this ain't no cbgb's....

not too long ago i was at an open mic where an old timer was reciting a poem he had written about cafe wha. cafe wha was a big deal back in the day. it was probably the cbgb's of the folk music movement of the 60's. many famous acts spent the early part of their careers playing there... none more famous than bob dylan.

i myself happen to be a big bob dylan fan. i remember going into cafe wha once. i was psyched. i was young and sorta inexperienced in the art of drinking in new york city. me and my friends took a path train to the village and walked around till we saw cool places that caught our attention. i didn't even know where cafe wha was exactly, we just happened to walk by it by mistake, and i demanded that we stop in there for a bit.

i remember there was a cover at the door and a menacing doorman. i believe the cover was $10. when we went in, the place was fancy looking and they demanded a 2 drink minimum to be there. there was also some jazz performance going on. the vibe in there felt nothing like what i thought cafe wha should feel like. it felt fancy and overdressed. me and my friends stood around inside cafe wha for a second, talked it over, and decided to ask for our money back and leave, which the doorman accommodated since we literally walked in and walked right back out.

when this old timer was talking about cafe wha in his poem and how great it was and how awesome he thought it was, i couldn't help but think of clubs i frequented to see bands perform live. many of them closed down, none more famous than cbgb's. and when it closed down, it caused a lot of anger and sadness. cbgb's was an nyc underground rock and roll institution. it can't be closed down to make way for condo's and bullshit... can it?

but after hearing his poem and revisiting that cafe wha trip in my mind, i figured maybe cbgb's is better off closed down. cafe wha was no longer the dingy place where folk singers passed around a hat and hoped people were nice enough to put money in it. who knows what cbgb's could've transformed into over time? the name alone could possibly be reason enough to give the place a good polish and turn it into some sorta tourist destination. but there's nothing about cbgb's that should be "polished." cbgb's was dirty and loud. and that's how it went out.

for all we know, the future of cbgb's could've turned into some farcical hardrock cafe ripoff with fancy pictures of all the famous bands that played there displayed everywhere... guitars and other memorabilia hanging on the walls. but that wasn't cbgb's. cbgb's was the place where i shared sweat with strangers and left with impaired hearing. cbgb's was the place where i saw the biggest cockroach in my life (seriously. it was crawling up my friend ernie's leg and he was wearing shorts. it was longer than my hand). i once hotboxed the men's bathroom at cbgb's with a bunch of friends while dudes went in and out using the facilities in our cloud of smoke. that was cbgb's and i'm glad it never got a chance to get to a point where it no longer resembled itself.

maybe neil young said it best when he sang, "it's better to burn out, than to fade away."