At least part of the failure of Continental, Pussycat Lounge and Lucky Cat to continue as live music venues lies with each of the venue's booking policies. Book crap bands most days of the week and it's no wonder patrons don't return or go there in the first place. Pussycat Lounge basically only had crap bands with the occasional interesting booking (Eyehategod anyone?). Continental had a good run in the early to mid 90s and then began letting any any ham & egger garage band and cover band play -- the bookers there did not make an effort to compete and stay on top of interesting new bands. Lucky Cat is just a dive bar with no stage or PA that didn't make any concerted effort to make it as a live venue of any note. Just opening the door to live music doesn't entitle anyone to stay in business. I've had great times at all of these places. I sympathize with the harassment they face from the Bloomberg administration, real estate interests and mild & entitled 2.0 NYers, but this article is just hopelessly off the mark. Pussycat dude is so oblivious that he doesn't even realize how off-the-mark his "getting CBGB's business" quote is. First, it would never happen given his location and complete lack of presence as a live venue (as opposed to titty bar); second, mainly tourists went to CBGBs for at least the last 10 years. It sure wasn't for the bands. CBGB survived on tshirt sales and overpriced beers. That isn't transferrable to any club in lower Manhattan.
At least part of the failure of Continental, Pussycat Lounge and Lucky Cat to continue as live music venues lies with each of the venue's booking policies. Book crap bands most days of the week and it's no wonder patrons don't return or go there in the first place. Pussycat Lounge basically only had crap bands with the occasional interesting booking (Eyehategod anyone?). Continental had a good run in the early to mid 90s and then began letting any any ham & egger garage band and cover band play -- the bookers there did not make an effort to compete and stay on top of interesting new bands. Lucky Cat is just a dive bar with no stage or PA that didn't make any concerted effort to make it as a live venue of any note. Just opening the door to live music doesn't entitle anyone to stay in business. I've had great times at all of these places. I sympathize with the harassment they face from the Bloomberg administration, real estate interests and mild & entitled 2.0 NYers, but this article is just hopelessly off the mark. Pussycat dude is so oblivious that he doesn't even realize how off-the-mark his "getting CBGB's business" quote is. First, it would never happen given his location and complete lack of presence as a live venue (as opposed to titty bar); second, mainly tourists went to CBGBs for at least the last 10 years. It sure wasn't for the bands. CBGB survived on tshirt sales and overpriced beers. That isn't transferrable to any club in lower Manhattan.