The heat. The noxious inhabitants. Bums. Garbage. Expense. It looks like there’s going to be one more reason not to go to New York this summer, unless things change radically. The birthplace (sort of) of punk music, the venerable CBGB, is looking straight into the face of closure by the time the next season rolls around.
If the club doesn’t renegotiate their lease with their landlord, pay the $40,000 monthly rent, and pay up the 91 large that’s built up since the club took its current form in 1973, the punk fixture will most likely be sent to the same moldering grave that punk music itself rots in. Owner Hilly Kristal dosen’t plan to give up without a fight, but it seems that the decision has pretty much been made already.
"We won’t be boarded up until after our lease is up," he claimed, hoping to keep the club he changed from a Hell’s Angels hangout all those years ago. "I am determined to stay, but they want me out."
Rumor has it that a group of musicians are forming to try and salvage the venue, but no one knows for sure. Maybe, though, it would be better to let it pass. Bankruptcy and death is a natural part of the life cycle of a venue, and it’s best to let it close with dignity. Who are we to interfere with nature?
Alert! More ’80s bands reuniting! But this time, it might be something to get excited about, depending on who you are. What does "Dinosaur Jr." mean to you? Nothing? A T-shirt you remember some kid having in junior high? Getting high and sitting on the couch? (I guess that’s more Pavement-ish.) Rock and Roll?
Well, for anyone in the last two categories, the dynamic J. Mascis/ Lou Barlow duo are reuniting and putting all their bad blood to rest. Since Barlow left the group in 1988 to be in Sebadoh, he and Mascis have been working steadily alone on The Fog and Folk Implosion respectively. But now, the original lineup will be coming back together to play the Fuji Rock Festival in Japan, and tour England afterwards.
No one at Merge Records or anyone from the band has confirmed the reunion, nor have any tour dates in our country been set. So, unless you have the time and money to go to Japan and fight tons of Japanese kids to get into the show (They love themselves some Dinosaur Jr. over there,) you’ll probably have to settle for the deluxe expanded reissue of You’re Living All Over Me due out later this year.
Apparently, I really missed the boat on the whole Green Day revival thing that happened this summer. I liked them pretty well in junior high, but I think my ears have been soured over the years by all the bad imitators and hacks that flooded the airwaves back in the ’90s. So I kind of ignored that new record of theirs. Now, though, it turns out that the damn thing is actually saving little kids from comas over in Wales.
Apparently, after being hit by an SUV and falling into a two-week coma, it took only one playing of the record to get the tyke into brain activity territory. After another hour, he was back in motor control of his extremities and taken off the critical condition list.
The family is vocally crediting the band with his recovery in the international media. Green Day also sent them a large and exclusive package of merchandise to thank them for the free and bizarrely positive publicity.