by Chris Frantz
At some point we left David and Jerry to browse in Shakespeare and Company. We all had books to read; Jerry was reading a series of spy novels called The Destroyer and David was still reading about cybernetics. Tina was reading about the Arthurian legend and I was reading mostly rock magazines and Lui, a French men’s magazine. I didn’t read much French but I loved the photos of Maria Schneider, Isabelle Adjani, Uschi, and Jane Birkin. Tina and I made our way across the Seine and took a short tour of Notre Dame. After that, we headed to the newly opened Musée National d’Art Moderne, also known as the Centre Pompidou. Outside the museum was a large public square filled with street performers and musicians. One fellow was stripped to the waist and breathing fire. Another guy juggled knives and swallowed swords. Musicians of every style wailed away and their sounds all bled together to create a truly psychedelic soundscape. Tina and I wandered among them, smiling and laughing. Look out for the mimes!
Whatever art we saw that day was overshadowed by the museum’s wild new style of architecture designed by Renzo Piano and Richard Rogers. All the air ducts and electrical pipes were on the outside of the building, which resembled some kind of crazy factory. It was a very daring and controversial design for its time. It was New with a capital N and we could dig that.
Feeling hungry, we walked around looking for a cheap café to have a sandwich and found ourselves on the Rue St. Denis. This was like walking through a funky French movie set with street-walking prostitutes leaning in doorways, yelling at one another and teasing passersby. Some of them were actually wearing striped sailor’s shirts, berets, and high stiletto heels, like a New Yorker cartoon version of a Parisienne prostitute. Some of them were just plain scary. We kept walking.
Tina and I finally found a café that we could afford and shared a ham and cheese sandwich on a baguette and a couple of beers. It was luxurious and romantic. We lingered over this little lunch and allowed the colorful ambience to sink in before we walked back to our hotel for a cinq á sept. We were awakened from our dreams by a rowdy Frank Gallagher, who had picked out a nearby restaurant for dinner. Frank had been touring for years and he was an avid foodie who was particularly fond of French food. Tina and I got dressed and we strolled down the street to Le Procope, the oldest restaurant in Paris. Thomas Jefferson and Benjamin Franklin had dined there regularly during their times in Paris. It’s been renovated now, but in 1977 it was really down at the heels. A sweet older lady brought us our coq au vin and a carafe of Bordeaux and complimented Tina on her command of the French language. Tina told her that her mother was Bretonne and the lady smiled with approval.
After dinner, as we strolled back to our hotel, we heard some cool-sounding jazz wafting up from a little cellar bar. Tina and I decided to check it out. It was a hip, candlelit nightclub with red tablecloths and a beatnik vibe and who should we find sitting there but Danny Fields? He invited us to join him and we ordered a couple of cognacs. I asked Danny where the Ramones were and he said, “They’re back at the hotel. They never go anywhere.” I wondered out loud what they might be doing in their hotel rooms with no TV or radio and Danny said, “Well, they’re not reading the Bible!” Our budget did not permit us any more drinks that night, so we said good night to Danny and headed back to Hotel Racine. The night porter let us in and smiled as we tiptoed up the stairs to our squeaky, sagging bed.
We were up early the next morning when our cafés and croissants were delivered to our room. Tina was reminded of how much she loved good French bread and butter and coffee in the morning. Taking a shower with a handheld nozzle and minuscule shower curtain was a bit of a challenge, but we managed and felt greatly refreshed. We were traveling to Normandy and the port city of Le Havre for another show. Le Havre is a pretty rough industrial city and was somewhat of a letdown after Paris. As if on cue, Johnny said it was grim and this time he was right. We played the Salle des Fêtes and during the sound check and during the show we were kept company by a small army of police and firemen, who had no doubt been warned about us dangerous punk New Yorkers. The Salle des Fêtes was a grand old ballroom with polished granite floors and very high ceilings with a proscenium stage probably built around the time of Napoleon. The kids in Le Havre were rougher and tougher than our usual audiences and some of them did not really get where Talking Heads was coming from. For the first time in a long while, we did not get an encore. When the Ramones hit the stage, however, they went nuts and we realized that maybe the presence of the police was not such a bad idea. The Ramones rocked the crowd so hard that the kids didn’t want their show to end. When it did, we heard cries of “Revenez sur la putain de scène! (Get back on the fucking stage!)”
After the show, the promoter, who seemed like he may have had ties to organized crime, took us to a restaurant he owned and gave us a fine sampling of Normand cuisine. He told us not to worry. “One day you will be popular even in Le Havre.”
After another night in a lumpy and squeaky bed, we boarded the bus to head back to Paris. I’m not sure how they found us, but the kids from Marie et Les Garcons and their girlfriends appeared at our hotel and we all went to eat dinner at Le Procope. We had the night off before our biggest show yet at Le Bataclan and we were all relieved to be back in Paris after the gritty, industrial vibes in Le Havre.
In the morning, we moved to a hotel near the Place de la République, which was closer to Le Bataclan. Le Bataclan is famous now for the terrible terrorist attack there in 2015, but in early May of 1977 it was one of the most beloved theaters in Paris. Opened in 1865, the Chinese-style theater had seen the likes of performers such as Buffalo Bill Cody, Colette, Edith Piaf, Maurice Chevalier, and Lou Reed, John Cale and Nico, billed as the Velvet Underground in 1972. This was a prestigious gig for Talking Heads and we were delighted to be there. As we waited in the adjoining café to do our sound check, Tina was surrounded by cute French boys who asked her lots of questions in French like, “Is it true that you know Richard Hell?” This really pissed off Johnny Ramone and David Byrne, who preferred to be the center of attention at all times. I think they both felt jealous that our fans were naturally drawn to Tina and it annoyed them that she was fluent in French. If some young fan asked Johnny a question he would just say, “Speak English!” David simply scowled into his beer and refused to speak to anyone.
We went backstage to do an interview with France Radio 1. Most of the questions were addressed to Tina for the obvious reason that she was the only one among us who spoke French. Not only that, but the interviewer told us that Tina spoke in a very classic and proper French that hardly anyone of our generation does anymore.
We were amazed at the backstage hospitality. There was a tower of fruits de mer, ham and cheese on baguettes, very good wines, beer, and espresso, as well as an enormous bouquet of fresh flowers.
During our sound check, Jerry was badly shocked when he touched his lips to the microphone. He stumbled back and fell to the ground. These kind of shocks were not always fatal but they could be. The crew and everyone else who saw this rushed to see if Jerry was injured. Thankfully, he was just seriously stunned. We took a few minutes to let him recover. It was a grounding issue. You had to be extra careful in these old theaters and probably in the new ones, too, if you were playing an electric guitar. The electric current in France was 220–240 volts, twice as powerful as the current in the USA. When we knew for sure that Jerry was going to be okay, we hurried through our sound check before they opened the doors and let the young punks rush in. Some of them had been waiting all afternoon.
Frank Gallagher had gotten his hands on some great Lebanese hashish and invited me for some “hash under glass” in the crew room. To avoid carrying a pipe or any other paraphernalia, you would take a band badge or a safety pin with the sharp end pointed up, set it on a table, stick a piece of hash on it, and light it on fire. Then you would blow it out and quickly cover it with a glass. When the glass filled with smoke, you would tilt the glass just a little bit and inhale the smoke through your mouth and into
your lungs. The hashish in Paris was the best. A few puffs and a couple of Alsatian beers felt just right. A very fine buzz, indeed, and I was ready for showtime. I had come to believe that I played better if I was feeling loose—not too drunk or stoned, mind you—but loosened up.
We had a feeling this would be a great show. When the people come in and start to dance and jump around, the sound always gets better. The warm bodies soak up the sound and reverberations. A sold-out show always sounds better than a less-than-sold-out show and a hot room always sounds better than a cold one. The audience was stomping and chanting before we even walked onstage, and when we made our entrance, we were greeted with pure adulation. Paris was hungry for punk. Not that we were the least bit punk. We were post-punk before there even was punk, but we came from New York and CBGB and that was all this crowd needed to know. From the opening bars of “Love Building on Fire,” they soaked the music up with powerful thirst and enthusiasm. Tina rocked her bass with perfect determination even while frozen in one spot. Jerry was a little bit reticent to get too close to his mic, but dug in like a Trojan warrior in tight pants. From my position on drums, I could only see David from the rear, but he was wiggling and wailing with that strange high-pitched voice of his and acting as if every nerve in his body was on fire. As for me, I was transported to a place where everything was clear, passionate, and beautiful. Even though my fingers were blistered and bandaged from playing so hard every night, I felt nothing could go wrong. The sound mix was as good as it gets and the entire sold-out crowd of 1,500 people rocked in unison. We got not one but two encores—and could have had a third, but it was the Ramones’ time.
If Talking Heads stimulated the left brain of these cool Parisians, the Ramones show clobbered their right brain. From Dee Dee’s first “One, Two, Three, Four!” the standing-room-only crowd surged forward and back, from left to right. No one was in danger of getting hurt, but they were definitely “pulsatin’ to the backbeat” of drummer Tommy Ramone. By the end of their set, two wild transvestites had climbed onto each end of the stage to shimmy and boogaloo in miniskirts and high heels. Oh, it was so great. It was paradise.
After the show, Mickey Stewart told us that both bands and crew had been invited out to dinner by Jackie, our Phonogram label representative. We accepted with pleasure and even Johnny was happy to go, knowing he could get a steak and French fries. After drying off while the crew packed up, we took one more look around the historic theater, soaking up the good vibes. Within a year we’d be back to headline our own show at Le Bataclan.
We all climbed on the bus after saying goodbye to a gathering of adoring fans, including the kids from Marie et les Garçons. All of us were in high spirits. We drove across the Seine and up Boulevard Raspail; at the Rodin statue of Balzac we went around the block and turned onto Boulevard du Montparnasse, parking in front of La Coupole. It was late but not too late for dinner at this amazing restaurant. La Coupole had been well known as a meeting place for artists ever since it opened in 1927. Big-time artists like Jean Cocteau, Giacometti, Josephine Baker, Man Ray, Georges Braque, Brassai, Picasso, Simone de Beauvoir and Jean-Paul Sartre, André Malraux, Jacques Prévert, Marc Chagall, Edith Piaf, Ernest Hemingway, Marlene Dietrich, and Ava Gardner. Now they could add the Ramones and Talking Heads to that fabulous list.
There were sixteen of us, so we sat at a long table in a quiet corner where we could see the fantastic giant floral arrangement under the dome in the center of the restaurant. The Ramones all sat at one end and we sat at the other. David always enjoyed eating things that he considered unusual, so he, Jerry, Tina, and I ordered escargots to start. Jackie from Phonogram called for champagne. The British crew was in heaven. They were bon vivants, too, and not all bands treated them this well. Most of us had steak frites and much champagne was consumed although the Ramones stuck with beer. When the main course was finished, Jackie called for strawberries and whipped cream. While we were waiting for our dessert, suddenly the two transgender groupies who had danced onstage with the Ramones appeared. One of them zeroed in on our bus driver, Paul, who was only nineteen and newly married. Paul, who was stocky with a sweet face and rosy cheeks, was very naïve and innocent to the ways of the world. He had just told Tina that he wanted to come to Paris to see if it would be a nice place to bring his new bride on a holiday. When this transvestite sat down on his lap, he blushed brightly and squirmed to get away, but she wasn’t going anywhere and she wasn’t letting Paul go anywhere, either. When the strawberries and whipped cream were placed in front of Paul she asked him, “Paul, do you like fraises? Moi, j’adore les fraises!” Then she pulled up her blouse to reveal a tiny hormone-induced breast. She stuck her finger in the whipped cream, circled her nipple with it, and asked Paul again, “Paul, do you like fraises?” He was frozen with embarrassment and said nothing as she pressed her Chantilly covered nipple to his lips. At this point Mickey Stewart, sensing Paul’s humiliation, stood up and said it was time for us to go—and off we went. Paul was visibly relieved to get back behind the wheel. Because he was so innocent, he never knew that the naughty girl on his lap was really a man, and we certainly didn’t tell him.
The next day, Joey and I were the first ones down to the lobby. We chatted about the Bataclan gig and how wild it was. Joey said someone had set off some smoke bombs in the lobby of the theater while we were onstage. He and I stepped outside and took a few photos with some fans and our new friends from Marie et les Garçons. When Tina arrived we got on the bus. That night’s show was in Orleans and a group from England called Eddie and the Hot Rods had been added to the bill. The venue was the Palais des Sports, which was like a big gym for a crowd of a thousand people. Eddy and the Hot Rods were cool guys and great showmen from the UK Pub Rock scene.
One of many great things about touring Europe is that the distance between shows is usually not too great. We arrived in Brussels by lunchtime. The only problem was that we found a single cup of coffee cost us our entire per diem. So we savored that coffee and waited until sound check when the promoter would provide us with some sandwiches and good Belgian beers. Before the show we did interviews with a fanzine called Mor Mag and Belgian Radio. Again, most of the questions were directed to Tina. Funny how people like to speak and write in their own language. The gig was at the university in a lecture hall that resembled a small amphitheater and it was clean as a whistle.
When showtime came around, we were thrilled by the reaction we got from the mostly male audience. The students went nuts and, for some reason, threw some potatoes and stuffed animals at us. Evidently, that meant they liked us. We got two encores and signed many autographs after the show. As usual, the Ramones killed. This young audience would loyally follow both bands from that day forward.
The following day, May 6, we rolled into Amsterdam, probably the hippest and most progessive city on earth. It still is. We would be staying at the Hotel Wiechmann, on the canal just off the Leidseplein. As the bus turned onto Prinsengracht, the very narrow street where the hotel was, we were blocked by a poorly parked European car. Mickey Stewart asked us all to follow him off the bus. He told each of us to hold onto the bumpers and underbody of the car and lift it out of the way! So the members of the Ramones and Talking Heads, to our own amazement, picked the car up and carried it out of the way and onto the sidewalk. Mickey said we were lucky it wasn’t a Cadillac.
The Hotel Wiechmann was where all the bands stayed. It was one of those tall but narrow historic townhouses that line the canals of Amsterdam, and the bands loved it because you could walk almost anywhere you wanted to go from it. As we checked in, we learned that Dr. Feelgood was also staying there. Tina and I climbed the very steep and narrow stairs right behind Joey Ramone. We had tiny rooms on the fourth floor and with our duffel bags it was a real hike. I remember collapsing onto the bed with Tina to take a short nap when there was a knock on the door. Getting into the tiny room was no problem, but there was no room to open the door from the inside without standing on the bed. It was
Joey, who wanted to make sure that we didn’t forget him when we left for the show. I assured him that we would never leave him behind.
The show that night was at the Paradiso, famously one of the best music venues in Europe. Hippies squatted in this big nineteenth-century church in 1967 and tried to turn it into a music and performance place. That same year the police kicked them out, but then the city took over and turned it into a subsidized youth center.
There were still a lot of hippies in Amsterdam, to be sure, but there were also many people who loved the concept of punk even if they didn’t fully embrace the lifestyle themselves. They spoke English very well and were well informed about music and art. They made our bands feel welcome. Dutch Radio played our first single, “Love Building on Fire,” before any other station in the world. The Dutch people that we met and came to love completely embraced the new.
When we arrived at the Paradiso we were impressed that the venue was still very much a church. In fact, services were still held there a couple of times a week. The main floor was all standing room with a large stage where the altar would be. The stained-glass windows remained. There were two balconies. It was very dark inside. The dressing rooms were downstairs under the stage, rustic but clean and bigger than most. As we walked in, Frank Gallagher grinned and said I should check out the choir loft. I walked up the stairs to find what looked like a little café where the guy behind the counter asked if I would like to see the menu. When I read it, I realized this was a hashish bar. They had a full range of varieties and prices for sale. Back home you would go straight to jail for this, but here in Amsterdam people were skinning up hash and tobacco spliffs in public. I bought a little piece of the black to save for later.