Punk Avenue

by (epub)

  “Yeah, it’s me too!” added another.

  “All right, I’m calling an ambulance,” I said, shaking like a leaf.

  “We gotta throw everybody out and flush all the drugs down the toilet. The cops’ll probably show up, too.”

  Suddenly, Cookie saw Bruce’s eyelashes move a bit, then his mouth. It had worked! He was coming back! The salt had given his heart the jumpstart it needed. He opened his eyes and started to cough, then he shook his arms and legs, splashing water everywhere.

  “Oh, my god! Thank you!!” Cookie screamed.

  “At last! She came! Maybe we’re gonna finally be able to pee,” cried one of the drag queens behind the door.

  Bruce got up, looking bewildered at the three of us in tears, on our knees in front of the tub. “What’s fucking wrong with you guys?” he demanded. “Why’d you put me in the bathtub with my sharkskin suit on?”

  “Bruce, you’re alive! It’s a miracle! You were dead!”

  “Yeah, great, but you could’ve at least taken off my suit! It’s gonna be ruined. That’s really smart, I just bought it …” he grumbled, and stepping out of the tub, he opened the bathroom door and started for his room. We followed him, cheered on by the applause of the impressive crowd that was still waiting in line for the bathroom.

  “This one was taking a shower fully dressed!” quipped one of the drag queens.

  “Who invited that clown? Get outta my house!” answered Bruce, dripping all over the carpet. He took off his jacket and closed his bedroom door, then sat down at his desk. “Where did you put my spoon?” he asked me, pulling a few little cellophane bags out of a drawer.

  “You’re not going to shoot up again, are you?! Are you out of your mind? We just brought you back to life. You were dead, Bruce, for at least ten minutes,” the three of us insisted.

  “Yeah, but you know … honestly, I don’t feel high at all anymore,” he smiled, and soaking wet, he started to cook up his next fix.

  Meanwhile, the Clash had become international stars. By far the biggest band from the punk movement. Seeing on the news that the Clash was adding a second week at Bond’s Casino in Times Square, I decided to call our manager.

  “Maybe they didn’t hire all the bands to open up yet,” I told him. “They saw us play at Max’s, and I think they dug us. We should contact them about playing one of the shows with them.”

  “Yeah, right! Why not the Stones? Did they see you play? Do you want to open up for the Stones, too?”

  “Yes!” I laughed. “But no really, we know them. I even hung out a bit with one of them last time they were in New York.”

  “You hung out with the Stones?”

  “No, the Clash!”

  “Phil, I am too busy for your nonsense.” He hung up.

  The next day, Steve and I were on motorcycle ride when we noticed a whole bunch of little punkettes in front of the Gramercy Park Hotel. “I bet that’s where the Clash are staying,” Steve said. A punk rocker was admiring his bike, so Steve asked, “Who are you all waiting for?”

  “The Clash, man, the Clash!”

  “Maybe I should ask about playing with them at Bond’s. … I’ll go look,” I said, and without even taking the time to remove my helmet, I ran into the hotel. I decided to ask the concierge to deliver a message to the band from me, and I scribbled on a piece of paper, Philippe, The Senders and my phone number. Just then, a few girls started screaming, and I turned around to see Paul Simonon entering the hotel. I tried to get over to him, but he was already surrounded by a mob of fans asking for autographs. I was only able to make my way to him at the very last moment, just before he got into the elevator with his entourage; I slipped him my piece of paper, and blurted out, “How are you? We want to play with you at Bond’s. Here’s my num—” as the door closed.

  I didn’t think it would actually go anywhere, so I was surprised when I got a phone call from their manager that very evening. “Do you want to open up for the Clash at Bond’s?” he asked, with a thick British accent.

  “Yes, great! When?”

  “Tomorrow night.”

  “All right, fabulous! How much money should I tell the band you’ll pay us?” I asked him, before immediately panicking—figuring I’d just fucked the whole thing up.

  But he didn’t hang up on me. Instead, he said, “A thousand dollars—is that okay?” before adding, “Sound check is at four. See you tomorrow.”

  The next night, we found ourselves playing in front of eight thousand people. Before us, there was the rap band called Grandmaster Flash & the Furious Five. The graffiti artist Futura 2000 had been hired to spray-paint a huge metallic wall at the back of the stage as the Clash was playing. Sure to always be into the latest thing, the Clash really dug the hip-hop movement that was starting to explode in the clubs of the Bronx and Queens. They loved all the New York rappers, which, of course, did not translate to the rest of the average American punk rocker crowd, as most people still considered hip-hop to be a part of disco—the enemy, the worst music in the world! Grandmaster Flash was booed off the stage like you wouldn’t believe. It was raining cans of Coke by the thousands. They got killed; it was pouring cans. The band and I looked at each other and said, “Fuck, we’re next!”

  We climbed onstage in almost total darkness. The audience thought we were the Clash and the room exploded with screams of “Yyeeeaahhh!!” It’s true that in the dark we looked more like the Clash than Grandmaster Flash did. All the spotlights came on at once, and there was a comical moment when everyone in the room realized their mistake. Two or three cans of Coke came flying at us—including one that missed me by a couple of inches. Shit! I told myself. We had barely started the first song. … Fortunately for us, the cans stopped coming almost right away, and the crowd decided to give us a chance—probably glad that at least we weren’t rapping. The show went beautifully. They couldn’t resist the fabulous Senders for very long. Haha! Nobody ever did!

  Before going on stage, Joe and Paul stopped by our dressing room to say hi—kind as always. It was a fabulous show, and we’ll be forever thankful to the Clash for hiring us. I have to admit, apart from Mick Jones—who might not have been the friendliest chap—the Clash guys were pretty cool!

  Bill, our guitar player, went to tour England for three weeks with some other good friends of ours: the Stray Cats, who were also starting to get really big. They decided to “fatten up” their rockabilly sound for that tour by adding a second guitar, a piano, and a sax. That same month, I went to see my family in Paris, and while I was there, I decided to go by the club Les Bains Douches with our record under my arm to see if The Senders could play there. There had been a great little article about us in the French music magazine Rock & Folk, entitled “PUNK BLUES!” and I thought the club might know about us.

  As I walked into the club’s office, I introduced myself and the band to the guy behind the desk. He had never heard of us and, at first, told me to come back in six months, but when he noticed that our record came from Max’s, he asked if we had gone to New York to record it.

  “No, we live there. I’m actually the only French one in the band—all the others are American. I’m a Frenchman in an American band!” And with that, he immediately offered me a solid week of shows any time we wanted. I guess it was a good idea to specify that we were from the States! That evening, I called our manager in New York to ask if he could finance Steve and Marc’s airfare so we could play for a week at Les Bains Douches, but he told me to go to hell.

  “I’m already in Paris and Bill is in England. All he has to do is take the ferry. My sister can put a couple of them up. We’ll manage. It’ll cost nothing, and we’ll make ten times more playing every night at Les Bains Douches than we would in New York—not to mention this will get us known in Paris, then France, then Europe, the entire world! ”

  “But of course …” he drawled, sounding like he was really getting annoyed now. “I’m n
ot buying any plane tickets for anyone—are you joking? What’s next?”

  “Yeah, but we don’t have enough money. We’re more like flat broke, and you and your partner may have organized Woodstock, but I don’t think you’re doing very much for us at all and if things don’t change soon, I’m not even sure I’m going to re-sign the contract when it ends …”

  “It ends now!” he yelled and slammed down the phone.

  I came back to New York feeling pretty disappointed. At the airport, this big Black customs woman looked at my passport and asked me, “Musician? Are you in a rock band?”

  “Yes, The Senders.”

  “Never heard of you!”

  “Yeah, yeah, I know …” I felt like saying, “but if we had played for a week at Les Bains Douches then you would have …”

  Risé and I were starting to get high more and more often, but we were careful—we were not junkies. We only did it once or twice a month … or only on weekends … or every three days … but no more!! We were hooked, and it was starting to ruin our marriage. Going down to Norfolk Street or Avenue D to buy dope was terrifying, but I was down there every two days now. …

  You got to this abandoned ruin of a building, and after slipping through a hole in the wall, you had to walk down a hallway littered with trash. Then you had to climb upstairs in total darkness. Half the steps were broken or missing altogether, and you had to try go to up without falling in between—all the while, hoping you wouldn’t get murdered. You’d get about two flights up and suddenly find yourself crashing into someone else you hadn’t seen. BAM! Shit! There’s someone there! From the second floor up, there’d be a line reaching all the way to the fifth floor. You had to wait in the dark behind a hundred other guys. Talking was forbidden, and every now and then you’d hear the dealer’s security remind everybody, “Ssshhh … quiet down there, or no dope!” Security went up and down the stairs, wielding baseball bats.

  I often waited for more than an hour, fucking terrified—like those times when there was no more dope, and I had to stay there, in silence, until the next shipment arrived. Once in the building, no one was allowed to leave unless the security said so by announcing, “Green light.” If they said “red light,” that meant you had to stay put. If you didn’t follow their rules, they’d kill you without a second thought. Who would give a damn about another dead junkie in an abandoned building? There must have been corpses everywhere in there. Once you got to the fifth floor and it was finally your turn, you’d walk to a metal door reinforced fifteen times—like a safe in a bank—and put your money, in ten-dollar bills, through a little hole pierced in the center. You’d say “D” or “C” to specify if you wanted dope or coke, and then you waited for the little bags to come out of the same hole. Then you’d get the fuck out of there in a hurry and run down the stairs in the dark playing “Let’s See If I Can Get to the Ground Floor Alive.”

  To give it a more official feel, they would stamp their little cellophane bags with brand names and logos, usually picking names like Magnum or Death. The dealers understood the importance of advertising. We were always saying things like, “Oh, did you try Skull on 2nd Street? It’s really good this week.” Seven-Up was the best brand for a while.

  The worst thing was when you got to the bottom of the stairs and it was “red light.” If the lookout at the corner saw a police car, no one could leave before it was clear. When that happened, you’d be stuck there, your pockets full of dope, in pitch black with an army of desperate junkies. Life was cheap by the front door. At least the guards there gave you a vague feeling of security. Where it really got bad, though, was when you got to the corner of the block—the entrance to the lion’s den, Alphabet City, where it was every man for himself. The best you could do was run for your life. There, you were good for it either way you went: they could get your money on your way there, and or your dope on your way back. That’s where the most dangerous and poorest Black and Puerto Rican junkies waited for their prey, their lambs … their little white junkies from good families, who were coming from Tribeca or the Upper West Side. The artists, the nine-to-fivers in suits who had just gotten paid, each one more lost and terrified than the other, pockets filled with money or dope. They knew damn well that the neighborhood muggers saw them as perfect victims, vulnerable to the point where they couldn’t even go to the police—because they’d had their drugs stolen. It was a good idea to wear sneakers and be ready to take off in a flash. Even better, having a getaway car waiting around the corner. I saw quite a few of them get jumped right in front of me like a bunch of rabbits attacked by wild dogs, everybody taking off in all directions. I, myself, beat the hundred-meter record a few times on Avenue D. It was military maneuvers between the muggers and the cops, and getting home with what you had just bought was never a guarantee.

  To avoid the “freshmen” that attracted the cops, the best dope houses catered exclusively to professional junkies, those they knew would be back every day. To get in there, you had to show “ID,” which meant rolling up your sleeves to show the tracks on your arm. Every now and then, some of the dope houses would be closed without any explanation. They wouldn’t even leave a sign on the door. You could easily venture into a building where there’d be no one but a couple of guys waiting to cut your throat. To avoid that, regulars would discreetly signal to each other in the street: “530 is closed. 573 across the street is open. …”

  Sometimes, they’d all be closed, leaving you with no choice but to buy your stuff on the sidewalk from gypsy dealers, independents, guys who sold generic dope, which could easily be crushed aspirin, if you were lucky—or Ajax or rat poison if you weren’t. On the sidewalks, it was the lottery, and you never really knew what you were taking home.

  So, one evening, after taking off my watch and my ring, I went down to Norfolk to get four bags. I had just come out of the building and was heading toward Houston Street when this big Puerto Rican guy with a thick black mustache asked me for a light. I told him I didn’t smoke and picked up my step, but I wasn’t able to get away. He pushed me against the wall and took out a knife, saying, “Your dope—give me everything. Hurry up!”

  “I don’t have any, I swear. I’m sorry!”

  “I saw you come out of the dope house—you think I’m stupid? Cough it up or I’ll kill you, motherfucker,” he whispered nervously, glancing around.

  “All right.” I was shaking like a leaf, but I took one of the four cellophane bags out of my pocket.

  “The rest, hurry up! Gimme all you got. Do you wanna die? Turn your pockets inside out.”

  I don’t know what possessed me. You have to be pretty badly hooked to justify that kind of move, but without another thought, I shoved the guy off of me and took off running as fast as I could. I’d never moved so fast in my life.

  “How did it go?” Risé asked when I came back home seventeen seconds later.

  “I lost one of them on the way … but apart from that, no problem, samo …”

  Johnny, now without the Heartbreakers, was going to play at Irving Plaza with The Senders and the B-Girls opening up. Irving Plaza was an old ballroom from the twenties right around the block from Max’s, near Gramercy Park. With its big classic room and balconies all around, it was a great place to see a band. Everything at Irving Plaza seemed old and authentic: beautiful staircases done in retro Chinese style, all red and gold and with dragons and all. I loved the atmosphere there. I’d seen a few good shows at Irving Plaza, like the Gun Club with Jeffrey Lee Pierce, the Vipers, and the Cramps, and we’d played there three or four times. It was a blast every time.

  When I arrived at sound check, I could tell there was a problem. Johnny’s roadies were busy setting up a large wooden cross on which he was supposed to be crucified during the show. But the owner of Irving Plaza, who was probably religious, didn’t seem to find it funny at all.

  “Are you joking?” the guy was yelling furiously at the roadies onstage. “Take thi
s thing off the stage immediately, and you can tell Mr. Thunders to go get crucified somewhere else! Where the hell do you think you are, exactly? We don’t appreciate this kind of bad taste here! And tell him that if he doesn’t like it, we’ll cancel the whole show. And if I see that cross onstage tonight, I’ll pull the plug and that will be the end of that! We like rock ’n’ roll here, but we respect religion too, mister!”

  Johnny showed up a little later, and the roadie told him they wouldn’t have the cross.

  “They can go fuck themselves!” Johnny replied, rolling his eyes and casually sitting down backstage.

  “Do you wanna come eat with us?” Steve asked him.

  “No, go ahead. I’m gonna hang out here a bit. See you in awhile,” he said, taking a syringe out of his pocket.

  When we came back around ten, the room was already packed. We went to hang out at the bar upstairs, and around eleven the B-Girls arrived. As they walked into the dressing room, they found Johnny asleep on the sofa, completely naked.

  “Ooohh! He’s naked!” they all shrieked together, which woke him up.

  “Eehhh? What time is it?” he asked, getting up. “Where’s the bathroom?”

  “Down the corridor, on the left.”

  “No! No! On the left!” they all screamed, laughing hysterically as Johnny, high as a kite and naked as a jaybird, kept going straight and mistakenly opened the wrong door, which led directly to the room where the audience was, just to the right of the stage. “Ladies and gentlemen, Johnny Thunders!”

  Later on, when he felt better and had gotten dressed, he went on to perform. And when the curtain came up, there he was, his guitar hanging in front of him, crucified on his cross … and nobody pulled no plug.

  Steve was starting to complain more and more that his ears hurt after the shows, and that he was having a hard time hearing. It was rapidly getting worse and he was getting to be pretty deaf. Boxing must have fucked him up pretty badly, and the loud volume of rock ’n’ roll in the clubs every night was probably not ideal.