It's curtains down for 'punk' club CBGB in Manhattan
Posted on : Mon, 16 Oct 2006 12:36:00 GMT | Author : Roland Waite
News Category : Entertainment
NEW YORK: The legendary rock club CBGB closed its doors finally after 33 years of being an icon for the punk in downtown New York with a farewell show Sunday night by rock poet Patti Smith.
All efforts to settle a rent dispute and retain its rights to stay ended in futility for the club's activist-members as a homeless advocacy group, which owns the property, the Bowery Residents Committee, decided not to renew the lease, which expired in August 2005. The club will close down 31 October.
Along with her longtime band members, Lenny Kaye, Jay Dee Daugherty and Tony Shanahan, Smith sang band favorites and cover songs from the Rolling Stones, The Who, Blondie, Lou Reed and the Yardbirds. The 350-capacity hall was packed with more than 500 fans.
Smith said the club may end its activities in Manhattan, but it will continue in other ways.
She described CBGB as a state of mind at a pre-show press meet. "The new kids have to have their own places."
The closure has brought in protests, tributes and vigils, but the club's owner Hilly Kristal decided he is giving up the legal fight.
The club, the full name of which is CBGB & OMFUG, or Country Bluegrass Blues and Other Music For Uplifting Gormandizers, had been the launching pad for several punk-rock music groups. As new bands found no outlets to perform publicly, it had allowed them to experiment and reach out to audiences for the high-energy rock 'n' roll that eventually became "punk." It has helped many careers to bloom, including those of the Ramones, Blondie, the Talking Heads, the Patti Smith Group and Television. All along, it has been icon in Manhattan's music scene.
Saturday, the club witnessed Blondie singer Deborah Harry setting her tunes as part of a weeklong farewell.
Kristal, 74, and a cancer patient, has plans to move the club to Las Vegas. Its CBGB Fashions is expected to move on 1 November to a nearby location at Broadway and Bond Street.
The Bowery Residents Committee, which has a 45-year lease on the building, houses 250 homeless people, who stay in apartments above the club.
http://www.earthtimes.org/articles/show/9495.html
16th October 2006 10:02 AM
Ten Thousand Motels
VIVA LAS VEGAS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Spoken: yall still want me to come with you?
Bright light city gonna set my soul, gonna set my soul on fire
Theres a whole lot of money thats ready to burn
So get those stakes up higher.
Theres a thousand pretty women just a-waitin out there,
And theyre all livin devil-may-care.
Im just the devil with a love to spare.
Viva las vegas.
Viva las vegas.
Spoken: ah, thank-ya very much baby.
And how I wish that there were more
Than twenty-four hours in the day.
But even if there were forty more,
I wouldnt sleep a minute away.
Oh, theres blackjack and poker and a roulette wheel.
A fortune won and lost on every deal.
All you needs a strong heart and a nerve of steel.
Viva las vegas.
Viva las vegas.
Viva las vegas.
Viva las vegas.
Viva las vegas with your neon flashin,
And your one-armed bandits crashin
All those hopes down the drain.
Viva las vegas turnin day into nighttime,
Turn the night into daytime,
If you see it once, youll never come home again.
Im gonna keep on the run,
Im gonna have me some fun,
If it costs me my very last dime.
If I wind up broke,
Then Ill always remember that I had a swingin time.
Im gonna give it everything Ive got.
Lady luck please let the dice stay hot.
Let me shoot a seven with every shot.
Viva las vegas.
Viva las vegas.
Viva las vegas.
Viva las vegas.
Viva, viva.
16th October 2006 10:13 AM
mojoman
BOO-HOO
16th October 2006 10:13 AM
Jeep
[Edited by Jeep]
16th October 2006 10:24 AM
Jeep
16th October 2006 10:39 AM
Fiji Joe
Punk club with an awning...it was way past time for that place to be closed
16th October 2006 10:58 AM
LadyJane
Very Sad!
So glad Patti closed the show!!!
Vegas?? No f'ing way!
LJ.
16th October 2006 11:07 AM
nankerphelge
Joey?
16th October 2006 11:28 AM
Ten Thousand Motels
I don't understand some folks aversion to Vegas. After all isn't entertainment what Rock N Roll is all about????
10 years from now they'll all have clubs in Vegas. Stones, Dylan, Bowie, Meatloaf, etc.
16th October 2006 11:30 AM
mojoman
quote:Ten Thousand Motels wrote:
I don't understand some folks aversion to Vegas. After all isn't entertainment what Rock N Roll is all about????
10 years from now they'll all have clubs in Vegas. Stones, Dylan, Bowie, Meatloaf, etc.
vegas. the branson fer rock and roll. you might be right TTM.
16th October 2006 11:53 AM
Bitch
I'm really sad to see it go, I've spent some of the craziest nights of my life there in the late 70's and early 80's. It was an "after hours" club, the punk rockers would come out after midnight, in the coolest clothes shoes, accessories and make-up, to hear the punk rock bands which were so ultra fvcking outrageous. Blondie was my favorite, and The Ramones. Lots of coke was snorted in the bathroom, which was really in need of revovatins 30 years ago. When I went there in January 06 to see Blondie play, it hadnt changed a bit, was still exactly the same as it was 30 years ago. The place was a landmark, lots of great talent took off there, it was an incredibly hip club which defined the punk rock scene in it's early beginning and thru the years has given us much music and great times.
16th October 2006 12:05 PM
monkey_man
I spent many weekend days there going to matinee punk shows in the early 80's. I'm really sad to see it go. I went in there for the last time in Aug to say goodbye!
FUCK CB's in Vegas!!
16th October 2006 01:49 PM
GotToRollMe
quote:Jeep wrote:
Ah, there's my girl! I was too knackered from Chicago to make it there last night for the last show. Back in the '70s I spent many nights in CB's seeing some of the best rock and roll (especially in '75-'76 when things were just starting to happen - pre-"punk" even!) and having the time of my life. It was an exciting time to be alive, and the music scene had seemingly endless possibilities. I'm gonna miss it.
[Edited by GotToRollMe]
16th October 2006 01:58 PM
Jaxx
they've been talking about this for months now. so sad. lots of great bands made their mark there: talking heads, blondie, the ramones to name a few. R I P. even if they reopen it in vegas ( and why not??, entertainment center that it is) it will still be lacking the funk of that old downtown building.
16th October 2006 01:58 PM
jb
long over due...it had it's day, and it is was time for it to close.
16th October 2006 01:59 PM
Saint Sway
Jaxx is posting like crazy today!
I suspect the Blondie review will be stickied
16th October 2006 02:07 PM
Gazza
If it does, I predict it'll be unstickied even faster!
16th October 2006 02:25 PM
Saint Sway
not a fan, eh?
16th October 2006 02:39 PM
pdog
When a punk club goes the way of nostalgia, I realize my decision to retire my mohawks and green dreads was a good decision.
Remember kids, keep your rock and roll in your heart, not your head, and all will be well.
CBGB's RIP!
16th October 2006 04:52 PM
Paranoid_Android
Word is the club will have franchieses...like HRC...HoB...etc...CB's London...CB's...CB's Miami...CB's Tokyo...etc etc...Las Vegas will be the launching ground...for the capital must be made first...no better place than Lost Wages...I mean Las Vegas to raise $$$$
16th October 2006 09:14 PM
mac_daddy
quote:Rock 'n' Roll High School
By RICHARD HELL
October 14, 2006
CBGB'S shuts down this weekend.
There's not too much left to say about the character of the joint. It's the most famous rock 'n' roll club in the world, the most famous that there ever has been, and it's just as famously a horrendous dump. It's the archetypal, the ur, dim and dirty, loud, smelly and ugly nowhere little rock 'n' roll club. There's one not much different from it in every burg in the country.
Only, like a lot of New York, CBGB's is more so, way more so. And of course, for three or four years in the mid-70's, it housed the most influential cluster of bands ever to grow up -- or to implicitly reject the concept of growing up -- under one roof.
On practically any weekend from 1974 to 76 you could see one or more of the following groups (here listed in approximate chronological order) in the often half-empty 300-capacity club: Television, the Ramones, Suicide, the Patti Smith Group, Blondie, the Dictators, the Heartbreakers, Talking Heads, Richard Hell and the Voidoids, and the Dead Boys. Not to mention some often equally terrific (or equally pathetic) groups that aren't as well remembered, like the Miamis and the Marbles and the Erasers and the Student Teachers. Nearly all the members of these bands treated the club as a headquarters -- as home. It was a private world. We dreamed it up. It flowered out of our imaginations.
How often do you get to do that? That's what you want as a kid, and that's what we were able to do at CBGB's. It makes me think of that Elvis Presley quotation: "When I was a child, ladies and gentlemen, I was a dreamer. I read comic books, and I was the hero of the comic book. I saw movies, and I was the hero in the movie. So every dream I ever dreamed has come true a hundred times." We dreamed CBGB's into existence.
The owner of the club, Hilly Kristal, never said no. That was his genius. Though it's dumb to use the word genius about what happened there. It was all a dream. Many of us were drunk or stoned half our waking hours, after all. The thing is, we were young there. You don't get that back. Even children know that. They don't want their old stuff thrown away. Everything should be kept. I regret everything I've ever thrown away.
CBGB's was like a big playhouse, site of conspiracies, orgies, delirium, refuge, boredom, meanness, jealousy, kindness, but most of all youth. Things felt and done the first time are more vivid. CBGB's is where many things were felt with that vividness. That feeling is the real identity of the club, to me. And it's horrible, or at least seriously sad, to lose it. But then, apparently, we aren't really going to lose it.
CBGB's is going to be dismantled and reconstructed as an exhibit in Las Vegas, like Elvis. I like that. A lot. I really hope it happens as intended.
It's occurred to me that Hilly's genius passivity is something he has in common with Andy Warhol. Another trait of Warhol's was that he fanatically tried to keep or record everything that ever happened in his vicinity, from junk mail in "time capsules" to small talk to newspaper front pages and movie star publicity shots to 24 hours of the Empire State Building.
We all know that nothing lasts. But at least we can make a cool and funny exhibit of it.
I'm serious. God likes change and a joke. God loves CBGB's.
- - - - -
Richard Hell, a musician, is the author of the novel "Godlike" and the film critic for BlackBook magazine.
- - - - -
http://richardhell.com
he also played bass and sang with the voidoids. oh yeah, and he started the band television with tom verlaine...
16th October 2006 09:21 PM
pdog
quote:mac_daddy wrote:
he also played bass and sang with the voidoids. oh yeah, and he started the band television with tom verlaine...
Not a bad resume, heh?
16th October 2006 09:24 PM
Poplar
quote:pdog wrote:
CBGB's RIP!
i knew this would hurt you.
my buddy's band played there last year, it was a huge thrill for them.
16th October 2006 10:19 PM
GotToRollMe
Got this in an email from a friend tonight. It's from someone's MySpace blog. It kinda took me back to the good old bad old days. I thought some of you might enjoy it.
Tickets for this last show sold out in 8 minutes on Oct 1st, and I didn't have one. I figured I'd stay home and listen to the SIRIUS broadcast live and enjoy it that way,
but this past week, as the end came closer, I thought I should go and give it the old college try and attempt to bullshit my way into the show.
I got to CBGBs on Sunday at 5 pm and there were 30 people in line already. Doors were scheduled to open at 8. There were dozens of newstrucks, camera crews and press in front of the club as well. Patti arrived around 6 and everyone broke into applause. I didn't know she was so tiny. She came out a while later taking photos of the front of the club as the press swarmed around her and she answered their questions. It seemed everyone has a camera these days, and wanted their picture taken in front of the club.
I'm guilty, I did it too.
Since there were no actual tickets, I figured I had a teeny, tiny chance to get in. The way it worked was, it was "will-call". They had a list of the names of people that had purchased tickets on the website. You had to show your ID and credit card you bought the tickets with, and they would cross your name off the list and you'd then enter the club for the show.
The time passed quickly and by 8:30 they started letting people in 5 at a time. I got prepared for my Academy Award performance. I had the feeling it wouldn't work. The security guards kept coming outside saying that if your name was not on the list, you will NOT get in.
When it was my turn to get in, I gave my name, handed them my ID and Amex Card, and they looked for my name on the list. It wasn't there. I told them to check again, perhaps they put my first name as my last name by mistake...
My name still wasn't there. They said I had to leave.
I said to the guy " I've just waited 4 hours in line, and I bought the ticket online 2 weeks ago. You can't turn me away like this dude. I did everyting I needed to do, I bought the ticket, its the websites fault not mine. I'll buy another ticket with cash right now, I don't care about the money, don't turn me away dude!!!". He bought it.
He whispered "Don't tell anyone I'm doing this, ok?"
I paid him the $33 ( ticket price was the amount of years the club has been opened) and got my wristband.
I walked into the club, shocked that my plan actually worked. I was sure I was not going to get in. Woohoo!!!!!!!!!
I worked my way down to the stage, where it was already crowded with tiny rock girls who hadn't been born earlier than 1985, but I managed to get in close to the front, with 2 rows of people in front of me. Luckily no one tall.
Patti took the stage about 10 and the show started quietly with her reciting one of her poems. There were a few false starts of some songs, and she was getting aggravated.
Some sound problems, and the band screwed up a couple of song intros so they started them again. Patti introduced Flea from the Red Hot Chili Peppers as part of the band tonight.
Most of the songs at this point were acoustic with no drums. It was a mellow start, but still, this was Patti Smith!!!
We were all wedged in like sardines, the temperature was hot hot hot...You could barely move. I'd never seen Patti Smith before, and like some people told me, she has tremendous presence. Even though the songs at the beginning were not rockers, you couldn't take your eyes off her. She worked the stage like a seasoned pro. Really cool, quick with one liners and very raw and real. She didn't talk to the crowd as much as connected to us with her heartfelt emotions. Whether she was talking about the song she was going to sing, or about her memories of CBGBs, it's as if she was spilling her guts out to us.
this is what was behind me....EEK!
After 8 or 9 songs, she took a short break, changed clothes, came back on and this is when they show took off like a rocket. This was the Patti I wanted to see.
The harder Rock material began. She was like a wild banshee, flailing around like a preacher trying to
convert her disciples into the church of rock and roll.
I wish I had the setlist, so I can only name some of the songs she did off the top of my head.
Marquee Moon, My Generation, Pale Blue Eyes, Gimme Shelter, Without Chains (a new song), Sonic Reducer, Pissing In A River, For Your Love, Redondo Beach, Birdland, Free Money, Space Monkey, Ghost Dance, Rock
And Roll Nigger ( A high point mid-show!!) Dancing Barefoot, So You Want To Be A Rock And Roll Star, a Blondie
Medley, a Ramones Medley, and I forget the rest. Its all a blur to me now. I felt like part of the furniture in the club, we'd all been there so many hours pressed up against each other. I was really getting tired, I'd been on my feet for 6 hours, I was hot, I'd almost gotten into a fight with an asshole that was pogo-ing into everyone and pissing everyone off. I felt that I might pass out from the heat and the aches, but I did not give in. I had to be there. This was history.
She went into Land and if it was possible, it upped the ante even higher and the electricity in the club shot up.
Was this really happening?
--When suddenly, Johnny...Gets a feeling..He gets surrounded by----
Was this the last show anyone would ever see at CBGBs? Was this really happening?
The walls were shaking with the music (especially Flea's bass) a bit of debris fell onto my arm from the ceiling or wall.
--Got to lose control, then you lose control!!!!--
Then they launched into Gloria, but skipped the slow beginning of the song, so the pace from Land was not lost at all. This was the song that first got me into Patti Smith and to hear her do this song from Horses, at CBGBs on this night was powerful and magical.
People were crying happy and sad tears. That this performer was closing the club's last night, after first performing here when she first started out in music. 33 years later and the book was closing on CBGBs. There were teens in the audience, there were people in their 30s,40's
50's 60's....Generations spanned the room last night for CBGBs last stand..
For the last song, Patti chose Elegie and before she began it, she read a list of names of people that were no longer living that she felt were important in the history of CBGBs, Rock music and her life..Bryan Gregory, Lester Bangs, Helen Wheels, Robert Quine, Johnny, Joey and Dee Dee Ramone, Richard Sohl, Lance Loud were a few I recall. Then she began the song.
Towards the end, she got very emotional and it was easy to see she was in tears. This was really it. The end of an era. Its the end. At the end of the song she began to wave goodbye, and we all waved goodbye to her. it was surreal.
It was like 1976 and 2006 had blurred into some sort of time/space vacuum...
And then the lights came up. Reality set in.
It was 1:30 am. It was like a war in there.
I stumbled out of the club onto the Bowery, exhausted, hungry, thirsty, with throbbing feet, where hundreds of people were still outside waiting to get a glimpse of Patti and CBGBs before it was shut for good. I got a cab to go home, and said my last goodbye to another NYC
landmark gone forever.
Goobye CBGBs.
Long live Rock And Roll.
17th October 2006 09:17 AM
UGot2Rollme
Thanks for posting this gotorollme, I really wanted to know what it was like that last night. I'd never been to CBGB's, but I saw Patti Smith twice in the 70's and love her spirit.
17th October 2006 01:39 PM
GotToRollMe
quote:UGot2Rollme wrote:
Thanks for posting this gotorollme, I really wanted to know what it was like that last night. I'd never been to CBGB's, but I saw Patti Smith twice in the 70's and love her spirit.
Yes, I thought it really caught the flavor - right down to the bits of debris falling down from the shaky ceiling. Patti was really something back in the '70s - I'm glad you got to see her back then. She broke the mold and created something totally new vis-a-vis females in rock and roll. She was a true original. I've never seen the likes of her since. Like a select few: Often imitated, never duplicated.
17th October 2006 01:46 PM
pdog
Great story...
17th October 2006 07:29 PM
Bitch
Great read, thanx for posting gottorollme. a nice ending for cbgb's.
17th October 2006 09:32 PM
glencar
I was there once long after its prime. Still, NYC is ever-changing & things like this will happen.
17th October 2006 09:40 PM
pdog
The only thing that will always be a constant in life, is change... And one day I will be taking a dirt nap...
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