NYHC (then) and NYC (now)

This week my tour schedule drew me back to the land of my birth, my cradle of consciousness, my city-as-muse, New York City. I'm back here at least once a year, and whenever I return to NYC I reminisce a bit, recalling my youth and the New York Hardcore scene (NYHC) of the early '80s. So I thought I'd take you on a little photo tour of NYC (using my camera's phone; sorry for the poor photo quality), and compare NY now to my NYHC scene then. laced with a few stops to recall my teen years as well, also spend in the East Village.

I began by getting off the IRT #1 subway in Greenwich Village, and walking down Christopher Street to Washington Square Park.

Washington Square was once the site of a marshy swamp, and later of a pauper's cemetery. In the days of the Revolution it was used by George Washington as a troop training area, and that's how it got its name. The fountain, above, was built uptown on 59th street, but moved here in the 1870s. Until 1964 the park was simply the arch and the fountain, and Fifth Avenue traffic rambled around it (below). The rest of the park was built in '64. Bob Dylan, Peter Paul and Mary, and Rambling Jack Elliot all played music and sang there in the '60s.

Washington Square before 1964, historic pic from this site.

Being a hot summer day, the fountain is watery and wet, and kids and teens splash around in it. In the fall, winter and spring, the fountain is dry, and becomes a hang-out for skate boarders and hacky sack players. In '82, a lot of Punks would skate there.

I learned to play Bluegrass by playing around the Square with some of the best NY musicians, especially Gene Tambor of the Minetta Creek Bluegrass band. Gene and I played from about '76 through the early '80s in a band called the New York Frets. He taught me nearly everything I know about performing. We would play on the streets of Greenwich Village, either in front of the wrought iron fence around the NYU chapel on MacDougal, or near his house on Bleecker St. There were a lot of weird things going on when one busked in those days. Once while we were playing, a guy began dancing. He took off his shoes and danced barefoot. Then he took off his shirt and danced bare-chested. Then he took off his pants, and danced naked. That wasn't the weirdest part. He then walked away, leaving his clothes in a neat pile in front of the band. (I couldn't make this stuff up...).

Of course people still busk in the Square. Most of it is crappy, but sometimes you hear someone really good. Today was a really-good day. I ran into some of my New Orleans busking buddies just outside the fountain area. Lyle (who plays with me in Odd's Bodkin while in New Orleans), Daniel and Jordan do exactly what I do every year, leave NOLA to tour up north. It was just happenstance that we all ended up in NYC today.

Jordan is playing a musical saw, and she's really good at it. Jason Mankey, who was walking around NYC with me for some of today, asked me "how does one learn to play a musical saw?" I told him that, while I imagine there are Youtube videos about it, one just watches other saw players and learns.

Before leaving Washington Square, I had to walk by 27 Washington Square North...

If you have read my poetry, you know that I've written a ton of poems about a girl named Kate. My CD Little Birds Of Desire is also laced with songs about this mystery girl: Compact, Bonny Kate, and Love Letter To NY are all about her. My reluctant muse Kate grew up right here, on the corner of Washington Square North and MacDougal Street. That was her living room window. The window right above it was that of Luscious Jackson and Moppy Skuds alum Jill Cunniff. The two girls were somewhat inseparable in '81 and '82. My crush on Kate was unrequited, I'm sorry to say. She ended up dating Cro Mags lead screamer/bassist Harley Flannegan, much to my depression and sorrow. Of course, to her credit, I was kind of a jerk in '81.

Jill Cunniff, Luscious Jackson alum, in '82. This was how most of the Hardcore girls looked and dressed, sort of Siouxie Sioux inspired bag-lady chic. Photo by legendary Punk music producer Dave Parsons.

Reluctantly moving on from 27 WSN, I headed down Washington Square North to Astor Place/Cooper Square, home of the Cube. Here are two views of the sculpture that sits at the center of Astor place.

The cube (actually titled The Alamo  and created by sculptor Tony Rosenthal in 1967) is a popular tourist site, and if you push it pretty hard it rotates on its axis, a favorite pastime of drunk NYU students. It's also a popular skateboarding hangout, and in '82 there were always a dozen or so skaters tricking around the thing.

Directly across from the Cube is Cooper Union college, one of the best design schools in America. In '82 Punks used to hold a makeshift flea market outside Cooper Union. Dave Parsons, of Rat Cage Records, would sell Punk records off a blanket on the sidewalk, and Punks would sell their old clothes, belts, and records, books and magazines on the sidewalk.

Today there were two kind of normal-looking girls spare-changing there. (I'm used to spare changers looking like, well, spare changers. Usually Crusties...)

Their sign reads "out of work; boss was a jerk." A sign of the times? When I walked by later there were signs for a poet who would write a poem on demand (a common busking career in NOLA), but I never did see the poet.

I walked down to Saint Marks Place, which in '81 was the hub of NYHC. Here is a pic of Saint Marks in '81, courtesy of Even Worse bass player Rebecca Korbet-Wootton (in center on stairs):

And here's the same street today. The stoop pictured above is just to the left of the Saint Marks Hotel and the Trash and Vaudeville shop (picture below), which was one of the first Punk stores on Saint Marks Place.

Upstairs is Vaudeville, and downstairs is Trash (see below). It was and is an awesome clothing shop, though a bit pricey. Still, if you visit Saint Marks Place, you ought to stop in there. The girl who worked at Trash and Vaudeville in the late 70s was named Angel. She was an early Punk rocker, skinny to the point of emaciated and pretty hyper. She used to rehearse her Punk band in the shop. The first time I ever shopped at Vaudeville Angel made fun of me because I was using my mom's credit card (hey, I was 15!). We became friends after that.

Here's the downstairs shop, Trash:

 The building nest to Trash, the Saint Marks Hotel, is a landmark building, and looms large in the Punk legend. Before the early '70s the building had housed the gay baths. I remember passing the baths in '68 and '69 on my way to shows at the Fillmore East. By the time I moved to the East Village in '72 it had become the hotel. Many Punk notables lived there at one time or another, including Spacely/Gringo, a weird crustie Punk who was often called the "Mayor Of Saint Marks Place." Someone did an indie film about him in around '82, and to promote it they painted a huge billboard of his face over Saint Marks and Third. While there is a legendary Punk presence there, in '82 the Saint Marks Hotel was largely populated by druggies and hookers. There was this one very cute but very strung out little blond hooker with asymmetrical eyes who always asked me if I wanted "a date." Whatever my morality may have been in '82, I never had any money. Poor asymmetrical eyes hooker... Third Ave and Ninth Street was a hooker area then, as was Second and Tenth, so many girls who made a living that way lived in the hotel. Most of the girls were pretty enough (as opposed to street girls since Craig's List made it easy for attractive addicts to hook-from-home). The East Village was pretty squalid back then.  Anyway, quite a few of my NYHC friends resided in the Hotel on and off.

Just down the street from the hotel is the Grass Roots Tavern, a Saint Marks landmark.

When I first returned to NYC after my couple of years in college up at New Paltz, I was looking for the Punk scene. My college friend and Punk princess Nicole hung around the Grassroots, and it was there I first met Bobby Bratz, one of my best friends in the NYHC scene. Nicole and I used to drink there (yes, I used to drink) with my high-school-GF-turned-Punk-buddie Alice.

Nicole died in the early '90s (a lot of my friends died...I'm the only one who isn't either dead or famous these days). Alice speaks to me on occasion.

Moving down Saint Marks, we come to the corner of Saint Marks and Second:

This used to be the Saint Marks Theater. In '73 and '74, you could see three movies there for a dollar (my first date with Alice was seeing Woodstock and the Jimi Hendrix movie at that theater. She left in the middle of the date). I saw a lot of art films there, and by '81 they used to do a midnight show of Clockwork Orange, a Hardcore fave. We would all go on Saturday night, then proceed en masse to A7 (I'll be getting to that in a few moments). 

Kitty corner across Second Ave is the Orpheum Theater. Stomp has been playing there for as long as I've been around the East Village, maybe since '73. I'm not kidding. This is one thing about the Village that never seems to change.

Moving a few yards down Saint Marks, we come to number 74. My teen-aged home!

Today this is the Kaplan House; when I lived here it was the Stuyvesant Residence Home. Long story which perhaps I'll tell one day... anyway I lived here form around '72-76. 

Next door at 78, there lived, in '73, two women who had been former Playboy Bunnies. One had a teen daughter, Kristen if memory serves, who played guitar, so we became buddies. Mom and her friends would throw parties on the roof, and invite the teenaged boys from Stuyvesant residence. Then the women would be topless or nude at the parties. The '70s were a fun era... Kristen's mom would date a lot of the teen boys and move them in when they hit 21 and had to leave the residence home (not me...I was not so lucky. I simply moved in with my girlfriend in the Vassar college dorms).

When you grow up in the squalor and chaos that is the East Village, you really don't know anything else. Now, looking back at my teen years, I often comment to myself "wow, I grew up amidst squalor and chaos!"  It's truly not most peoples' teen experience. I really need to write my memoirs someday...

Across the street from Stuyvesant Residence is the Holiday Cocktail Lounge.

In '81, this Ukrainian bar didn't stand much on legal drinking ages (in the Ukraine there is no legal age limit), so they would serve anyone who could pay. The little Punk girls all drank there, and not one of them was 18 just yet. Next door is Stromboli's Pizza, the best pizza in NYC in the '70s and '80s. I went there today and found that they had built tables and chairs (in '81 we stood outside, eating pizza as we leaned against parked cars), and that the pizza had become a bit mediocre... yet still better than anything outside of NYC and Jersey.

Speaking of food, down First Avenue at 11th Street we come to Veniero's Cafe, the BEST Italian pastry cafe in America!! Really.

Since 1894, this place has served delicious Italian pastries. In '81, the front room staff was all Italian school girls, and the dining room staff was all tall, blond Ukrainian girls.Today I was waited on by a young man of nondescript ethnicity, who served me this:

The iced cappuccino  is iced with coffee flavor gelato ice cream. OMG!!! It's like a cappuccino milkshake. 

Yes, that is a wall of chocolate cake.It extends across the length of the front room, maybe 20 feet. The next case is cheesecakes of all descriptions. Then come the fruit cakes.

Just down twelfth street is my old tenement apartment, where I lived from '79 to about '83. I write about the place a lot...

E 12 st and Avenue A, my home for many years. It was a hideous ghetto then... now it's beautiful. 

Those trees were not there in '81. 

515 East Twelfth Street. The sew-Top Cleaners was a tax service in '80-83. I lived in the back building. There is a courtyard behind this building, and a smaller building in the back of that. It's a nice arrangement, because the front building muffles the noise from the street, and it's quite peacful back there. 

I lived for most of that time with Carol Louderbach. Here's a picture of Carol and her BF Barbara Taylor from around '83:

Carol is the seated six-foot Punk girl. Barbara says Carol's mom was taking the picture, and they couldn't think of anything picturesque to do, so they shook hands. Barbara and I remain friends. She lives in London now with her teenaged daughter. We can't seem to locate Carol. Punks are currently scouring the Earth looking for her, but to no avail. It's a real life mystery. Carol was dating one of the Bad Brains, so I would often come home to find three Bad Brains asleep on my kitchen floor and one in Carol's bed. The Bad Brains were kind of homeless in '82. They mostly lived in the recording studios at 171 Avenue A, where they, the Beastie Boys, the Stimulators and Reagan Youth would all record. Other days it was my kitchen floor.

After visiting 515, I walked across Tompkins Square Park to what used to be A7. On the way I was stopped by this woman. She knew me, mentioned people I knew, that she had just gotten out of jail (intent to incite, I believe, whatever that is), and that she was so glad to see me. I have no idea who this is...

She does have a Baphomet tattoo across her chest... still, I cannot place her.

From the park you can see the building that used to be the center of Hardcore Punk in '82, A7.

The building that used to house A7, seen from the park. A gaggle of Hardcores would hang out here in the park until the doors to A7 opened, usually between midnight and one AM. Then we'd march over in an orderly fashion. Billy Idol used to drink at A7 every night, as did several of the Plasmatics. Bands that played there included the Even Worse, the Moppy Scuds (some of whose members became Luscious Jackson), the Bad Brains, Reagan Youth, the Beastie Boys, the Cro Mags, and the Young Aborigines. I played there regularly with a band called Mara. Here I am in '82 playing on the stage at A7:

Here is the wall art on the building today:

Joe Strummer, immortalized here, was the founder of the Punk band The Clash, as well as a one-time member of Irish Punk-Folk band The Pogues. He was a Punk legend, though he never played at A7. 

The NYHC scene was a time and place in pop culture that will never happen again: the time and place was just right, and when it faded it was gone. I am forever grateful to have been a small part of that time and place. The death of Beastie Boy Adam Yauch this year brought a lot of us Punks together on Facebook, and we all ended up recalling those days and comparing stories (and scouring the Earth to search for Carol). Those of us who survived the era have moved on with our lives, but I think we all cherish that moment in time and our places in it. I still write about it a lot. I have a novel I'm finishing up set in NY in '81. I haven't been able to find a publisher just yet, but Jason Mankey assures me I ought to self publish the ebook. Your thoughts?

I return to NYC each year to see what has changed and what has stayed the same. I'll be hanging around the NY area for another few days, then I'll be heading back to Ohio for Starwood, and to upstate NY for the festivals at Brushwood.

From squalid, chaotic NYC, this is Kenny Klein explaining it all.

What Goes On In The French Quarter When You're Not There?

When people think of the French Quarter, what do they think of? Mardi Gras. Bourbon Street. Bars and strip clubs, alcohol, women showing skin for plastic bead throws. Or maybe French Quarter Fest, Jazz bands playing on stages set up on the streets (Jazz bands, by the way, that are not the bands that play in the Quarter every day that is NOT French Quarter Fest; the one above, playing near the Courthouse, is a band that plays here when it is NOT French Quarter fest). Or maybe people have come here for a convention, or a cruise, and think of the Quarter as a stopping-off point to have a drink on their way to the next event.

I admit that when I used to winter in NOLA, I'd get a place to stay close to the Quarter. I'd play on Royal Street, and when the season was over I'd leave town and head off to Georgia or Texas for renaissance faires. I knew nothing of the rest of the city. It really never occurred to me that there was more of the city. Later, when I worked for Carnival Cruise Lines and we docked near the Riverwalk, I would leave the ship by nine AM and head to Bourbon Street for some French Quarter amusement. Even the Riverwalk seemed like a strange, foreign place, nearly a mile from the Quarter.

So when I got involved with a girl a few years back who lived Uptown, I eyed her with trepidation. “You live in New Orleans...Uptown? You don't live in the French Quarter?” My mind could not even grasp this concept!

Now I myself live Uptown, though I spend a lot of my time in the French Quarter. I know a lot about the whole city. But the French Quarter is, for many people, the gateway to New Orleans. When I speak to people who have come here for Mardi Gras or French Quarter Fest, they are often curious about what goes on in the Quarter when they're not there.

Let's take a little trip through the French Quarter on an average weekday, when no special event is going on. We'll start at Frenchmen Street and Decatur, where stands a French Quarter landmark, the Old U. S. Mint.

This amazing building was a branch of the United States Mint (the folks who bring you the coins in your pockets!) from 1838 to 1861. It closed during the Civil War, but reopened from 1879 to 1909. In the few years before the Civil War, the coins minted here were CSA, rather than USA coins. (Collectors love the New Orleans Morgan Dollars, marked with an "O" mint mark). The building is now part of the Louisiana State Museum. One of its functions is to have brass band concerts on its lawns.

 Down Decatur just a bit is the Old Ursulines Convent, which the Parks Department calls "the finest example of French Colonial architecture in America."

The Ursuline Nuns were some of the first French women to arrive in New Orleans, sent by King Louis XV in 1727. They ran a hospital, taught the daughters of Noble families, and ministered to the native women. They'd built a smaller convent when they arrived, but moved into this incredible building in 1751, and stayed there until the 1820s (the Ursuline Nuns now have a convent and a school Uptown close to where I live). The convent is still used by the Church, and houses Saint Mary Cathedral; the street it stands on is still called Ursulines Street.

Above is a detail of the Saint Mary Cathedral.

The nuns gained a bit of a reputation in the 1700s when they brought French women to New Orleans as brides for wealthy French colonists. The women would arrive after six weeks at sea in an awful state, pale and disheveled, carrying coffin-sized steamer trunks. Word soon got out that the nuns were bringing vampires to the city to drain the aristocratic blood of French nobles! The local bishop apparently led a mob to the convent, volunteered to go in alone, and came out a few hours later claiming he had destroyed the vampires. This story is how the city got its vampire reputation.

Across Charters Street from the convent is the Beauregard Mansion with its stately courtyard. Beauregard was a highly decorated Confederate Civil War general (down here we call it the War of Northern Aggression).

Our most spectacular cathedral is the Saint Louis Cathedral, right up Decatur Sreet in Jackson Square. It has the distinction of being the oldest operating cathedral in the United States.

Here is Saint Louis Cathedral as seen from Jackson Square.

Here are the grounds.

The cathedral is open daily to visitors. Let's peek inside.

Cool, huh?

When we cross Decatur, watch out for the insane drivers. There are plenty of F^#*ing cars driving at any moment up and down Decatur Street. The cabs are the worst. But there are also two other modes of transportation worth noting.

The first is bicycles. Most of my busker friends live farther downtown, in the Lower Ninth ward or the Saint Claude area. They come to work in the Quarter every day on their bicycles, an instrument strapped to their back.

"Wait a minute! I have a bicycle too," you say. "Doesn't everybody?" Well here there is an entire bike culture. In fact we call the downtown females "bicycle girls." We have a store called Plan B: they'll help you make your own bike. It's an identity as well as a mode of transportation here. On any day in the Quarter, every gate, fence and column has a dozen or so bikes chained to it. It's how we roll. Really!

But OK, you're still unimpressed. You have a bicycle too. Maybe you even ride it to work every morning. Maybe you even love your bike with a New Orleanean passion. But do you have one of these?

I didn't think so... Yes, we use mules, all over the city. They draw carriages for tourists. They draw candy vendor carts. They draw floats for parades. They've even been involved in a wedding or two. And they're damn cute! Look at that face... All over the Quarter you find troughs of water for these critters. We love our mules. Next time you come down take a mule carriage tour. The drivers are the best tour guides in the city (aside from moi).

By the way, a mule is male. Do you know what a female mule is called? Maybe I'll tell you some time...

On our way from Ursulines to Jackson Square we run into our first of many street performers. This one has what nearly all street performers around here have: a dog. And his dog has puppies. I made the mistake of calling my girlfriend over to see them. I highly recommend not doing this, by the way...

Stop staring at the puppies. Let's head over to Jackson Square.

We love our history here in New Orleans. This cannon was fired in the War of 1812, the War of Northern Aggression (that would be the Civil War), and the Mexican American War. It now guards the river.

Below the cannon is this cool sign. The first riverboat to navigate the Ohio-Mississippi weighed anchor right here! I knew you would be utterly impressed.

In Jackson Square is a "human statue" street performer. They're pretty much all over the Quarter. I just like this human statue best of them all. I imagine you can figure out why that is...

The day I was down here, there happened to be a Mardi Gras Indian showing off his mask for tips (mask, you may remember from my previous Blogs, is the word for the entire costume). These costumes cost a LOT of money to construct. Some indians show off their current mask to make money to create their next mask. If you read my previous Blog, you'll know that this is a Flag Boy.

Let's head up to Royal Street next, passing the statue of Saint Joan, patroness saint of New Orleans, which we call Joanie On A Pony...

She stands over the French Market. A lot of bands play here. It's the only place in the FQ where bands need a permit to set up and play. I passed this band as I crossed Decatur under Joanie.

By the way, a female mule is a jenny. Let's head up to Royal.

Royal Street is lined with art galleries. Here are my friends playing Old Timey Fiddle outside the Blue Dog Gallery, home of local-painter-done-good George Rodrigue.

The fiddle player, Lyle, is also in a band with myself and singer Stephanie Mitchell. A lot of musicians down here, myself included, play in several bands. That way we work as often as possible.

Royal Street is closed off every day to auto traffic, and becomes a pedestrian mall. For that reason, many busking bands play here, as you can play right in the street and gather a good crowd. Here are my friends the Yes Ma'am Band playing at Royal and Toulouse.

Dizzy is an awesome washboard player, and is in great demand by several local bands. Washboard is our preferred rhythm instrument: easy to carry, easy to play, and with a sound unique to Cajun, early Jazz, and to String Band music. Most bands down here have a washboard (few players are as good as Dizzy though). Note the requisite dog at Dizzy's feet...every busker has one.

Elena is every bit as good a fiddler as me, and I do NOT say things like that lightly. She also dresses to match her bow. Nick on the banjo is also in a band with my buddy Hank. They are about the funniest band I know. I wish I could be as funny as Nick and Hank when they play. Yes Ma'am, while really good, is not very funny.

One bock down from Yes Ma'am, at Royal and Saint Phillip, is the Royal J band. They play early Jazz, and they have professional dancers accompanying them. The male dancer is also their singer.

The banjo player is Joseph, and yea, we're in a couple of bands together. I also used to be in a band with the drummer.

The female dancer also teaches swing dance classes at a couple of clubs around town, including the Spotted Cat on Frenchmen. You should check it out!

Before we leave the Quarter, we should walk down to the river. Here is one of my favorite statues along the river, representing the immigrant spirit. My grandfather came to America in about 1910, at the age of nine. I think of him when I see this...

This is the other end of the statue, the spirit guiding the immigrants to American shores.

And finally, a dog, belonging to a busker friend of mine. Yes, they all have one.

From the French Quarter in New Orleans, this is Kenny Klein explaining it all.