Me and CBGB

From My "Terrible 20s" to the Person I am Today

My nurse called with the bad news: The virus had broken through. I had been on a brutal clinical trial with three nasty drugs to get rid of my Hepatitis C, contracted during my punk rock days in New York City. Sex, drugs and rock & roll. I had every possible side effect, from my hair falling out, to nausea, food tasting weird and more. Lisa, my clinical trial nurse, was sure that meant that the drugs were working. Alas, that wasn’t the case, and Lisa was distraught as she broke the news to me.

Lisa and I saw each other weekly for months during the clinical trial, and we became quite close. Because she was so upset, I immediately started consoling her, since putting others first as is my tendency.

That night, I couldn’t sleep, berating myself for my behavior back in the day. So, I called Lisa the next morning, and said, “wait a minute – I’m the patient here, and it’s your turn to console me. It’s all my fault for being such a bad girl in my terrible 20s.” Lisa immediately countered with “No, Beth. Those days helped make you the vibrant person you are today.”

It was the mid-1970s in New York City, urban decay on full display, especially in the summer. Gritty, dirty, putrid and so alive at the same time. The infamous New York Daily News headline – “Ford to New York City: Drop Dead”, as President Ford refused to bail the city out as it teetered on the brink of bankruptcy. Stifling heat and humidity topped off by a garbage strike, with the aroma of waste in the air, and the smelly and steamy old subways I took to work every day.

And in the midst of all of this decay was an improbable oasis on The Bowery, right next door to a flophouse – CBGB, the birthplace of the New York punk rock scene. I read so much about it in the Village Voice and Soho Weekly News. The bands – with names like Television, Talking Heads, Ramones, Blondie and more – sounded intriguing, a far cry from the folk and pop music I l tended to listen to. My curiosity piqued, I decided to check it out.

Outside CBGB, the punk rockers and wannabe punks from the outer boroughs and New Jersey mingled with the drunk denizens of the flophouse. CBGB looked pretty nondescript from the outside. A white stucco building with two dingy windows separated by a narrow door, and a white awning. Unassuming from the outside, and something entirely new on the inside.

My first time at CBGB was an awakening of something that was dormant inside me. I was such a good girl, always looking to my parents for approval and losing myself in the process. I walked in, with my short hair, tight black jeans, white tee shirt and white Keds sneakers, and sunglasses even though it was night, emulating Patti Smith whose androgenous sexuality was a magnet for many of us. The smell of beer, floors sticky from spilt beer and who knows what else, neon signs over the bar, and the best sound system anywhere. The Ramones were playing. Loud, thumping and totally alive. I was transported, and I woke up from my good girl dream as a nice Jewish girl from Long Island.

By day, I was a paralegal at a prestigious Park Avenue law firm, and transformed into a punk rock chick at night – kind of like Cinderella in reverse. My prince charming was the lead guitarist from a band named Jack Ruby, which was described by a record company exec who heard their demo as “The Velvet Underground in a car crash”. Chris was extremely tall and skinny, with a wild mane of hair. Jack Ruby’s music was raw and brutal, but Chris was sweet and so smart. He taught me so much about music, and I parlayed that knowledge into my career in the music business.

Chris would come to my apartment late at night, after his job at Colony Records, the legendary record store for connoisseurs on the outskirts of Times Square. I’d wake up from my slumber and, after talking about our day, and the characters Chris met at Colony, we’d start playing records, going from one track to another based on whatever association made sense in the moment. Chris loved all kinds of music, from the Velvet Underground and the Stooges to Brian Eno to ABBA and the Captain & Tenille. We’d eventually fall asleep, and in the morning find LPs strewn all around us. Of course, Chris wasn’t the prince charming my parents had in mind for me, and they never met him. We eventually drifted apart, but what I learned from him has stayed with me to this day.

Happily, my liver is now clean and healthy. And, what I experienced in my CBGB days does inform the person I am today, as Nurse Lisa said. I look in the mirror and see new lines on my face, marking my experiences in life. I wouldn’t trade them for anything.