24″ X 36″ acrylic on canvas, in rough-hewn wooden frame with iron corner brackets and collage of historic paper flyers

The famous music establishment and New York landmark closed its doors in October 2006, thirty-three years after opening. It had been the “Ground Zero” of punk and New Wave in the U.S.A., having presented such iconic bands as Blondie, The Talking Heads and the Ramones. In its later years, the 1990s and 2000s, when we got to frequent CBGB’s it was more associated with local bands, parties, Miss Gothic NYC Pageants and aspiring, never-to-be-seen-or-heard-from-again punk rockers from around the country who could now and forever recount to their friends, their future children and grandchildren that they had once played at CBGB’s. The biggest name we were fortunate to catch was Patti Smith— in the revival phase of her career when she performed one Halloween night around 1999.

We will never forget the gracious hostess Althea, performances by The Empire Hideous, Ninth House, The Voluptuous Horror of Karen Black, the wit and wisdom of Voltaire, the walls papered with promotional announcement fliers, the door-less, seat-less toilets, the mohawk-tressed punks and the elaborately-clad Goth kids whose attire blended indistinguishably with the nightmarish Halloween costumes of party-goers.

It is to these— and all the others who made CBGB’s that special place—that this art-work is dedicated.