The Mudd Club

by Richard Boch

  Thirty-plus years later, I wish I had the T-shirt that never existed: threadbare and tattered, another memory of time gone by.

  Land of a Thousand Dances

  Today, the time I once had is less than plenty. Bleecker Street seems another lifetime and Long Island a distant past. Still, I remember them with barely a fade. I remember too the night in 1975 when “Jesus died for somebody’s sins but not mine.” That night was permanently burned into my brain.

  So much of the time was reignited by her words and music but Patti Smith never set foot inside the Mudd Club. Her version of “Gloria” caused eruptions on the dance floor and “Land: Horses/Land of a Thousand Dances/La Mer (De)” was an incantatory wall of sound. I can only imagine what live at the Mudd Club would’ve been like.

  Patti’s guitarist, the songwriter, producer, historian and journalist Lenny Kaye, remembers, “It wasn’t that unusual to stay out till dawn” and that “Mudd was about hanging out late.” Lenny loved the music the DJs played and knew that when it came to the White Street sound, “You didn’t have to adhere—the further afoot it went, the better.” He liked to say the Mudd Club was his kind of joint. Further afoot certainly had its appeal.

  Richard “DNV” Sohl (so named by Lenny Kaye, who thought the star keyboard player resembled Tadzio, the beautiful boy in Visconti’s Death in Venice) was at the club nearly every night. Patti’s loyal assistant and sometime supporting musician Andi “Midge” Ostrowe wasn’t far behind. I stayed close to them all, closer than just “proximity and association.” Friends for life.

  Jane Friedman, a fellow nightlife traveler, came by as often as anyone. She was a founding partner of the Wartoke Concern, a publicity and talent development “operation” instrumental in shaping everything from the Woodstock Festival, the Mercer Arts Center and Patti’s early career. Despite time, place and degrees of separation, there’s a direct connection to Mudd.

  Jane often arrived with Frank Zappa or John Cale, hung out at the bar, and talked to Steve Mass about music and whatever else was happening. She loved the club and was one of the first to say, “the place felt like home and that was important to us. It’s why we were always there.” From Max’s to CBGB’s to White Street, “we lived in those places; that’s why they were special.” Despite my not always spiritual take on things, we could both agree, “those places had a soul.”

  I thought Jane was a sweetheart, offering me a bit of comfort amid chaos. As Patti mentioned on the back cover of Horses, Jane was the woman “who knew.”

  John Cale, no stranger to White Street, is someone else “who knew.” A founding member of The Velvet Underground, he’s a musical genius and one of Rock ’n’ Roll’s great collaborators. He worked with everyone from The Stooges and the Modern Lovers to avant-garde pioneers like John Cage and La Monte Young. He produced the album Horses.

  John performed at Mudd with Chris Spedding and occasionally joined Nico onstage for a few songs. He liked hanging at the bar with Steve Mass, disappearing and reappearing several times a night. An oddly accessible, smart and funny guy, John Cale was a hero fueled by New York City and the night. That viola on the first Velvet Underground album—there’s nothing like it; hearing it from the White Street stage, countering Nico’s moans, chants and harmonium flourishes, sent a dark and eerie chill.

  Whether we were painting, making films or standing at the door of 77 White we informed one another. Working on White Street, I became friendly and, in some cases, friends, with people I’d seen around—with the names I knew and the voices I heard. Whatever our previous connection might have been, it was now the Mudd Club door—a connection both clear and unclear.

  Ronnie Cutrone and John Cale, second floor Mudd, 1979, by Kate Simon.

  Rubber and Leather

  By the time I arrived on White Street, my soon-to-be friends Claudia Summers and Marcus Leatherdale were already inside while I was still figuring out the lay of the land: who was who and what I really wanted.

  Dressed in black, beautifully severe and just a little bit vulnerable, Claudia was a struggling musician with an eye for trouble. A San Francisco Punk transplant, she arrived in New York a few months before Mudd started happening and by 1979, Claudia had begun playing keyboards with Walter Steding and The Dragon People. Hanging out, making music and getting high, she was hiding something and searching for something else. I felt a connection and still do.

  My friendship with Marcus was different. He was a young photographer from Canada—handsome, boyish and easygoing, with an iconic sense of style. He met Claudia in San Francisco; they reconnected in New York and got married at City Hall. Robert Mapplethorpe, a close friend of the newlyweds and Marcus’ constant companion, presented the bride with a rubber garter belt as a wedding gift (who knows what he gave Marcus). Rubber and leather remained in her future. Their union was an open marriage and still is.

  Marcus Leatherdale and Claudia Summers, colluding on the second floor, 1979, by Marcia Resnick.

  When I began to get lost in the insanity—the death drugs and kinky sex—Claudia already had one foot in. Marcus, prone to a lesser dose of drugs but a higher-profile kink, seemed to better manage the madness. Their friendship helped me survive and more than three decades later the story continues, each in our way still figuring things out.

  The Mudd Club was a mixed bag. Lenny Kaye used the words “further afoot” with regard to the music but those words say it all. An art bar, a dance hall, a pickup joint and drug den, all on its own terms; Mudd cast a wide net and rarely threw anything back. An incredible incubator for talent, I believed there was a reason why the people inside were there. I believed too that we all had some sort of résumé and credentials necessary to get us thru the door. In the words of Rebecca Christensen, we “brought something to the party” and to that end we found a connection. Our diversity created a unique convergence—of cultures, cliques and individuals—and for the most part everyone got along. Steve’s management skills and problem-solving tactics were whim-driven, straightforward or occasionally convoluted, but whatever they were, he got the party started and kept it going. For nearly two years I held the chain and the key.

  The club echoed the spirit of a city on the verge, whether a changing time or a nervous breakdown. They existed in parallel, one being possible only because of the other. Freedom still ruled the street as well as the dance floor; no one realized impossible was lurking around the corner.

  Diplomacy and Pot Stirring

  Convergence and cultural diversity aside, paranoia often had a hand in the mix; Steve’s on-again, off-again affair with Reggae and Rasta, uptown celebs and bridge-and-tunnel was hard to keep up with. Instant door policy changes often were initiated to rid the club of any perceived threat or scourge. Sometimes the innocent got caught, lost or exiled in the shuffle. Cocaine dealers occasionally got a pass while heroin dealers were mostly street or dirty boutique, though rules rarely applied. The policy changes were at times reasonable, other times arbitrary and occasionally funny. Easy targets—fatties, longhairs and the like—always fair game.

  Roots Reggae band Steel Pulse, and their eventual landmark gig at Mudd, meant disorder and negotiation at the door accompanied by great music, giant spliffs and smoke-filled bathrooms. Steve, however, seemed to believe that anyone with dreads was selling pot (White Street’s naïve nod to racial profiling), and such friends as musician Richard “Dirty Harry” Hall and Tier 3’s Manny L’Amour were always getting tangled up in the nuance of door policy. Finding it difficult to look them in the eye and talk shit, I generally ignored Steve’s instructions regarding their admission. Keeping my fingers crossed, I played diplomat and dumb at the same time, but that’s not how it started.

  When Steve and I first discussed my job he told me he didn’t want David Bowie or Mick Jagger types getting out of limos and coming inside. It sounded like crap and I said okay but when the real deals started showing up things changed fast.

  I made an effort to get on the same page with Steve and occ
asionally I’d get there first. He could be reticent and evasive until you read between the lines, his suggestions and instructions always creative and designed to stir the pot. Whether they worked or not wasn’t the point.

  Original Modern Lovers bassist and poet Ernie Brooks felt that “exclusivity of any kind was terrible but if you were going to have a door policy, the Mudd did it right. That’s what made the Mudd Club different.” By then Ernie was playing bass with The Necessaries and kept his hair long and curly. He wore jeans and lived in Long Island City but never had a problem at the door.

  Steve’s instigating and “pot” stirring, combined with my respectful disregard and diplomacy skills, made for good policy. The only real problem was figuring out what to do about the Hells Angels. Our club-to-club relationship kept getting edgier and there had been several uncomfortable incidents. Keeping the Angels outside or getting them to leave once they got in was only part of the challenge. There was no relating to, only dealing with, and the breaking point was just months away.

  Free Meal Manifesto

  Regardless of door policies, drugs were ever-present; a lot of people—including me—were doing as much and as many as we could get our hands on. In spring ’79 I was a pot-smoking coke user. I liked to drink and I liked fooling around with a line or two of heroin. I thought that was pretty normal—and for many of us hanging out or staying out till 6 A.M., it was.

  At Mudd, cocaine was everywhere. Heroin was out of the closet and somewhat acceptable. Quaaludes were a hot item and bathroom fixtures like Linda Ludes or the Russian Punks had as many as anyone wanted. Between those and the other “tips” I received, my pockets were always full and nothing went to waste. My appetite for excess remained healthy; for everything else, it depended on the offer.

  I kept painting and doing some good work but did little else to avoid temptation. I couldn’t tell the difference between opportunity and distraction, drugs becoming the fuel and my eventual undoing. Silence might’ve been the no that greeted people I wasn’t letting into the club but I said yes to just about everything else—including a free meal.

  Working at Mudd just a short time, I joined Pat Wadsley and a half-dozen others for a free lunch with Bryan Ferry and his girl-friend Barbara Allen (the well-connected party girl socialite) in a suite at the Carlyle Hotel. It happened because I was in the right place at the right time and I said yes at the right moment. It was the same way with my job at Mudd—the same with a lot of things.

  Quaalude, RORER 714, real, 1979, courtesy Richard Boch.

  I arrived at the Carlyle wearing a monogrammed Brooks Brothers shirt, a black leather motorcycle jacket and a red leather tie. When I got upstairs and walked in, Bryan told me he liked the tie. The next night he bounded onstage at the Palladium for the New York stop on Roxy Music’s Manifesto tour wearing a red leather suit. It seemed either one or both of us was on to something.

  When the show was over I grabbed a cab and headed for White Street. My ears were ringing and I could still hear Ferry wailing, “In every dream home a heartache…” I got to Mudd and DJ Danny Heaps was playing the single “Trash” from Manifesto. I went back outside and told Joey Kelly where I’d been. I was a Roxy fan and felt like a kid. That was on March 29, 1979 and I was one week on the job. Everything still felt new.

  By now, summer was slowly approaching. The Murray Street loft’s not far from the Mudd Club location fast became popular and I started doing a lot of entertaining. On May 21, 1979, I hosted a birthday party for my boyfriend and roommate Gary Kanner. Like me, Gary was a child of suburbia and grew up in Great Neck, Long Island, just a few miles from New Hyde Park.

  Gary landed in New York in the fall of ’77, hung out at Hurrah and got a job at Cinemabilia, the movie, book and memorabilia store in the Village. In 1978, he found his way to The Ballroom where I was working. Before long Gary was living at Murray Street. The love between us came and went; drug-fueled camaraderie, ambivalence and animosity ensued. In between all that we shared our lives and celebrated numerous birthdays.

  The twenty-first was a Monday and I had the night off. Gary and I focused on getting high, blowing out candles and trying to eat birthday cake. The previous evening, Louie Chaban inquired politely if he could bring his then boyfriend, the poet, gadfly and Warhol associate Rene Ricard to the party; I soon came to understand why someone would ask. Rene’s sparkling but razor-sharp wit, encyclopedic knowledge and ability to expound on any subject were well known. Any response or reaction perceived by him to be incorrect often turned things loud and ugly. Louie knew that better than anyone. I’d yet to learn.

  Richard Sohl, Anita Sarko, genteel pleasure-seeker and art connoisseur Clarissa Dalrymple and our friend Solveig Lamberg arrived early, leaving plenty of time to celebrate and make it to Mudd by 2 or 3 A.M. Glenn McDermott, his girlfriend Debbie, and fellow Mudd employee Jay Siano came by around midnight, shared a bit of coke and headed for White Street. Old friends, new acquaintances and a few people we’d never seen before strolled in and joined the party. We served a little food, a lot of liquor and what seemed like a ton of drugs. People brought flowers, champagne and more cocaine. Everyone survived, the flowers lasted for days and some people stayed all night. Ricky Sohl stayed until the next morning. Robert and Joey worked the door at Mudd and made it thru the night without me.

  Despite the near certainty of volatility, Rene behaved.

  Rock ’n’ Roll Star

  The following evening, the Patti Smith Group headed into a two-night stand at the Palladium on Fourteenth Street (the band’s fourth album, Wave, was released a week earlier). Before the show I ran into music guru, rock legend and Mudd Club regular Danny Fields at the old Luchow’s Restaurant next door. I split after a few drinks, headed thru the Palladium’s Thirteenth Street entrance, sat on the floor backstage and smoked cigarettes with Ricky before the band went on. Robert Mapplethorpe and Marcus Leatherdale, all black leather and serious, nodded as they breezed past on the way to see Madam before she hit the stage. Fifteen minutes later, Ricky stood up, grabbed his Sharp mini-radio-television combo and drifted toward the keyboards. I smiled, stepped out into the orchestra and stole a seat up front. Patti ran onstage trailing a giant American flag, Ricky turned on his TV and the band opened with The Byrds’ “So You Want to Be a Rock ’n’ Roll Star.”

  I split after an hour and got to Canal Street with enough time to grab a hot dog and an egg cream at Dave’s. I walked down Broadway and turned onto White Street. I stuffed the last bite in my mouth and picked a shred of sauerkraut off my shirt.

  Patti played again the next night. I had to work but Lynne Robinson and Gary used my name at the back door. The following night the band did CBGB; I squeezed my way in and out and made it back to Mudd before I was missed. That was New York City, May 1979. The hot dogs at midnight were still hot and most people knew that an egg cream had nothing to do with an egg. White Street was still a wild time ride and the Mudd Club, a different crazy every night. Despite the bumps, bruises and too much cocaine, I loved my job, and at times I really did fit in. All I had to do was keep painting and get some sleep.

  Must Attend

  Two weeks later, 6 P.M. The early days of June were behaving like summer and daylight wasn’t turning off till 9. I stuffed some money in my pocket and Gary and I headed uptown to Madison Books: Rene Ricard was holding court and signing copies of his first book of poetry, a thin volume with a Tiffany Blue cover published by the Dia Foundation. An early-evening, under-the-radar event, it was a must attend for a small but discerning cross section of New Yorkers. Gerard Malanga (the assistant to Andy Warhol from 1963–1970), who worked for Dia at the time, had edited the collection of poems and cohosted the evening. Louie Chaban was there, and one of us had to be at White Street by 11. Teri Toye arrived with Victor Hugo, the window dresser, Warhol instigator and Halston companion. Wearing a football jersey, a pair of Maud Frizon heels and no pants, Teri easily dazzled the room. Richard Sohl, just back from another round of endless touring wi
th the Patti Smith Group, spoke quietly and in code about his infatuation with downtown. I knew what he meant but had no idea what anyone else might’ve known. Minutes later when Warhol arrived the evening officially qualified as a minor event.

  I said hello, good-bye, and split after Rene spent a moment signing a copy of Rene Ricard, the new book of poetry. Inside was a hand-drawn Cocteau-like Ricard with a personal inscription. I thought it was beautiful and still do.

  The night isn’t even half over and everyone else is sticking around. I have to shift gears and get to work. Outside I hail a cab on Madison; the driver heads south on Fifth. It feels like it’s going to be an easy night but you never know. Anything can happen between midnight and 5.

  I arrive at 77 White and Ross Bleckner walks out the front door as I walk in. Steve’s at the bar either talking with DJ David or just talking; it’s hard to tell. The house lights are still on and David’s digging through a stack of 45s looking for a few things to start with. Steve’s looking a little uneasy, as though he can’t decide whether he wants to hear “Betty Lou’s Got a New Pair of Shoes” or the Village People. My “easy night” prediction is already falling apart.

  Then the lights go down and DJ David has a headphone to his ear. Bowie and Eno’s “Moss Garden,” an ambient piece from Heroes, trickles out of the speakers and drifts around the room. Bartenders Greg and Elizabeth come up from the basement carrying a few bottles and get behind the bar. Greg’s already hyped and Elizabeth looks trapped behind clenched teeth and her own negative energy. Luckily, she gets buried in the mix.