Flaming Pablum

Manhattan of The Damned

The Damned first played New York City’s CBGB in 1977, the first British Punk band to do so (along with having been the first British Punk band to issue any vinyl). During that maiden voyage, the band were famously captured by erstwhile CBGB door-minder/photographer Roberta Bayley in the photo above, posing with great, snotty aplomb in front of the twin towers of the World Trade Center.

The band ended up playing four April nights at CBGB, sharing the bill with their Buckeye counterparts in the Dead Boys. Here’s a shot of them during one of those doubtlessly volatile evenings, this one taken by Ebet Roberts.

Today, meanwhile, in trawling around the `net, looking for nothing in particular, I came across this uncredited photo from the same era. I’m making some assumptions here but based on the line-up (with guitarist Brian James still in the ranks), I’m guessing this was snapped during that same span of April days. I have no idea who took it, but my question is – where in Manhattan was this photograph snapped?

I’d say the awning behind Dave Vanian on the left is a big clue, as are the terraced apartments behind Captain Sensible’s head. I have a hunch which I’m going to investigate, but where do YOU think it was taken?

The Damned are coming back to New York City (with original drummer Rat Scabies with them, this time) this May, but the next day is my son’s graduation, so I don’t think we’ll be going. We did just see them in October, anyway.

Meanwhile, here’s a taste of one of those shows…

Feel Better, Mr. Fripp

Back in 2007, I penned a slavishly overwritten paean to the infernal majesty of King Crimson’s signature piece, “21st Century Schizoid Man,” in the wake of a debate I’d waged at my then place of employment, i.e. MTV News Online, about the Crimbos’ indelible influence on what would become heavy metal. Then as now, I maintain that if you can’t hear the, to my mind, UNMISSABLE similarities between “Schizoid” and Black Sabbath’s epic “War Pigs,” you’ve clearly got your head completely up your own ass, but I digress.

News came down, this week, that King Crimson maestro Robert Fripp, an incomparable musician and notably difficult character that also played on seminal albums with David Bowie, Brian Eno, Peter Gabriel, John Paul Jones, David Sylvian, Andy Summers, Blondie, Talking Heads and even fuckin’ Daryl Hall, has recently suffered a heart attack, resulting in two separate surgeries and a stay in intensive care. As recounted in this story in Rolling Stone, the famously iron-willed Fripp being who he is, he still managed to play a scheduled gig, afterwards.

As I mentioned back on that post from 2007, I’ve been a fan of Fripp and Crimson’s wide body of work ever since first discovering them in college, so news of the great man’s brush with mortality – and this after already losing names this year like Rick Buckler of the Jam, David Johansen of the New York Dolls, Brian James of The Damned, Al Barile of SSD, Dave Allen of Gang of Four, Clem Burke of Blondie, David Thomas of Pere Ubu and Mike Peters of The Alarm (and I’m probably forgetting someone) – found me reverently rediscovering the myriad joys of Fripp’s robust oeuvre, which led me to the curious video below.

With audio culled from a recording of “21st Century Schizoid Man” captured at London’s fabled Marquee club in 1969, a YouTuber named Samuel S. appended some fancifully rudimentary animation that looks like a fittingly head-warping amalgam of Charles Schulz’s “Peanuts” gang and Episode 8 of David Lynch’s “Twin Peaks: The Return.”

Enjoy.

Back in Time at Hamilton-Holly House on St. Marks Place: Prior to the Punks

Back in May of 2019 – one short year before the COVID lockdown hit New York – I posted an exhaustive little entry documenting the historical trajectory of the Hamilton-Holly House at 4 St. Marks Place. Colloquially named for its most famous tenant, Eliza Hamilton – widow of Alexander – the address became better known, throughout the `80s and `90s, at least, as the home of fabled punk haberdashery, Trash & Vaudeville, one's best option for procuring things like bondage trousers, brothel creepers and Dead Boys t-shirts. A St. Marks Place landmark, of a sort, its signature neon was fleetingly featured in the opening montage of "Saturday Night Live," and was also a place of employment for neighborhood punks like the late Fran Powers. It was in the downstairs chamber of Trash wherein Scorsese met and recruited Fran and his punky peers to serve as extras in the Club Berlin scene in "After Hours," as floridly discussed at great length on this old post.

Trash & Vaudeville, of course, decamped from the spot back in 2016, moving to East 7th Street and its colorful proprietor, Jimmy Webb, passed away in 2020. Jimmy’s second shop, the similarly inclined I Need More on Orchard Street in the Lower East Side, closed three short months after Webb’s demise. Last time I checked, Trash & Vaudeville on East 7th was still in operation.

Back at 4 St. Marks Place, here in 2025, the “garden level” is still empty and dormant, whilst the second floor now plays host to a gallery called Art Gotham, which is certainly preferable to yet another bubble tea emporium or vaping venture.

The reason I’m dredging all this back up, however, is because my friend Susan Fensten posted a remarkable photo on Facebook, recently, that I felt really compelled to share. I asked if I could re-purpose, and she gamely said yes.

Here’s how she set it up…

St. Mark's Place. 1969. Photo by David Gahr. (35mm Negative my collection.) We lived across the street at 7 St Mark's Place up until 1967. The rent was $41.00 a month! I love this picture so much for many reasons, one of them being that my mother bought an old carved wooden bed frame for $8.00 from this store right before we moved uptown. She painted the bed pink and orange.

So, anyway, here is that photo below. Obviously, by 1969, St. Marks Place had already accrued a reputation as something of a bohemian hotbed (what with the fabled Electric Circus, which would have been in full, psychedelic swing across the street, and hallowed jazzbo hangout, the Five Spot on the corner of Third Avenue), but this photo still exudes such a faint whiff of folksy quaintness.

Devolving Again

My very first concert ever was DEVO at Radio City Music Hall in 1981. I saw them a second time the following year at the Palladium on East 14th Street, this being well before its makeover from a live-music venue into a giant nightclub. A few years later, I saw them outside of New York City in 1988 at Columbus’ own Newport Music Hall in their home state of Ohio, and later still at the Hammerstein Ballroom, McCarren Pool in Brooklyn, at Central Park Summerstage, a couple of performances at Irving Plaza and then at Pier 17 in 2022. If they come to town, or I’m in a town where they’re playing – I go. It’s that simple.

For that last show at Pier 17, I brought my then-16-year-old son, Oliver, making DEVO his very first concert, too. The boy returns this very day from his first year at Trinity Dublin in Ireland, and tonight, we are going to see DEVO at the Brooklyn Paramount.

The picture in the frame was taken by the great Allan Tannenbaum, who captured it at the 1981 show that was my first concert. He lives in TriBeCa, and I bought a print of it from him several years back. He’s also got a great retrospective show happening at the Morrison Hotel Gallery that is well worth everyone’s time.

Beatle on Bank Street

Hey all. Again, please pardon for the relative slowdown in posting, but life’s just a bit busy, these days. My kids return from college very soon, so we’re getting ready for that. Work is typically crazy. I’ll have another brain-busting update on the fucked-up feet front, soon, after I take my dreaded NCV test …. ahem, “Nerve Conduction Velocity” … next week. So, y’know … get excited for that.

But real quick, I spotted the below two items recently, and figured I should share them.

I’ve posted several entries, over the years (see below), speculating about what John Lennon loved most about living in New York. I mean, obviously, what’s not to love, especially if you’re living in the fuckin’ Dakota, but what specifically did he love? Did he have a favorite pizzeria? Did he go to gigs at CBGB? What’d he get up to here?

I’ve gotten a little bit of that picture, but I came across the video below, put together by Strange History X, that delves into John and Yoko’s relatively brief tenure living in the West Village, specifically on Bank Street. Here’s the blurb:

Step into the world of John Lennon as we explore his life in New York City’s legendary Greenwich Village. From the vibrant streets to the bohemian spirit, discover how this iconic neighborhood shaped the former Beatle’s creative and personal journey in the 1970s. We’ll dive into the stories behind his move to the Village, his time with Yoko Ono, and the eclectic energy that fueled his music and activism. Imagine the Village through Lennon’s eyes—peace, love, and rock ‘n’ roll await!

Enjoy…

Speaking of the West Village, I read a wholly dispiriting (but not especially surprising) piece in New York Magazine’s The Cut about how – in the wake of the one-two punch of “Sex & The City” and fuckin’ COVID-19, the very same West Village depicted in the video above is now little more than the stomping ground of a nation of matcha-sipping “influencer” girls. Make of that what you will and click here to read more.

More on the Lennons in Flaming Pablum...

Where was John's Manhattan? 

Mudd Club `79: Beatle Meets Misfit, Puke Ensues

Bleecker Bob’s Beatle Boast to Bauhaus Bassist

Finding Lennon’s Manhattan

Lennon on Punk

Revisiting “One Down, Three to Go”

Oh Yoko

The Walrus Goes to Hell’s Kitchen

Back ... Again ... to Privates on East 85th

I’ve spoken here before about Privates, the long-lost cutting-edge live-music venue that formerly stood on the strenuously unlikely corner of East 85th Street and Lexington Avenue. Don’t go looking for it now, as the venue closed in June of 1981 and the whole building was torn down sometime after that. Today, a big yucky condo called The Ventana stands in its footprint, with a Starbucks occupying the space that would have been Privates, back in the day.

But, as mentioned in this post and that post, as Privates, the space played host a slew of at-the-time cutting edge bands like Joe “King” Carrasco & the Crowns, the Revillos, Cyndi Lauper’s Blue Angel, Richard Lloyd from Television, a late, Frampton-less iteration of Humble Pie, and even Flaming Pablum favorites like XTC, The Stranglers and Bauhaus. The whole concept of that last trio of punky bands playing on my childhood home turf of East 85th Street completely blows my mind.

Jessica over at Desperately Seeking the `80’s devoted her half of a podcast episode to an event at Privates wherein the club hosted a special screening of hallowed cinematic ska opus, “Dance Craze,” which doubtlessly prompted scads of skinny-tied Upper East Sides to partake of some skanking in the streets.

Of course, arguably the most famous act to have ever graced the presumably intimate stage of this club in Metropolitan Hill (note: contrary to my dubious reporting in previous missives, the southeast corner of East 85th Street and Lexington Avenue is not technically part of Yorkville, although it is mere footsteps from its westerly border) would have been Joan Jett & the Blackhearts, who recorded the arguably iconic video for “I Love Rock ‘n’ Roll” within Privates’ four walls.

I talked all about that, of course, on these two posts from 2016.

Apropos of nothing, however, I recently dialed up the video in question, only to discover that, circa 2022, someone had uploaded a new “Full HD (Remastered and Upscaled)” version which swapped out the original’s grittily grainy black-&-white patina in favor of sharpened, vibrant color and enhanced proceedings with disquieting dollops of AI.

The results restore the full experience of the original music video, complete with preamble and coda, revealing the full interior of the empty club and a tantalizing 180-degree vista of the surrounding neighborhood beyond Privates’ windows at the end. Having never set foot in the place (I would have been a sniveling 14-year-old upon its closure), the ability to see the former interior in such detail is something of a revelation.

It also got me thinking, who are all these kids in the crowd scenes? Were they members of a Joan Jett fan-club? Rockheads bussed in from some outer borough? Any representatives of the 84th Street Bombers? Are there any local NYC punk luminaries to be spotted hidden in the throng?

Weigh in if you know.

Back Through The Mill

Okay, this one's a bit odd, ... and I thought I'd already evangelized this new aspect of it (see below), but evidently not. Or, if I did, I just can't find it.

In any case, back in 2015 ... which is astonishingly a decade ago .... I wrote up a little reminiscence of a long-lost attraction in midtown called, or so I thought at the time, Burlington Mills. The trouble was, despite the vividness of my recollections about the exhibit, I couldn't seem to find any evidence of its existence, despite all my inventive Googling. Eventually, I did track down the correct appellation, and up came everything I needed (I had this same quandary when trying to trace back to the old and endearingly grotty Comic Arts Gallery on East 58th Street). It wasn't Burlington Mills, it was The Mill at Burlington House.

If you're curious, you can read all about it here. But, a short time after I posted that entry, I stumbled upon actual video evidence of the exhibit, which blew me right off the porch. For whatever reason, however, I apparently never got around to sharing it here, so I'm rectifying that now. 

I found it quite surprising to learn that the full ride took upwards of eight minutes. That seems like kind of a lot, but I'm sure my mother was happy to keep us occupied, if only for those feeling eight minutes. 

If you're a Manhattan kid of a certain age that wants to re-experience The Mill at Burlington House, I'm afraid the exhibit in question closed circa 1980. But now, thanks to the magic of archival video, you can turn back the clock...

Enjoy.

Godspeed, Crocus Behemoth

Pere Ubu was arguably the nerdiest nerd band to ever walk the earth. They made records so rife with oblique oddness as to make offerings by comparatively more celebrated weirdos like Devo and Talking Heads sound as daring as Supertramp. And like both Devo and Talking Heads, while Pere Ubu was certainly born “of” Punk, one would be hard-pressed to call them a Punk Band, or at least not in the more codified manner the term now implies. By the same token, you’d be equally hard-pressed to find a more Punk Rock opening line to a song than “Girls won’t touch me `cos I got a misdirection,” which ushered in their signature single, the unfortunately titled “Final Solution.”

The first several times I heard them – usually courtesy of fellow geeks – I found them difficult and shrill. I’m not sure when the penny finally dropped, but I finally managed to de-code Pere Ubu, and became a reverent acolyte, seeking out their further-flung recordings. Suffice to say, you couldn’t always find their stuff at your local Sam Goody.

I eventually tracked down copies of Ubu records like The Modern Dance, Terminal Tower and Dub Housing, each one sounding completely different from the album that preceded it. I remember putting a couple of Pere Ubu tracks – notably “30 Seconds over Tokyo” and “Sentimental Journey” -- on a mixtape for my friend Ed, and his girlfriend commenting, shortly afterwards, that “Alex only loves serial killer music.”

Pere Ubu never had a hit single. Their albums can’t be found on most jukeboxes. Their songs are not immediately suitable fare at your local karaoke bar. I only got to see them play once – in 1993 at Central Park’s Summerstage, of all places, opening for their fanboy upstarts in They Might Be Giants. They closed with the song, which compelled me to go buy one of their shirts, which I still have.

Their newly late lead singer Dave “Crocus Behemoth” Thomas was, by all accounts, a complicated character, but he was a strikingly unique artist the likes of which we invariably will not see again.

Go buy this Pere Ubu record today. You won’t find it on Spotify.

 

 

Christmas with Fishbone at The Ritz, 1987

Fresh in my head since doing this post, I strolled by the Ritz … or, more accurately … Webster Hall of East 11th Street, over the weekend and snapped the photograph above. I’m trying to think of the last time I was actually inside the building, and I think it must have been when I saw the Secret Machines and …And You Will Know Us By the Trail of Dead there in … cripes… 2009. So, yeah, it’s been a minute, but it’s still near and dear to my heart.

In any case, some may remember a post I did back in 2017 wherein I recounted some of my favorite shows there, notably a pair of shows featuring the triple bill of The Toasters, Murphy’s Law and Fishbone in December of 1987. Here’s what I had to say about it in 2017…

My favorite anecdote about The Ritz, however, involves one of a pair of shows in December of 1987, which featured Fishbone, The Toasters and Murphy’s Law. My friend Rob D. and I attended both of these Christmas gigs (hot on the release of Fishbone’s holiday EP, It’s a Wonderful Life), and the room was jam-packed with an army of punks, skinheads, rudeboys, rockers, hardcore kids, college types and all points in between. It was, as they say, the event of the season.

On both nights, each band whipped the capacity crowd up into a complete frenzy, but on the first of the two evenings, I remember being amidst the pit during Murphy’s Law’s frenetic set. The heat coming off the crowd was intense, and the action was nonstop. I managed to weave my pipe-cleaner-like physique through the merry melee to the western side of the room, clinging to the bar as if it was the side of a deep pool. Sweaty and exhausted, I petitioned the bartender -- via a variety of complex hand-signals, given the stentorian din of Murphy’s Law at full throttle -– for a COKE! As if on cue, right as the barkeep was completing my order, lead singer Jimmy Gestapo (a moniker he has since tastefully renounced, truncating to simply “Jimmy G.”) heroically vaulted from the Ritz stage and onto the very bar to which I was leaning. Just as my cup of ice-laden Coca-Cola was put down in front of me, Jimmy started enthusiastically skanking down the bar, with limbs akimbo, flailing in time with the music. Just as I was reaching for my beverage, Jimmy brought his battle-weathered Doc Marten down on my cup with a splattering-STOMP. Fittingly or unwittingly, no soft drinks were going to be consumed on his watch.

Indeed, it was quite an occasion, and while it was over three decades ago, those memories are still quite vivid, for me.

I started sniffing around the internet, recently, looking for any comparable accounts of those shows. I do this periodically, and usually come up empty handed, but I struck oil today.

The first find was an auction site called VNTG Shop, who are selling an original shirt – XL no less – from those shows.

Cool, right? Well, as delightful it would be to own that, VNTG wants $375 for it, so … suffice to say, that’s not happening, for me. If you want to surprise me with a gift, someday, you now have all you need to know and act on.

The second thing I found, meanwhile, was this site, Fishbonelive.org, who hosted photos from the event!!! Here are just a couple...

Murphy's Law...

..and here's Fishbone...

I’m in there somewhere…no shots of the Toasters, sadly.

Tragically, as far as I'm aware, there is no video of either of the two show in question, but here's a little taste of what was on offer.

Here's Murphy's Law at the Ritz, at some indeterminate point. They're opening for someone here (notice the covered drum kit behind the drum kit?), but no idea of when and for whom..

This, meanwhile, is the Toasters circa 1987...

Lastly, this is the mighty Fishbone, as captured around the same era in Tokyo...

Just For Clix: Whorelords on the Corner

Here’s a curious one.

The shot above comes from the ever-excellent New York Hardcore Chronicles Facebook page. The ensemble depicted therein was a band called The Whorelords, who were fronted by a gentleman named Bobby Snotz. I spoke about there about eleven years ago. Here’s what Misfits Central tells us about them…

Bobby Snotz formed this band in 1978 with Tarik Schapli. Because Tarik hadn't been playing guitar for long, Barry (and later Bobby Steele) joined the band as second guitarist. The Whorelords performed live several times while Bobby Steele was in the band; he left when he was asked to join The Misfits. Along with The Whorelords came a group of Whorettes (Charlotte Harlotte, Diedre, Carry Hamilton, and Rachel Rage) who did background vocals. Some members of The Whorelords went on to form Hell Sent, who opened for The Misfits in September 1979. A Whorelords reunion show took place that weekend when Bobby Snotz showed up and replaced Hell Sent's singer Kate K-Mart to perform a set of Whorelords songs. After spending a few years in jail, Snotz reformed the band in 1982. At some point during this time, they recorded a demo tape (with Pete Marshall on guitar) that has never been released. Bobby Snotz and Tarik also recorded as The Fiends on the New York Thrash compilation. Snotz was beaten to death in 1992.

There are two other small things of note, her. First up, the gent on the far left is depicted wearing a Blitz Benefit t-shirt (which I wrote about back here). Secondly, and this is really what initially jumped out at me, the tag behind the band is none other than MODERN CLIX, Fran Powers’ old band, and the impetus behind Charly Garcia’s Clics Modernos and Charly Garcia Corner.

For more on Fran Powers, click here and here.

For more on Charly Garcia’s Clics Modernos and Charly Garcia Corner, click here and here. 

I shared this back in 2014, but here were the Whorelords in action:

Bad Brains on Jane

The originally appeared, early last year, on Howie Abrams’ excellent No Echo site, but sheerly for the sake of evangelizing it, I’m sharing it here, too.

For backstory, check out Howie’s account, but this is Bad Brains just prior to I Against I as captured in the original Rock Hotel, over on Jane Street (which I’ve spoken about several times here, most recently here).

It’s remarkable stuff. Enjoy.