Max’s Kansas City – New York

If London mirrored New York in its punk scene, then it’s no surprise that they both also had key clubs which the scene revolved around. In the UK it was the Roxy Club and Vortex. In The US in New York City there was Max’s Kansas City and CBGB. The UK clubs barely lasted a year at most. The New York clubs were around much longer and had a rich history, atmosphere, excitement and rock’n’roll in spades.  The closest thing we had was the Marquee but we fucked that right up didn’t we and like everything went way the way of developers and greed. None of these places sadly exist anymore.

Max’s Kansas City was located at Park Avenue on 17th Street and was a key club in Manhattan in terms of the acts that either directly influenced the nascent US punk scene or became part of it. The downstairs restaurant was the melting point of cutting-edge culture including rock, painting, poetry, fashion and photography. The upstairs disco was converted to a performance space where Iggy Stooge, the New York Dolls, Patti Smith, Wayne County and Television all played. The backroom downstairs was immortalised in Lou Reed’s Walk On The Wild Side. Blondie’s Deborah Harry was once a waitress there.  Now a deli.

Max’s connections went right back to The Velvet Underground who had played there in the late 60’s and who had even recorded and released a live album from Max’s.

A Max’s Kansas City album was released, though not live, which featured artists who played there including Suicide, Wayne County, Pere Ubu and Cherry Vanilla.

Sid Vicious played his last gig there in 1978 before his girlfriend Nancy Spungen was murdered 12 days later. Billy Idol played the last night at the end of 1981 before it closed and the venue is namechecked in the Sex Pistols withering brush off of the New York Dolls in their song New York.

Here’s a history from the liner notes of Jungle Records

Max’s Kansas City, opening in NYC in 1965 was amid clubs and discotheques playing Motown and British invasion records, wound up becoming the first landmark ‘underground’ nightclub in America. It served as a gathering place for poets, sculptors, writers, artists, actors from the worlds of theater and film, and musicians, songwriters and performers all sharing a newfound ‘hipness’ that had emerged from the Beatnik scene of the 1950’s. The world was changing, and when one of those world changers. Andy Warhol, brought his gaggle of musicians, speed freaks. male hustlers, junkies, drag queens and groupies downtown from his East 47th Street ‘Factory’ (later moving the factory to Union Square in order to be closer to Max’s), thereby placing the seal of ‘in’ on Mickey Ruskin’s hip steakhouse.

Max’s became the place to play, and the place to get signed. Warhol’s creation. The Velvet Underground with Lou Reed. created the musical idiom that would lead to glam/glitter, punk, new wave and beyond. Eric Emerson 8 The Magic Tramps, Ruby 8 The Rednecks. Suicide, Queen Elizabeth starring Wayne County. and The New York Dolls all became Max’s bands, via The Mercer Arts Center and the Club 82. Bob Marley & The Wailers shared a night with a young man from New Jersey who showed up by bus with his guitar in a brown shopping bag; that young man was Bruce Springsteen, and he was signed to his lifelong Columbia Records deal at Max,. Aerosmith, who were part of the NY Dolls/ Wayne County crew also were signed at Max’s, as were Cheap Trick a bit later on.

NY’s ‘girls’, Patti Smith. Debbie Harry and Cherry Vanilla all played Max’s, as did Television. The Fast, Talking Heads, and any other name to emerge from the scene that you could think of. The Ramones played Max, as well, although they downplayed that fact a few years later. Mickey Ruskin had to close Max’s in 1974, and while it was closed, Hilly, On The Bowery became CBGB, quickly trying to fill the gap left by Max’s closure.

In 1975, Laura and Tommy Dean bought the bankrupt Max’s and hired Peter Crowley to book the bands, steer the ship and get the joint hopping again while managing Wayne County whose new band, The Backstreet Boys, became regular attractions at Max’s alongside Cherry Vanilla, The Fast, Suicide, and ex NY Doll Johnny Thunders’ new band The Heartbreakers, the greatest rock and roll band to emerge from the 1970’s NYC scene … period.

When you think New York punk you think Max’s Kansas City and CBGB

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