Goodbye CBGB

Throughout the years, CB’s has become a NYC institution, no doubt! It has been the breeding ground for some of the world’s biggest bands. It is also one of the places in this great city where I spent a large part of my formative years either frequenting as an audience member, or as a performer. The place is a fucking gross dump, but the sound was incomparable to any other place of its size, and on any given day they could be hosting one of your favorite bands.

With that being said, I can’t wait for that place to shut the fuck down. I can deal with every fucking, never stepped foot in the club, wannabe, glossed out, scenster assbag wearing a cb’s shirt. I can take the name-dropping from clueless relics that haven’t frequented the club since Deborah Harry was doing rails off some dude’s cock in the bathroom. What’s really burning me up is the perception by the club, and the media, that hardcore played a minimal part in the success of the club. I’m sure Hilly is down to take $30 a head for a Gorilla Biscuits or Underdog reunion, but yet have I seen him or anyone else acknowledge that hardcore kept that place alive for years. When you saw all those silly press conferences and releases, not once did I see a notable figure from the hardcore scene present and speaking about the club’s rich history and why it should stay. It wasn’t Talking Heads or Blondie that was filling CB’s to capacity every Sunday for a decade. Hardcore’s relevance should not be sidelined by one of its most relevant institutions. There are probably more bands still playing, struggling, as well as having success that have more in common with Cro-Mags than they do with Television.

One can argue that many bands in hardcore never saw the success of bands like Blondie or Talking Heads, so they never really had a choice. What I have to say to that is that some hardcore bands could have played bigger places at certain points in their careers, but chose CB’s as their forum because it meant that much to them.

So, that’s it folks. October 31, 2006 will be the end. See you in Vegas.