Tuesday, October 26, 2010

HalloweenNYC 2010, Hate Crimes and Getting Past a Tough Door



The Nightlife Report for October 26, 2010
Compiled by Gamal Hennessy

Events
Halloween
Still looking for someplace to wear your Lady Gaga meat costume? Check out the New York Nights Halloween 2010 List.

Feature Story
Hate Crimes and New York Nightlife
City Hall and New York nightlife need to send a clear message in response to recent anti gay attacks in bars

Opinion
Getting into the Club
Noche Latina offers some common sense tips on getting into exclusive New York nightlife venues.

New Venues
Bunker: Meatpacking District

Windsor: Village

Seize the Night

Kindle Edition
The definitive New York nightlife book, Seize the Night, is available from Amazon in print, on Blackberrys, iPhones and iPads. Get it now
Have fun.
Gamal

Sunday, October 24, 2010

The New York Nights Halloween Event List for 2010

Compiled by Gamal Hennessy

Still looking for someplace to wear that Lady Gaga style meat dress or slutty nurse costume? Here are some suggestions for every night of the Halloween Weekend. Keep in mind two things; First, many of these events require ticket purchases in advance, so don’t wait until 6pm on Friday to decide where to go. Second, there are going to be hundreds of other parties not on this list, especially in the bars and lounges around the Halloween Parade route on Sunday, so don’t get discouraged if you don’t see something here that fits your tastes.

Friday October 29th
Wepa! Halloween Party
Bar 13 kicks off the weekend in Union Square with a Afro House and Latin Soul themed party complete with Conquito, Cigars and a heated roof deck

Maskarave
House legends Junior Sanchez, Frankie Bones and D’Mitry of Dee Lite headline this mid Manhattan masquerade dance party

Halloween Candy Land
Stitch combines an open bar, free candy and prizes for the best costume with a benefit for the Asthmatic League

Playtime
Willie Graff takes a break from his Ibiza tour to bring soulful dance music to your Cielo Halloween Party


Saturday October 30th
Deity
The premier Brooklyn Lounge has an open DiSarrono bar and Common’s DJ Dummy providing the music.

Jonathan Peters Holiday Ball
The Veteran house DJ headlines the costume party at Pacha

Halloween Pub Crawl
If you just can't make up your mind...don't.

Party Like a Rockstar
Enjoy a rooftop costumer party at Hudson Terrace

Freaks Come Out at Night
If you can’t make it down to the city on Saturday, check out this party at Salud in Yonkers

Scream Party
DJ Camilo and Ric Roc headline this uptown hip hop party at Talay

Sunday October 31st
Webster Hall
Fresh off its Nightlife Awards accolades, Webster Hall hosts the Halloween Parade after party
Rocky Horror Picture Show
Celebrate the 35th Anniversary of the Ultimate Halloween Party Film at Le Poisson Rouge

Garage
Music and dancing close to the parade route

Pornoween at Bar 13
Take your slutty costume to a party promising live erotic shows at Bar 13

Have fun
Gamal

Monday, October 18, 2010

Chelsea Room, Snap, The Nightlife Awards and Saving Hip Hop Music




The Nightlife Report for October 19th 2010
Compiled by Gamal Hennessy

New York Nights
The Erosion of Hip Hop Heritage
The foundations of blues, jazz and rock are preserved for future generations. Is hip hop getting the same treatment?

Prince of the City
A Short History of American Hip Hop
My brief survey of our most influential musical genre.

Events
The 6th Annual Nightlife Awards
Paper Magazine's 6th Annual Nightlife Awards were held last night. Here are this year's winners.

Reviews
Vintry Wine and Whiskey

New Venues
Snap
An upscale sportsbar will open in the Meatpacking District just in time for this year's World Series

The Chelsea Room
The Lounge that was formerly Serena and Star Lounge is set to open underneath the historic Chelsea Hotel.

Seize the Night
The definitive New York nightlife book, Seize the Night, is now available from Amazon in print and Kindle devices:

Nightlife New York

Talent Search
New York Nights is Looking for Local Bartenders, Chefs, Designers, DJ’s, Dancers and Musicians. Read more about it here...

Have fun.
Gamal

Friday, October 15, 2010

A Short History of American Hip Hop



By Gamal Hennessy

Earlier this week I posted an article about the erosion of hip hop heritage and the reasons behind it. Now I’d like to follow up with a brief history of the hip hop genre to put the art form in perspective. This history is primarily based on my own experience and memory (because I‘m pretty old) but I don‘t claim that this is definitive. I’m also not saying one era is better or worse. I just want to highlight the history and evolution of the genre to show how rich and complex it actually is.

Classic or Old School Hip Hop (1978-1983) This is the recognized beginning of the genre when Caribbean dance hall toasting merged with DJ’s spinning records at block parties and house parties to create a new form of music. Recognized artists from this period include Kurtis Blow, The Fearless Four, Salt & Pepa, the Sugarhill Gang and UTFO. This period roughly begins with Grandmaster Flash and the Furious Five and ends with the rise of Eric B and Rakim.

Golden Age Hip Hop (1984-1995) This is the age when rap adopted a radio friendly four minute structure and production qualities of the records increased. Rap began to branch out here, with one set of artists (like the Beastie Boys and the Fresh Prince) becoming more accepted in the mainstream and another camp (Public Enemy and X-Clan) becoming more antagonistic to the social status quo. This was also the period where local rivalries bubbled over into more violent exchanges. Well known acts from the Golden Age include A Tribe Called Quest, De La Soul, NWA, Naughty by Nature, Tupac, and the Wu Tang Clan. This period generally begins with Eric B and ends with the death of the Notorious BIG.

Regional Hip Hop (1995-2007): At this point, hip hop was a universal genre in American music. The rap video was a staple on MTV and rap artists began to dominate the music charts. Artists from different parts of the country began to establish their own flavor of hip hop to compete with the music coming out of New York and LA. Cities like Atlanta, Chicago, Detroit, Miami, New Orleans, St. Louis and other urban hubs all produced successful hip hop acts and redefined the sound. Critics point to this as the period where image and packaging became more important than lyrical talent and originality, but its commercial success can’t be discounted. This period included artists like Common, Eminem, Jay-Z, Kanye West, Ludacris, Nas, Nelly, OutKast, and Snoop Dog. This era generally begins with the rise of Puff Daddy and ends with the emergence of T-Pain.

Mainstream Hip Hop (2007- ): Hip hop now goes beyond its own genre and has become an almost required element of popular music. Many pop, R&B, reggae, and rock songs feature a hip hop artist collaborations as a way to boost sales. House and techno mixes of hip hop songs are common. Far from being a passing fad in entertainment, hip hop is now a recognized spring board for an artist to branch out into acting, music production and even corporate management. Drake, Kid Cudi, Lil Wayne, Lupe Fiasco and T.I. have found success in this period which might be the most lucrative era in all of hip hop. The mainstream period starts with T-Pain and shows no sign of slowing down.

As I said earlier this week, I don’t mean to suggest that the rappers listed in each category only were only successful in one era. Many artists have had long term careers. I am suggesting that hip hop has a rich history spanning more than three decades and a cultural influence that is just as strong, if not stronger than other forms of American music. That music deserves to be studied and preserved in the same manner as the music of Bob Dylan, Miles Davis and the Beatles. Anything else is a rejection of what hip hop means to nightlife culture specifically and American culture in general.

Have fun.
Gamal

Special Thanks: Alysse Jordan, the head of the Social Work Library at Columbia University and a reader of New York Nights, informed me that contrary to my assertion earlier this week, there are historians and scholars working to preserve hip hop music. Anyone who is interested can find more information at these sites:

http://www.hiphoparchive.org/
http://dubois.fas.harvard.edu/hiphop-archive-harvard-university
http://www.stanford.edu/group/hiphoparchive/
http://rmc.library.cornell.edu/hiphop/
http://uhiphop.uchicago.edu/
http://h2c2harlem.com/



Wednesday, October 13, 2010

The Erosion of Hip Hop Heritage



By Gamal Hennessy

The roots of Hip hop have been in the news quite a bit recently.
Fat Beats , the iconic repository of rare vinyl has closed. Angus Batey, a writer for the London Guardian recently argued that the history of the genre is fading away because early albums are not being reissued in the same way that blues, jazz and rock albums are. When you add to all this hip hop’s inherent obsession with being current and moving forward to the result a loss of years and years of great music by rap pioneers.

The history of rap music is a dramatic story of growth and influence that is not actively preserved. In thirty years, it has gone from what some critics referred to as a
passing fad to the dominant genre of modern music. Hip hop established a strong cultural connection to America from the 80s to today. However, while most other genres of music have historians, musicologists, and other scholars preserving the music and the history of the musicians. Hip hop doesn’t really have that same archive.

One of the main ways music is maintained is through the practice of reissues, where older tracks are re-mastered, unreleased material is added and major box set compilations are released. This gives the original audience a chance to relive the music of their youth while at the same time introduces a new generation to the music. Artists in other genres, including blues, jazz and rock, benefit from extensive reissue collections every year.

Hip hop has several characteristics that hinder this kind of treatment. Live performances, mix tapes and demos are not available or difficult to come by for the purposes of re-mastering. Many of the original artists signed deals that took away all the rights to their albums, so they couldn’t re-release them even if they wanted to. Finally, hip hop has and inherent stigma against living in the past. The Grateful Dead toured constantly for years without releasing a new studio album. Maxwell and Sade stayed out of the industry for years and were able to return with chart topping albums that maintained their signature style. It is very difficult for a hip hop artists do live off their past glory that way. They have to be current or be ignored.

This struggle for reinvention limits the understanding of the public. The general public knows where hip hop is, but not where it came from. Flavor Flav only known for being on Flavor of Love, not as the influential hype man for one of the most popular afro centric hip hop acts in history. Run only known for being Rev Run and having a vague connection to hipster T-shirts, not as one of the foundations of old school rap. Queen Latifah, Ice-T, Will Smith, Ice Cube and LL Cool J have almost completely reinvented themselves as actors first and rappers second. Diddy is on his third name change. These new incarnations aren’t necessarily bad, but the new personas don’t have to erase the original music.

There is some support for the music and artists that established hip hop. VH1 just broadcast its annual Hop Hop Honors awards show to recognize the contributions of founding artists. The Rock the Bells concerts brings back artists to perform their classic albums every summer. As a small contribution to the preservation of hip hop heritage, I’d like to offer a timeline of the hip hop genre of music later this week. It won’t be definitive by any means, but it will be enlightening for anyone who thinks hip hop started with Eminem.

I don’t argue that the rappers listed in each category only were only successful in one era. Many artists have had long term careers. I am suggesting that hip hop has a rich history spanning more than three decades and a cultural influence that is just as strong, if not stronger than other forms of American music. That music deserves to be studied and preserved in the same manner as the music of Bob Dylan, Miles Davis and the Beatles. Anything else is a rejection of what hip hop means to nightlife culture specifically and American culture in general.

Have fun.
Gamal

Thursday, October 7, 2010

Guns in Clubs, Oktoberfest, Stonewall and the Nightlife Awards


The Nightlife Report for October 7, 2010
Compiled by Gamal Hennessy

Awards
Paper Magazine
Cast your vote in Paper Magazine's nightlife awards.

Events
Oktoberfest
Citysearch offers five German themed bars to help you celebrate Oktoberfest.

Nightlife New York
Talent Search
New York Nights is Looking for Local Bartenders, Chefs, Designers, DJ’s, Dancers and Musicians.

Nightlife Violence
Gun Control
Some states let nightlife patons carry guns. Could New York be next?

Opinion
New York’s Best Rock and Roll Bars
Clubplanet offers a list of the best live rock & roll clubs in New York nightlife.

Prince of the City
Stonewall as the Past and Present Symbol of Gay Rights in America
Recent events should remind us that nightlife is part of the struggle for gay rights and the struggle isn’t over.

Seize the Night
Now Available on Kindle Devices
The definitive New York nightlife book, Seize the Night, is now available on
Blackberrys, iPhones and iPads devices

Wednesday, October 6, 2010

An Invitation for Nightlife Artists



(New York Nights is Looking for Local Bartenders, Chefs, Designers, DJ’s, Dancers and Musicians)

New York Nights has always been a major supporter of nightlife culture. We understand that the artistic energy of our bars and clubs is the real reason why the City Never Sleeps.

We are currently looking for local talent to be part of a television program we are developing about New York nightlife. The show will go beyond the bottle service in celebrity venues to explore the emerging creative energy that defines the nightlife experience.

This is a new production, so the initial impact might be very small. However, when the program takes off it will have national exposure. Getting involved on the ground floor could pave the way for your success down the road.

We are not charging for this service and we are not asking for ownership of any of your work. Our main goal is to find exciting artists that will enhance the quality of our show.

If you are interested in the exposure that this kind of show could bring to your work, please let us know. Send us your contact information, links to your website or samples of your work and information where you perform or work to gamal@newyorknightsonline.com . If you have any questions, please let me know.

Have fun.
Gamal