A reader named Gabriella (I believe) just weighed in to assert her piece on the Sade question (which I’ve already devoted two posts to), but I unwittingly deleted her comment by accident -- so please weigh back in, Gabriella! Apologies.
The gist of her comment, however, was to emphatically confirm that Sade never lived in New York, thus never poured drinks at Danceteria and that her former boyfriend, the afore-cited Robert Elms, never worked as a New York club DJ. I picked up that last bit of info from Wikipedia, so go know, as they say. I don’t pretend to be an authority about any of this – I’m just trying to get to the bottom of the rumor.
With all this in mind, I reached out to my old comrade Willie (not his real name). You might remember me invoking him on a few posts here (notably here, here and here). In a nutshell, Willie was a precocious high-school classmate of mine, who somehow gained carte blanche at several Manhattan nightclubs while the rest of us snivelling teens were still squeezing blackheads, listening to Motley Crue and playing our Atari 2600s. Willie attracted quite a bit of stick from the rest of our class, at the time, as we were somewhat roundly incredulous at his presumably tall tales of late-night debauchery alongside the hip glitterati. In a nutshell, many thought he was simply full of shit. In later life, as I became immeresed in a frankly dubious “career” as an ersatz “music journalist,” I found myself regularly chatting with veterans of the New York City club community. When I did so, I could never resist the urge to ask if any of them knew my pal Willie (that sounds like a euphemism for something, but I assure you it’s not). More often that not, they answered in the affirmative. As it turned out, Willie was not quite as full of shit as many might have assumed.
Anyway, in the wake of this great Sade debate, I figured I’d reach out to Willie, Jack of All Clubs, as he would at least have some degree of an informed opinion on the notion. I put the question to him: Did Sade ever bartend at Danceteria?
Willie, in turn, reached out to Danceteria’s owner (who he is indeed Facebook friends with). Here is that answer:
“She probably went behind the bar and served a few drinks as a promo stunt when she played with her band Pride, but best to ask _______ [name redacted by me], as she put the whole thing together. Sade was not on the payroll or scehdule, though.”
Again, at this stage of the proceedings, I have zero reason to doubt my friend Willie’s contacts and information. I don’t know the individual who allegedly “put the whole thing together,” so I’m not going to pursue that, but as far as I’m concerned, this legend has been debunked.
….unless you have evidence to the contrary?
Here's what the most celebrated former iteration of Danceteria at 30 West 21st Street looks like today. Not as much fun is had within.
And here's how it used to look ...
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