring a masked surgeon with fire coming out of his eyes alongside a New Wavey redhead with mirrored sunglasses I'd cribbed from a car stereo advertisement -- over the mantlepiece in the living room. By the end of the year, everyone was sick of it -- myself included.

After I graduated in 1989, I dutifully carted all my paintings back to New York, and even put some of them up on my walls for a while. When I moved downtown in the mid-90s, they all came with me again, only to be shoved into the back of a closet. When I got married in 2001, my paintings joined a vast pile of other bullshit on a mass exodus to a Manhattan-Mini-Storage space on Varick Street, and they've been there ever since.

Until now.

I've moaned about my storage problem in great detail here before, so I won't get back into it now, but suffice to say, I am now very close to closing it up for good. Today, my mission was to remove my paintings. Of the six that remained (I actually sold one to a college classmate -- somewhat unbelievably -- in 1989), I've decided to keep only two, one of them being the huge surgeon/New Wave babe one, although God only knows why. I wasn't sure what I was going to do with the other ones, but I figured it would dawn on me as I was taking them out. Regardless, they had to go.

Then, I was struck with an idea. Armed with my trusty camera, I thought it would be worth preserving images of my paintings -- however undeserving they may be -- so I took a few snaps of them. Then, in keeping with my fascination for documenting street art, I decided to take them out of their ridiculous context and make a little street art of my own. The end results are the pictures below. And if I do say so myself, when placed amid the atmospheric textures of the street, they've truly never looked better.

Incidentally, if you actually like any of these pieces enough to want one, I'm not saying I left them there, but you might take a stroll around the West Village and see what you can see. Just sayin'.

The Cedar Gets Waxed

I've never considered this blog to have an overriding theme. That was by design, to afford me the freedom to write about any topic that sparked my interest. Over time, however, certain issues started to gradually define Flaming Pablum. The slow, painful demise of my native New York City's once-thriving network of independent, mom'n'pop record and disc shops certainly edged me in the direction that now guides this blog, but I'd suggest it was one single, specific occurrence that really kicked Flaming Pablum into gear, that being the demise of The Cedar Tavern.

As I've laboriously pointed out in many, many posts on the subject (see arguably authoritative list beneath), the Cedar Tavern was something akin to my second living room. It was the perfect place, ripe for any occasion and any sort of company, cool without being exclusive or sceney and rich with civic history, personal history and personality. I sorely miss it and pretty much lost all faith in humanity when news came that it was gone for good.

It's been about six years since the place closed its doors. Since then, the place was demolished and gutted and rebuilt as a dreadfully shitty condo, but there's been absolutely zero business on the ground floor that the Cedar Tavern formerly occupied.

Until now.

I walked by 82 University Place this afternoon on my way to the hardware store and was surprised to see something new in the window beyond a "for lease" sign. Evidently, the space that the Cedar Tavern once called home is now going to be a waxing salon.

Yeah, that's great. That's just what our neighborhood needs.

People suck.

The story thus far...

Seeya Cedar Tavern?

Cedar in Name Only

Last Word on the Cedar Tavern (not!)

Depressing Cedar Tavern Shot of the Day

University Place Grumbles

Meanwhile, Back on University Place

It's Gone & It Ain't Comin' Back

Pining for the Cedar

Karmic Justice

Back Down at the Cedar

Fake Out at 82 University Place

82 University Exposed

Questions on University Place

Matinee Memories Deluxe

Despite the pervasive, London-esque rain today (light and misty, but after twenty minutes out in it, you're soaked), I repaired back downtown to my storage space on Varick and VanDam to dispose of more needless detritus I'd been expensively holding onto from my past. After jettisoning a couple of bags-worth of cassettes (nothing great, rare or worthwhile, trust me) and stacks of dusty, yellowing copies of New York Perspectives, a long-defunct free weekly I used to pen a music column for back in the early `90s, I decided to take a stroll around SoHo to try and find the corner I posted here the other day from "Swimming to Cambodia" and maybe .... just maybe .... somehow get closer to finding further evidence of that ancient bit of street art I'm currently obsessed with.

No dice on either front, I'm afraid. While it looks frustratingly familiar, I could not pinpoint that exact corner, I'm sad to say. Sure, there were several like it, but the specific architectural flourishes pictured in the still just didn't match up with anything. I suppose it's entirely possible that the building's changed its facade in the ensuing twenty-six years, but that just doesn't seem like the right explanation. And as far as finding more about that stencil (and it's parody stencil), I dare say that's turned out to be an implausibly difficult mission thus far. In a nutshell, I'm trying to track down a bit of friggin' graffiti that's been long washed away by decades and decades --- I might as well be trying to find the Ark of the Covenant or the Holy Grail. Hopes are not high on that front.

But while I was walking around, getting damp and cranky, I passed by an art gallery on Centre Street (one I'd normally never look twice at -- the sort of joint that sells pricey coffee-table books and ridiculous tchotchke) and was stopped dead in my tracks by a massive print of an instantly recognizable image.

Back in 2008, some may remember a video I posted up here with the headline "Matinee Memories." The clip in question had been making the rounds on Facebook at the time. It was essentially this project by a photographer who'd originally documented the CBGB matinee scene between 1983 and 1985 and then had gone back to talk to some folks from that era. Well, that photographer is a guy named Drew Carolan, and this gallery on Centre Street is showcasing his work (he evidently had a show there some years back). Knowing what little I know about this place, I didn't bother to check out the prices for any of Carolan's prints, as I'm sure they'd have made my head spin. This stuff is never cheap. But damn if they don't look great.

When I got home I Googled Carolan's name, and up came the photographer's own site (I don't know why I didn't do this when I first saw the clip -- which Carolan himself posted on YouTube in 2007). In any case, click "Matinee" under the collections header here to check it out. If you're a fan of the hardcore scene of the era, it's well worth your time. Even if you're not, the photographs are really quite striking.

Trivia-obsessed rock jerks like myself might also recognize Gina Volpe and Yana Chupenko, future members of The Lunachicks and PMS/Wench, respectively.

Here's the video, once again!

Back to Woody's SoHo

Inspired by that glimpse of the old, arty SoHo (and my maddening search for an implausibly fleeting bit of street art that occurred between the eras of Basquiat and Banksy), I turned once more to Woody Allen's "Hannah and Her Sisters," a classic Allen film (like countless other Allen films) that acts as a visual love letter to New York City. Sure, its still rife with signature excesses from the director in question, but it remains a keeper across the board for a variety of reasons. That it captured a taste of certain neighborhoods that no longer exude the same vibe today is only a tiny reason to cherish it.

Released only a year before Spalding Gray's "Swimming to Cambodia"" (and, for that matter, one year after Martin Scorsese's Soho-centric "After Hours"), "Hannah and Her Sisters" visits SoHo to find the film's lovestruck protagonist Elliot (played masterfully by Michael Caine) frantically pursuing Lee (played by Barbara Hershey prior to those collagen-injections) around the neighborhood. The SoHo of 1986 appears in all its weathered, rusty and comparatively grubby glory as Michael Caine sprints breathlessly through it.

Not that I was expecting to spot it, but that damned stencil does not make a cameo (but trust me ---- I will find further evidence of it). The only thing that's continued to bug me after all these years is the fact that Woody places Elliot and Lee in SoHo, and then has Lee suggest repairing to the Pageant Bookshop, saying it's "only a couple of blocks from here." This is an infinitesimally tiny point, but being that the old Pageant Bookshop (now the Central Bar) was on East 9th Street between 3rd and 4th Avenues, that ain't exactly a hop, skip and a jump from the heart of SoHo, where their conversation takes place. Like I said, it's a tiny quibble, but for a native, pedantic New Yorker, it's a glaring oversight (I had a similar grievance with Spike Lee's "Summer of Sam.")

In any case, bitches aside, it's still a lovely slice of the old SoHo (and of the Pageant, for that matter). Enjoy.

Searching for That Stencil

Here's a prime example of how I regularly drive myself completely insane.

Okay, so yesterday, I stumbled upon a screen-grab of a still from Spalding Gray's "Swimming to Cambodia" that evocatively captured the endearingly decrepit, art-slathered vibe of SoHo circa 1987. I posted it here, calling attention to the stencil sprayed on the wall behind Spalding, citing it as a bit of street art that I spotted everywhere around that neighborhood at the time. Walk down around those streets now -- as transformed as they are -- and you'll still see numerous stencils, stickers and bits of street art, but back then, they were in less concentrated pockets, so each piece had a bit more breathing room, it seems. As such, when you spotted one, it left more of an indelible impression.

In any case, after calling attention to it -- essentially a self-portrait of the artist, a young Asian guy with the subtly spiky hair of the era -- I also noted that it was so ubiquitous that there was also a stencil series (or campaign, for lack of a better term) that seemed to mock its hubris. That parody stencil was essentially a cartoonishly grim depiction of that same artist getting shot in the head. I guess it was just a tasteless form of artistic turf-warfare.

Here's where the trouble starts: Since doing that, I've become committed to finding further evidence of both bits of street art, and somehow convinced myself that it would be easy as pie to find shots of them online. Yeah, think again. Trying typing in variations of "80's," "street art," "stencil," "NYC," and "SoHo" into a Google image search, and you've got yourself a full evening of frustration.

I combed through Google and Flickr and Tumblr and a few street art sites I knew, but found nothing. I went analog and turned to my bookshelf to crack open aging tomes about New York City street art from that era, but still came up empty. This was going to plague me.

I want to say that somewhere between Houston Street and Canal Street, there is still a surviving example of this series somewhere, but that might just be my typically naive projection (the same sort of notion that occasionally convinces me to look for rare Einsturzende Neubauten discs or laughably out-of-print books at, say, Barnes & Noble).

I'm now throwing it out there to you. I know I didn't imagine these bits of street art -- and I'm not even sure why I give a damn at this stage -- but Spalding Gray evidently reached to me from beyond the grave and planted them back in my head. I didn't necessarily understand them at the time, but now that I've scratched the surface, I need to bring the search to fruition.

Who else remembers these stencils? Do you know the backstory? Do you have pictorial representation of them? Speak up and help solve the mystery.

Addenda to the Addenda

Regarding those updates from the other day, reader Graehme wrote:

CBGB Theatre?? What??? What is this? I've never heard of such a thing, despite fetishizing the world of CBGB for thirty years and more. Please elucidate, if you know more.

It’s the truth. For a brief window of time between 1977 and 1978, the Anderson Theatre on Second Avenue -- just a few steps to the south from St. Marks Place (across the street from Gem Spa) -- was an adjunct venture for CBGB. You can read more about it here.

After CB’s short tenure there, it morphed from the Anderson to The Orpheum. I remember seeing “Little Shop of Horrors” with my mother there in the 1982 or so. Since the mid-90’s, however, it’s been the home of “Stomp.”

Back to the David Johansen/Gramercy Gym debacle for a sec: I re-posted a pic on that last corrections post of the old Palladium and pointed out a doorway I thought might be the 116 in question. Bob Egan weighed back in again. Here’s what he had to say  -- in typically crazy-thorough fashion:

Hi Alex, I saw your report today. You ended by thinking the door might be next to the Palladium (#124 on the map) . I think you were off by one building and a parking lot. See the details below.

#116 and #118 seem to share an entrance. But if it’s like the one in the photo of the old guy, then maybe there was another entrance on the side. It would probably be facing 14th street since it has the #116 on it and I don’t think they would put that on a door in the back alley.

Spalding and the Stenciled Head

I spotted the screen-grab below on Tumblr this evening and felt compelled to share it here (click on it to enlarge). This is a fleeting still from Spalding Gray’s “Swimming to Cambodia.” I’m sharing it not only because I’m a huge fan of Gray’s work (you can read more about that here), but also because as a single snapshot, it almost completely captures the vibe of SoHo in the mid-80’s.

Because I’m obsessed with seemingly meaningless minutia, I was also captivated by the fact that it displays a stencil that used to be EVERYwhere for a while. In the center of the photograph, sprayed onto the bottom portion of the building’s edifice, you’ll see what looks like the head of an Asian man. Like I said, this stencil was absolutely everywhere in SoHo back then (predating Shepherd Fairey’s work by a good couple of years). I don’t remember the specifics to it – I believe it was just a self-promotional thing for some hip, young artist. I even remember some parodies of it (the same face with the eyes X’d out as if having been shot). I doubt you’d be able to find examples of either on any SoHo facades today.

At a glance, I can’t say for sure what street this is, but I’m guessing it could be the corner of Mercer and Broome. I’m purely projecting, of course. What say you?

Corrections, Addenda and Quiz Solutions

Casual readers might assume that the content presented here on Flaming Pablum is carefully hand-picked and meticulously crafted by a secretive, international think-tank of intellectuals, hepcats, cultural experts, word-weary urbanists and sneery ex-punk rockers, but that's actually not the case. It's all thought-up, assembled, hastily edited and sloppily produced by one individual, that being me. As such, mistakes happen, oversights occur, typos run rampant, vagaries hold sway, inconsistencies are dubiously reinforced, images are deplorably misidentified and rumors and tarted-up as the god's honest truth. Luckily, there is an outspoken cabal of loyal readers who realize this, forgive my innumerable failures and chime in with the real facts from time to time. Herewith are the merciful fruits of their knowledge regarding some recent posts. Enjoy.

1. In my recent, windy rumination about the possibility of Bryan Gregory of the Cramps having worked at a long-defunct King Karol outlet on the Upper East Side, I dusted off photographer Stephanie Chernikowski's lovely live shot of the Cramps in full, feral swing that originally appeared on the back cover of their debut 12", Gravest Hits. That's the back cover in question up top. In this instance, I speculated that the venue depicted might be the old Ritz on East 11th street. Swifter than eagles, two of my favorite regulars -- former-Missing Foundation-member-turned-photographer Christopher Egan and noted-photographer-and-former-next-door-neighbor Glen E. Friedman weighed in. The venue in question, says Egan, was actually the short-lived CBGB Theatre (formerly The Anderson) on Second Avenue and East 4th Street. I found a nice shot of its exterior here by one Chuck Pulin (check out more of his remarkable shots here). Glen rightly pointed out that it couldn't have been the Ritz, being that there are seats pictured. Well-spotted, gents. Thanks!

2. This past weekend, I posted another epic-length entry about trying to divine the precise location of a photograph by David Gahr of erstwhile New York Doll David Johansen, loitering manfully in front of cryptically-addressed doorway. I spent the better part of an afternoon trotting around Gramercy looking for that doorway, but to no avail. A crucial clue was the signage behind David, which I wrongly assumed spelled out "Gramercy Room." Two readers named RJJNY and Deirdre sharply shut me down with some research that more or less confirmed that it wasn't the Gramercy Room Johansen was standing in front of .... but the Gramercy Gym.

Being that I was working on the wrong assumption (again), it's no wonder that I didn't find it, and I tossed the challenge to PopSpots' Bob Egan (no relation -- I don't think, at least -- to the afore-cited Christopher Egan). Armed with the info that RJJNY and Deirdre had already cited, Bob wrote:

Hi Alex, I visited your site today and saw my name. Then I saw that others had done much of the groundwork, finding Gleason's Gym. I've been looking for a photo of the door, I think it was the building to the right of the Palladium. Will keep working on it. - Bob.

Never wanting to leave a note without supplying some compelling evidence to buffer his argument, Bob thoughtfully included these pics of the gym in question.

Based on all this research, could we then assume that this is the doorway? Or am I too far to the East? Let's stay tuned for Bob's reply, I guess.

3. Back in January, I posted an entry speculating about the location depicted on the cover art to Blondie's 1980 album, Autoamerican. In it, I wondered aloud if the spot upon which Debbie Harry and Messrs. Stein, Burke, Destri et al. were standing was the same building that housed the Clocktower Gallery on Lower Broadway. You can see that post here. 

Well, guess what, readers? I was wrong AGAIN. Bob Egan once again got on the case. Here's what he wrote:

HI Alex,  Just saw your entry for Autoamerican. Here’s my future entry, which I think works out, as I’ve read from some other source that the photo was taken “on a roof near Broadway and 8th Street.  (they were off by a block. ) I used to swim on this roof when we had kids. The part of the roof they were photographed is kind of off limits to the poolgoers. It’s around the back of the elevator.  Also, I’m 99% sure Bob Gruen took the photo they based the painting on.

Get the F*$% out!! All this time I thought it took place in TriBeCa, and it was right here but a stone's throw from my own front door?!? As always, Bob supplied visual testimony...click on each to enlarge.

So there you have it! Three posts rife with inaccuracies all brought to factual fruition at last! Thanks, all. Please keep reading. To celebrate, enjoy these topically-timely tunes...