I hate to keep mining the Facebook group Manhattan Before 1990, but there’s so much gold to be found there. In any case, this morning a participant named Ino Yoon posted the photograph below by O Yoon (a parent, maybe?) from 1982, and it instantly rang a bell.
This immediately recalled a photo search I’d done back in 2011, looking for the location of a photo of the Beastie Boys that first appeared in SPIN, snapped by Josh Cheuse. Here’s that photo now.
The band later used a shot from that same session as the cover of this hits compilation...
In any case, this is the southwest corner of West 26th and Broadway, which is right around the corner from the St. James Building, wherein the Beasties had one sort of business arrangement or another.
Here's my then-still-very-little Oliver in that same spot in 2011. Today, this corner is occupied by a restaurant called La Picora Bianca Nomad.
Longtime blogging compatriot and celebrated author Jeremiah Moss made what I consider an amazing discovery today and posted it on his Instagram account. As many will recall, the iconic Gem Spa on the corner of Second Avenue and St. Marks Place closed back in 2020, and has been basically a dormant shell ever since. Well, there’s been an uptick in activity in its footprint, of late, and in removing the plywood facades and scaffolding, a remarkable artifact from a vanished age was uncovered.
Among a selection of weathered, age-old flyers, this one below was newly revealed on a pole, advertising what looks to be a glam band from 1974. Oddly enough, the gig in question was for a venue way uptown on East 84th and York Avenue called Brandy’s II. This same year, notorious proto-punk electronic duo Suicide also played Brandy’s II a couple of times.
The original Brandy’s, of course, is a fabled piano bar which was a big favorite of the Upper East Side’s gay community (and still there, happily, in 2022). Brandy’s II, meanwhile, was situated at 1584 York Ave. I actually lived in this very neighborhood from about 1983 until about 1996, although I believe Brandy’s II was already long-gone before I moved in. The notion of a rock club being right in the neighborhood was already nigh on unthinkable. Until recently, that spot that had been Brandy's II was simply a watering hole called ... Saloon, but I believe that, too, is now gone.
Here’s a closer shot of the band in question — does anyone recognize these happenin’ hepcats?
Incidentally, if you haven’t already, you really need to pick up a copy of Jeremiah Moss’ second book, “Feral City.” Ostensibly an account of Moss’ time voluntarily sequestered in Manhattan during the extent of the pandemic (not that it’s over, mind you), “Feral City” is also a remarkably personal memoir of one individual’s perceptions of the acute changes New York City has undergone during this particularly fraught period of history. It’s a raw and bracing read that pulls very few punches. But Moss’ eloquence, unflinching candor and human compassion shine throughout, even when he’s at his most curmudgeonly. “Feral City” provides a compelling voice to demographics, issues and concerns that otherwise have to fight for equal time and representation in our current cultural and sociopolitical climate. It can be uncomfortable in spots, but it is well worth your time.
For those of you who are invested in such things, you’ve probably already seen that the next iteration of the mural on the southwest corner of Bleecker Street at the Bowery, which I recently invoked here, is complete. That’s it up above and, yes, it’s another Shepard Fairey piece, this one paying tribute to Bad Brains by way of a rendered composite of images from the photography of my former next-door neighbor, Glen E. Friedman. That’s it above.
Now that this work is complete, I thought I’d turn back the clock to look at what this particular patch of real estate borne witness to, over the years….
In 1982, as I recounted here and here, photographer Drew Carolan set up an ersatz, outdoor film studio on this same corner to capture images of the burgeoning NYHC community, which he’d later compile into a handsome coffee table book, “Matinee.” In writing about this project, I had my kids pose in the exact spot Carolan had used. See that below.
In 1983, Jim Jarmusch filmed an iconic scene of Eszter Balint crossing this particular byway as part of the opening montage of his 1984 film, “Stranger Than Paradise,” which I tried to replicate with my kids as some point in 2012.
Skipping way ahead to 2015, a mysterious mural of Joey Ramone sporting a pair of boxing gloves came up. I speculated as to why, but then it occurred to me, as recounted on this post, that it was ultimately a wafer-thin and frankly misleading promotion for the then-just-opened UpperCut boxing gym, which I continue to think was stinky and lame of them. I was glad when it vanished.
Much as with love, it seems the things you really want only reveal themselves to you when you’re not actually searching for them. In this romantic fashion, another tantalizing morsel about the long-lost Blue Willow on Broadway at Bleecker Street recently dropped out of the sky, and I thought I’d share it here.
It’s usually at this point in the narrative that I point out how strenuously niche this particular concern is, and how I normally doubt anyone is as beguiled as I am by the subject. But upon posting that last entry about it, longtime friend/reader of the blog, Was Proxy, nicely wrote in to share that the Blue Willow had been the location of the first date he had with the woman who later became his wife. I’m taking that as a sign.
In any case, prompted by the recent release of the the 40th anniversary edition of If I Die, I Die by the Virgin Prunes (which I wrote about recently here … and yes, I bought it, making it the fucking fifth iteration I’ve actually bought of this album), I’d been trawling around on the internet looking for pics of the first time I ever saw Gavin Friday perform live, that being from within the iconic confines of CBGB in November of 1989. As long as we’re talking anniversaries, I should note that this past week was evidently the 49th anniversary of the opening of that fabled club. Don’t bother telling Gavin Friday that, though. My biggest takeaway from that evening, beyond it being a brilliant performance — his solo debut, was his remark from the stage about how underwhelmed he was by the stark reality that CBGB genuinely was just a grotty hole in the wall. What exactly had he been expecting?
Anyway, I didn’t take any pictures that night, mostly because I didn’t bring my big, bulky camera (which, as some of you’ll remember, in 1989, was still the only means of capturing photographs). I have very specific images in my head about the show, but have always hoped to find some photographic documentation of the gig. But I’ve always come up empty in that search….
…until today … kinda.
Simply by typing in “Gavin Friday” and “CBGB,” this morning, up popped a link on Google for a website called Concert Archives. While the entry for the gig in question is pretty threadbare, it did contain two images, ironically uploaded by a friend of mine — Greg Fasolino. More about him in a second.
Greg uploaded two sides of a postcard from Island Records that was mailed out in November of 1989 as a special invitation to the gig. Now, during this time, I was still a luckless intern at SPIN (as recently discussed here), and had not yet wormed my way into the good graces of various record-company publicists around town who’d put me on promotional lists like the one Greg was on. That would all come later, but at the time, I’d simply heard about the gig by word of mouth and paid at the door (with my friend Rob B.) for entry.
But the postcard is a puzzle, and I’ll explain why. Here’s the front…
…and here’s the back.
Two things struck me about this. First up, you’ll see that following that November 14th performance at CB’s, there was actually an afterparty just down the fucking street at, appropriately enough, the Blue Willow (which, if you’ve not caught up in your reading, thus far, was the location of the cover shot of Gavin’s debut solo album, Each Man Kills the Thing He Loves, Here that is again.
I didn’t know that, at the time, as I hadn’t gotten a special invitation postcard like Greg had. Moreover, I wouldn’t make the connection between the Blue Willow and Each Man Kills… (as first recounted in my debut post on the subject) until friggin’ 2013. Had I known, I’d have gone down to meet the great man and the significance of the venue would have dawned on me, but `twas not to be. If memory serves, after the show, Rob B. and I repaired to CB’s 313 Gallery next door for beers and I sprang for my first black CBGB shirt, which amazingly still fits today, although it’s currently buried in a drawer in my mom’s house out in Quogue.
But the puzzle is as follows: This postcard is advertising Gavin Friday’s first-ever performance at CBGB in November of 1989. Figuratively turn the card over to the picture side, and you see a shot of Gavin performing next to a cellist, appended with the legend: “Gavin Friday Onstage at CBGB. Photo by Paraic Finnegan.” Has anyone figured out the discrepancy, yet?
How can there be a picture of Gavin allegedly performing at CBGB on an invitation to what would have then been his first-ever performance at CBGB?
Before you recommend it, yes, I’ve started searching for more info on photographer Paraic Finnegan, although my hopes for success are not high.
There is, of course, the possibility that the two images Greg uploaded are NOTfrom the same postcard. * ADDENDUM: SCROLL DOWN
In later years, I would go onto interview Gavin Friday at the the home of his publicist, then on White Street in TriBeCa, and would go onto see him perform live at Sin-E on St. Marks Place, The Bottom Line on 4th Street and the Westbeth Theatre on Bank Street. As of late 2022, along with CBGB and CB’s 313 Gallery, all of those live-music venues are gone.
Gavin Friday went onto release a string of great solo albums and soundtracks and spent many years being creative consultant to his pals in U2. His most recent project involves writing music for a forthcoming documentary on volatile figurative painter, Francis Bacon. I’m looking forward to that.
As for Greg Fasolino, Greg and I walked very parallel paths. I think he might be a couple of years older than myself, but he was a regular face at many of the same gigs and same anglophilic record shops around town. He also worked for a while at a music magazine called Reflex, which was kind of the rival indie periodical to the one I latched onto while at SPIN, that being the New York Review of Records. Don’t bother looking for either mag today, but that’s a long saga in itself. In any case, Greg and I found each other again on social media, probably a decade ago or so, and have been friends ever since.
In terms of the Blue Willow, meanwhile, as mentioned on that previous post, the douchey menswear concern that previously occupied that lofty space vacated some time ago. The ground-floor space previously occupied by Atrium, KITH and probably several other ventures after The Blue Willow today remains dormant and papered up. But, in walking by that corner the other day, I noticed some rips in the paper and got out my phone, heartened to see that the stately marble trimming that Gavin Friday posed near all those years ago can still be seen…
I also found this. Should have a spare several million dollars lying around, why not treat yourself to a luxury apartment in the building in question (644 Broadway)... they're ....uhhh... quite nice, as you'll see.
More on Gavin Friday & the Blue Willow on Flaming Pablum:
*ADDENDUM: Shortly after publishing this post, I shared it on Facebook, where Greg Fasolino swiftly replied:
I can clarify all, my friend. The live image is not connected to the postcard at all. It’s a clip from a local NYC Irish-culture newspaper “The Irish Echo.” You can see me in the bottom right of image, watching Gavin perform while sitting at the front table at CBGB.
P.S. I also interned at Spin in 1986-87 and wrote for New (York) Review of Records as well circa 1993-95.
Here's the picture from The Irish Echo, and that is indeed Greg sitting in the very front. The question, then, remains -- what was on the front of the postcard? Funny you should ask. Greg shared that, too. It's the naked couple from the album cover:
Lastly, here is Greg's own interview with Gavin Friday for the aforementioned Reflex, recorded just two months prior to the gig at CBGB:
Okay, strap in, `cos this is really confusing one, and I’m bound to get something wrong, so please bear with me.
I covered a lot of this in this recent post, but at some point in about 2019, a friend of mine sent me a music video from an Argentinian artist named Charly Garcia. My friend rightly figured I’d be interested in it, as it featured several shots of my beloved downtown Manhattan circa 1989. In the course of writing about that, however, I realized that I had remembered this guy Charly Garcia because of an album he’d put out some years earlier called Modern Clix. I wasn’t familiar with the music on that record, but had been initially struck by the title and the sleeve. The cover art was significant as it featured a shot of Charly sitting beneath some familiar street art (specifically one of Richard Hambleton’s “shadow men,” which I’d addressed here), but more because of the legend “MODERN CLIX” that was scrawled in spray paint above his head. Whether Charly knew it or not, at the time, that was the name of a local punk band led by one Fran Powers.
Fran Powers was a face on the early New York Hardcore scene, given his membership in bands like Ultra Violence, Whole Wide World and, once again, Modern Clix (not actually a hardcore band, but more of a punk/ska/reggae/funk hybrid – you can hear some of their music here). I’d first spied Fran’s face via the photographs of Brooke Smith (who I just interviewed) and made the connection between Modern Clix and this cryptic graffiti I used to spy all over downtown – this warrior figure holding a spear. Shortly after that, I attended a party thrown by SoHo Memory Project’s Yukie Ohta in SoHo (duh!) and ended up running right into Fran Powers (I mean literally running into -- he was boarding an elevator I was exiting) and we started chatting. Shortly after that, I discovered he’d made a crazy cameo in my favorite movie of all time, Martin Scorsese’s “After Hours,” so I reached back out to him to interview him about that, and we became friends from that point on.
Again, I’ve already covered all this stuff a bunch of time, most notably here when I stumbled across some photographs that revealed the exact location of the Hambleton and Modern Clix graffiti that ended up on Charly Garcia’s album cover. As reported in that post, the spot was on the southwest corner of Walker Street at Cortlandt Alley. The shot up at the top is me at that same corner but, just as a refresher, here’s the cover photo from the original sleeve in question:
Alright, so I put up that post in April, and pretty much thought, “well, that’s that, right?”
Wrong.
Two things then happened.
The first was a note from a gentleman named Iñaki Rojas. Iñaki is a writer from Mendoza, Argentina who was putting a book together about the backstory of the Charly Garcia/Fran Powers/Richard Hambleton confluence that manifested itself as Garcia’s Modern Clix album. What I’d never quite realized, of course, was that Charly Garcia is not just “some Argentine musician” as I’d described him but evidently, like, practically the Latin American David Bowie -- an artist with profound reach and influence around that region of the world. His acolytes are legion. I mean, we’re such provincial snobs here in the United States that just because an artist doesn’t sing in English, we can’t be bothered to investigate their music, but I feel completely duty-bound to now go procure myself a copy of Garcia’s iconic Modern Clix album and do my due diligence.
The second thing to happen, tragically, was the untimely death of Fran Powers that following June. As I expressed in my farewell post to the man, there was so much more I’d have loved to discuss with him, but we simply never had the opportunity. As another random tendril of connection, Fran also played in a short-lived band with former Even Worse vocalist and fellow Flaming Pablum Interview survivor, RB Korbet.
Anyway, over the course of several emails, Iñaki quizzed me on some of the minutia I’d discussed in my previous posts on the subject and I shared some pictures of the location as it appears today (that’s where the shot at the top of this post comes from). Ever since then, he’s been working away on this master project, and has been gradually posting a series of YouTube videos that go into great, crazy, obsessive depth about the whole saga.
If you’re at all curious, you can check them out below. If, like myself, you don’t speak the language, simply click on the setting icon on the lower bar and select the English subtitles option.
Part One...
Part Two....
Look forward to Parts Three, Four and Five coming soon!
Never mind fuckin’ “Thriller,” the greatest music video of all time is 1984’s “All That I Wanted” by Belfegore, and directed by bugfuck-insane Polish cinematographer, Zbigniew Rybczynski.
Don’t believe me? Watch the below and get ready to admit you were fatuously mistaken.
I’ve spoken about this clip before, but someone uploaded the crisper, sharper iteration of the video onto YouTube a few days ago, so I felt compelled to share.
The video was filmed on Pier 25, across the West Side Highway from N. Moore Street in TriBeCa. Today it looks like this…
Back in 2013, I had my kids try to replicate the video. Here’s them doing that now.
Belfegore, meanwhile, didn’t last. Despite being produced by noted Krautrock pioneer and Killing Joke producer Conny Plank, their self-titled LP on Elektra was also their last. I believe the lead singer later became a physical therapist.
Over on Facebook, my friend and fellow NYHC acolyte Lou posted a shot from a deleted scene from "The Warriors." Lou writes
A scene that never made it into the movie or as a deleted scene. The Warriors walking through The Savage Huns territory. It was filmed in an alley in Soho.
Here's that photo now....
Now, I like to think I'm fairly familiar with the topography of lower Manhattan, at this point, but I can't think of an alley in SoHo that matches this terrain. It's certainly not Cortlandt Alley off of Canal.
I postulated that this might be St. John's Lane, an alley that extends between Laight Street and Beach Street at the mouth of Tribeca, just steps to the west of Sixth Avenue. There's been a lot of development since 1979, but here's that strip now...
I’ve been very lucky, over the years, to have found people for whom my weird little posts resonate. I’m always skeptical that some trivial factoid that I’m all hot and bothered about will actually connect with a reader that shares that particular enthusiasm, but every now and then, it happens. I’m also continually amazed that some items that I just blithely mention in passing get latched onto and widely circulated. Which stories find their audience and why are not an exact science, by any stretch.
In any case, this entry is something of a minuscule follow-up to one of those stories I was somewhat inexplicably all fired up about upon first posting it. Technically, all it’s really about is a room in a long-vanished restaurant where a photograph was taken, but something about the story has always continued to haunt me. Let’s see if I can capably encapsulate it.
Back in 2013, I put up a post titled “Searching for the Blue Willow.” The Blue Willow, by way of explanation, was an eatery on the northeast corner of Broadway and Bleecker Street that was allegedly open between October of 1983 and some point in 1990. I never dined in that establishment, I’m sad to say, but it was notable to me in that I’d gleaned that one of its rear chambers had served as the location for the photograph that graced the cover of one of my favorite albums of all time, that being Each Man Kills The Thing He Loves by Gavin Friday and The Man Seezer. Here’s that cover now.
Cool, right?
Exuding a beguiling air of what I called “elegant decrepitude” in that first post, the sleeve of Each Man Kills… features Gavin Friday, former singer in Dublin’s macabre post-punk combo, the Virgin Prunes, leaning with louche aplomb against the piano of musical co-conspirator Maurice Seezer, depicted with his back to the viewer as he presumably plays. Beneath a stylishly distressed wall of stripped wallpaper, a nude couple embraces next to a glowing jukebox. Snapped by renowned Dutch rock photographer Anton Corbijn, the image says absolutely nothing about the era in which it was captured. It’s a mysterious picture that perfectly matches the sound, sentiment and sensibility of the album it sheathes. You’d never know that, at the time this photo was taken, the pop charts were caked with idiotic offal like “I’m Too Sexy” by Right Said Fred and “Gonna Make You Sweat” by C+C Music Factory, but I digress.
I have no idea whose idea it was to shoot the cover and accompanying promo images and single sleeves in the Blue Willow, but I can only imagine Gavin had happened upon it and been enchanted by its noirish, old-world atmosphere. Or maybe it was just a lucky fluke. Regardless, when I learned the name and the location of the restaurant (regrettably over a decade and a half after it closed its doors), I was immediately compelled, as detailed in that first post, to check out what was in that space in 2013.
At the time, of course, it was a douchey menswear emporium called Atrium who leant out its rear space — the very chamber where the the sleeve of Each Man Kills… was taken — to a pricey sneaker concern called, inexplicably, KITH. As you’ll see back on that first post, only traces of the original details of Corbijn’s cover could still be seen, notably the flooring and some of the marble trim that was depicted in some of the other photos from the shoot.
A couple of years after that, I posted a quick follow up to report that even those remaining elements were, by that point, covered up.
That was pretty much that. I remember posting the original piece on a discussion board about Gavin Friday and the Virgin Prunes. Already converted to the cause, so to speak, that community was duly intrigued and appreciative, but the layperson probably doesn’t care too much. But I remained so intrigued by the Blue Willow and always wanted to see more.
The only problem was…. there wasn’t much out there about it. I forget where I’d found it, but I did have an image of a matchbook from the place, as well as a fleeting mention of the eatery taken from a 1984 article in the Times about its then-slow-gentrifying neighborhood. Here’s the crucial mention from that piece.
'Back then, Lower Broadway was a bankrupt neighborhood with bums lying around in doorways,'' said Martin Fine. Mr Fine, a lawyer, owns the four-month-old Blue Willow restaurant at 644 Broadway at the corner of Bleecker Street. All the food in his restaurant is cooked without salt. Mr. Fine also owns the building it occupies, a former bank with handsome moldings and chandeliers. ''A few of us bought buildings here because we knew that someday the area would be hot,'' Mr. Fine said.
Where is Martin Fine today, one wonders.
In any case, beyond the images on and associated with Each Man Kills The Thing He Loves and that matchbook, I had no other visual ephemera to pair with the place.
Until today.
For no readily apparent reason, I was doing some random Googling, as I’m wont to do, and thoughtlessly entered the words “Blue Willow” and “Bleecker.” While the same images I’d posted on my blog about the Gavin Friday album came right up, a link to the Poster Museum also came up with a “vintage poster” of the place that practically blew a new part in my hair. Here’s the prefacing text.
"644 Broadway Corner Bleecker Street. New York, New York. Open Late."
Original vintage poster for a Chinese restaurant, the Blue Willow. The poster illustration features a bustling dining room, a waitress incoming with a majestic peacock on a platter—not to be eaten, I hope!
Artist: Kristen Johnson
Year: c. 1975
Condition: Fair, please note some small tears along the poster's perimeter. The appearance of tears can be significantly improved by having the poster linen-backed.
Here’s the image now….
Anyone notice the discrepancy?
Clearly, this is the very same Blue Willow, given the correlating address, but the Poster Museum believes this artifact dates back “circa 1975,” when, by the fleeting accounts I’ve tracked down, including the afore-cited New York Times piece, the restaurant didn’t open until 1983.
Like I said, this probably means so much less to most folks than it means to me, but the fact that since 2013, I’ve been able to discern that the Blue Willow boasted a kind of Belle Epoque vibe, served Chinese food and prepared its fare without any salt helps complete the picture.
Here in 2022, I can report that Atrium has since closed and vacated the premises at 644 Broadway. Noxious footwear concern KITH, meanwhile, decamped and moved a block to the east, taking over the old “Peace Pentagon” building that used to house Paper Tiger TV and Marty’s Cool Stuff.
Gavin Friday went onto release on a few more truly excellent albums before focussing predominantly on soundtrack work. His last proper solo album was 2011’s Catholic.
That ground-floor space at 644 has now been vacant, dormant and covered up since well prior to the pandemic. I am unrealistically hoping that whatever venture next occupies that space sees fit to restore some of the hidden trappings first captured on the sleeve of Each Man Kills…, but with my luck, its next iteration will be a AT&T cell phone outlet.
Every now and again, someone will latch onto an old post of mine and share it on social media. It’s rare that I’m able to track down how the post is being framed or re-purposed, but I’m also curious as to which posts garner such second winds. I noticed one such post get a re-discovery boost today, and felt compelled to bring proceedings up to speed.
Regular readers might remember an entry I posted here back in 2015 about an arguably obscure British band from the early `70s called Dr. Feelgood (not to be confused with the Motley Crue album of the same name). In a nutshell, Dr. Feelgood was a “pub rock” band who played a taut, hardscrabble brand of R&B (and by that I mean guitar-based rhythm and blues, not schmaltzy loverman ballads) in an era when the pervading tastes were more inclined towards mellow, Laurel Canyon-styled singer/songwriters and the more indulgent aspects of shaggy prog rock. They were loud, bawdy and aggressive and played songs that were comparatively short, sharp and shocking. Basically, Dr. Feelgood were out-of-step punks before punk was punk.
In any case, this particular post of mine concentrated on a tiny aspect of a documentary made about them by filmmaker Julien Temple called “Oil City Confidential.” In one fleeting seqeunce therein, Temple divulges that former lead singer Lee Brilleaux (above) had passed away in 1994 from cancer. While recounting same, Temple showed strangely incongruous footage of a tiny memorial plaque in Brilleaux’s honor on a park bench in my own Manhattan’s West Village. Acting on a hunch, I tracked down the actual bench and plaque, as documented in that post, in Jackson Square. On the surface, it made absolutely zero sense to have a memorial plaque to Lee Brilleaux in the West Village of Manhattan, given that the fabled frontman never lived on these shores, nor had any tangible connection to New York City.
Towards the end of that post, meanwhile, I disclosed that a compatriot of mine had solved the riddle, sharing that a nearby art gallery, White Columns, had done a whole installation about Dr. Feelgood, one aspect of which was affixng Lee’s small plaque to a bench in Jackson Square. The link I posted in that orignal entry no longer goes to the explainer page, but I found another page with the full story (and pictures) still available here. Apparently, the plaque was put up at some point in 2005, a decade before I discovered it through Julien Temple’s film.
Noting that my post was being re-circulated, however, I thought it was prudent, once again, to bring things up to date. If you go looking for Lee Brilleaux’s memorial plaque here in 2022, I am sad to relay that you will not find it. For whatever reason, what started off as the only memorial park-bench plaque in Jackson Square has been replaced by a slew of new ones commemorating since-deceased figures who, more than likely, actually have some genuine connection to the park, unlike dear, departed Lee. That makes sense, of course, but I miss the strange little anomaly of that furtive tribute.
Meanwhile, for those curious, here’s some great footage of Dr. Feelgood in action, taken from a French television program from 1976 called “Beau Fixe Sur Pithiviers.” The band shows up in a vintage blue convertible in the beginning, then plug in and rock your face off starting at around 01:59.
Someone posted the photo below on Facebook, and it immediately got the wheels a-turning.
This is, of course, the greatest living American, Iggy Pop, louchely perched aside the vehicle of New York’s Bravest. Ig’s looking comparatively young, here, so I’m going to guess this was taken at some point in the early `80s. In any case, when I spied the terraced building on the left-hand side of the photo, I thought of the giant, white-bricked building on the corner of East 9th Street and Third Avenue (where Joey Ramone used to live), which would put Iggy on the northeast corner of St. Marks and Third Avenue, a locale he would have lived relatively close to in that era (for certain spells, Iggy had an apartment on Mercer Street, and then later in the Christadora House on Avenue B). Here’s the corner of St. Marks and Third, more or less, today….
Sure, they look kinda similar, but several things don’t quite add up to make this a lock.
The firetruck Mr. Pop is leaning against is emblazoned with (as far as we can surmise) the legend FDNY 16. According to some quick Googling, the firehouse for FDNY Engline 16/Ladder 7 is on East 29th Street. That’s neither here nor there, really, but what would a firetruck from East 29th Street be doing on St. Marks Place?
There’s a bit of signage at the top of the photo for a concern called “Ernest Lo Nano Interiors.” Further Googling reveals that said establishment was perched at 201 East 67th Street.
Et voia….
It’s partially obscured by trees, but I think this is the corner, although that does not explain why a firetruck from 29th Street (if that’s even accurate) was there, much less why the great Iggy Pop was in that neighborhood of the comparatively sleepy Upper East Sid.
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