Because I’m a fatuously geeky fanboy, I am a member of a group on Facebook devoted to the Sisters of Mercy. This post is not really about the band in question, but I’m just citing this for context.
Over the past several weeks, members of this group have posted a couple of photos of enigmatic Sisters mainstay Andrew Eldritch sporting variations of black t-shirts (shocker!) emblazoned with the logo and legend “The Pit – New York City.”
I was, of course, immediately intrigued.
As an Upper East Side kid, I first started exploring downtown Manhattan during my early high school years. When the parents of my friend Spike (immortalized here, although still not his actual name) got divorced, Spike moved with his dad to an expansive apartment in Greenwich Village, down on Cornelia Street. This particular spot became my preliminary staging ground for acclimating myself with this captivating new (well, new for me, circa 1981 or so) part of the city, having already bored myself senseless looking for comic shops and record stores all around uptown and midtown.
During those early sorties (wherein I discovered crucial locations like Bleecker Bob’s, 99 Records, Subterranean Records, Second Coming Records and It’s Only Rock’n’Roll …. all gone now, of course), I do dimly remember a selection of places that haven’t gone onto become as well-documented as others. For example, I seem to be the only person who remember a heavy metal shop on MacDougal Street between West Third and Bleecker called C.C.& Star. I have vivid memories of the tiny joint, but there’s no evidence on the internet (apart from my own invocations) that it ever existed.
Similarly, I want to say I remember a concern named The Pit, but I may just be projecting.
Some members of the SOM group on Facebook suggest that it may have been situated on St. Marks Place. Was it a shop? A live music venue? A bar? Did the Sisters play there? It’s difficult to discern.
Much like my search for anything to do with C.C. & Star, nothing really comes up, other than the t-shirt design above, although that comes bereft of any info of the image’s true provenance.
Given the Hell’s Angels’ until-recent foothold in the East Village, I’m guessing The Pit might have had something to do with them, given the biker aesthetic at work – something the Altamont-fixated Sisters of Mercy would certainly have gravitated towards.
In any case, while the name rings the faintest of bells with me, I’m fairly certain I never set foot in the place, and probably only walked by it, at best.
Who can share more about The Pit? Weigh in…
For more context, here are the Sisters…
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