Gil Scott Heron, Hookah Bans, La Birreria and Why Kids Drink

Nightlife News for June 1, 2011

Compiled by Gamal Hennessy

Prince of the City
Yelp

I’ve recently started developing a list of reviews on the popular venue site. Take a look at my new listings for Les Enfants, Pravda, SubMercer and assorted SoHo venues. Let me know what you think…

Liquor as a Rite of Passage
There is a direct relationship between the rules for drinking and people’s relationship to alcohol. Until we understand and deal with that relationship, we can’t deal with underage drinking on any meaningful level.

The Private Lounge
My new residency at one of Esquire’s top clubs of the year. Stop by tonight to experience a unique blend of music and spirits created to help you look forward to Wednesdays.

Culture
DJ Qu
The Village Voice sat down with a DJ who has seen the evolution of the house scene from Zanzibar to Limelight to the House Dance Conference. His interview reveals a strong connection between West Indian and urban dance culture. It also hints at a tradition that has developed over the past 30 years not just for DJs, but for music, dancing and technology in general.

Gil Scott Heron
While he never took any credit for his influence on hip hop, Gil Scott Heron is recognized by many successful artists as the person who took spoken word, urban anger and music and combined them into a new form of expression. While drugs and overconsumption crippled him for several years, Heron had recently released an album and return from a European tour when he died last Friday. Anyone who listens to funk, hip hop or neo-soul today has heard Heron’s influence in the samples and lyrics of the artists who came after him.

Business
Is hookah the target of the next smoking ban?
Now that New York and several other cities have banned smoking in restaurants, bars, parks, beaches and other public areas, it appears that hookah might be on the radar of the anti-smoking lobby. Unlike most smoking, hookah is allowed indoors in New York City under for an exemption for “tobacco specialty shops.” This is one of the reasons that hookah bars came into prominence in the Lower East Side in the days after normal smoking was banned in local bars. While the health information contained in the report is accurate, it is not coincidental that this report comes out a week after the park ban on smoking went into effect…

New Venues
La Birreria
Eataly opens a rooftop beer garden on the top of its Chelsea venue

Have fun.
G

The Manhattan Cocktail Classic, Kool Herc, Binge Drinking and the Private Lounge

Nightlife News for May 24, 2011
Compiled by Gamal Hennessy

Prince of the City
Yelp
I’ve recently started developing a list of reviews on the popular venue site. Take a look at my new listings for Greenhouse, Santos and District 36 and assorted Tribeca venues. Let me know what you think…

The Private Lounge
My new residency at one of Esquire’s top clubs of the year. Stop by on June 1st to experience a unique blend of music and spirits created to help you look forward to Wednesdays.

Events
The Manhattan Cocktail Classic
One of the City’s major events on all aspects of drinking took place last week with an assortment of seminars, demonstrations and plenty of high end drinking. Here’s a rundown of the week’s events.

Culture
Kool Herc Honored at a Special Ceremony
Before Drake and Kanye, before Jay-Z and Diddy, before Biggie and Tupac, before Rakim and Run DMC, there was a man named Kool Herc who mixed dancehall toasting with funk and soul beats to create rap music. While mainstream media and much of the hip hop industry has forgotten him, several prominent hip hop artists including the Roots and Big Daddy Kane came together in honor of this musical pioneer. We can only hope the money from this tribute went to pay Herc’s ongoing medical bills.

Business
Nightlife and the Living Wage Debate
There is a bill moving through the New York City Council that would require businesses that get bonuses from the city to pay their workers a higher hourly salary than the minimum wage set out by Federal law. While operators in the nightlife industry often aren’t direct recipients of public funding, there are various loopholes in the law that could trigger this law if passed. That’s why members of NYNA came out against the proposed legislation at a hearing early this week. The debate will continue into the next political season and the economic effect it could have on the city could directly impact who becomes mayor of New York once Bloomberg is gone.

Health
Substance Abuse Grows Among the Older Generation
Mainstream media usually associates alcohol and drug abuse with nightlife and young people, but according to the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration. Between 1992 and 2008, treatment admissions for those 50 and older more than doubled in the U.S. There are now more than 230,000 Americans over 50 in treatment for substance abuse. While the study concludes that the baby boomer generation has a historically high rate of substance abuse, this is study indicates that 1) substance abuse is a national issue that goes far beyond nightlife and 2) many of the fanatics and amateurs in nightlife now who think they will grow out of this behavior might find themselves facing their grandchildren as addicts.

Binge Drinking Increases Memory Loss
How many times have you gone out drinking and forgotten everything that happened the night before? Researchers for Health Day News conducted a study on the memory of binge drinkers and found that the binge drinkers scored lower on the test than non drinkers. The researchers also found that binge drinkers scored well on visual tests and they admitted that the test didn’t prove the direct effect of binge drinking on memory loss. In spite of this, anecdotal evidence suggests that responsible indulgence with liquor will help you have fun at night without forgetting the good time you had when you wake up the next day.

Have fun
G

Afrika Bambaatta, Closing the Beer Gardens, the CBGB Film, Tenjune, Venugo and Yelp

Nightlife News for May 17, 2011
Compiled by Gamal Hennessy

Prince of the City
Venugo
A new nightlife site wants to be all things to all patrons, but do they want too much from you?

Yelp
 I’ve recently started developing a list of reviews on the popular venue site. Take a look at my first 25 listings, including Lambs Club, Milleseme, Painkiller and about 20 venues in the Financial District. Let me know what you think…

Business
Anti Beer Garden Law
A measure has been introduced in Brooklyn that would shut down beer gardens or any outdoor drinking space by midnight, even on the weekends. The proposed law would also require a special outdoor drinking permit for these spaces. While the sponsor of this bill claims that she is not trying to put anyone out of business, it is clear that this type of legislation favors NIMBY elements of her constituency at the expense of operators and patrons. While almost 80 percent of Gothamist readers don’t think outdoor spaces should close by midnight, those people don’t vote and it is the voters (in this case the NIMBYs) that the politicians will cater to.

Club Scents
A recent study suggests that operators who want people to stay in their venue and spend more money need to install fragrance machines instead of smoke machines. The Netherlands study showed that by pumping a venue with orange or peppermint smells, patrons danced more, drank more and had a much better opinion of a club.

Culture
Afrika Bambaatta
The Museum of Modern Art is currently celebrating Bambaatta and his seminal hit Planet Rock as a part of its Looking at Music 3.0 exhibit. Along with Kool Herc and Grandmaster Flash, Bamtaatta gave birth to a form of musical expression that went from an underground “fad” to the dominant music form of the last 30 years. The exhibit will show how Bambaataa and hip hop itself moved from nightlife culture to mainstream culture.

CBGB
There is a film being developed about the story of the iconic CBGB. Produced by Lisa Kristal Bergman (daughter of CBGB owner Hilly Kristal), the film will focus on the development of punk rock in New York nightlife and the pivotal role the Bowery club played in the development of that music. The only outstanding question now revolves around the infamous bathroom. Will they actually recreate it or will it all be just special effects?

Crime
Tenjune
A lawsuit has been filed against Mark Birnbaum, owner of high profile venues. While the case is still pending and no allegations have been proven the complaint claims that "Birnbaum made unwelcome sexual advances, requested sexual favors and engaged in inappropriate and illegal verbal and physical conduct of a sexual nature with plaintiffs.” While it isn’t as high profile as the IMF President’s alleged rape, this doesn’t do anything to improve the image of nightlife in New York. Unfortunately, the negative image of the industry is so rampant that many patrons aren’t even surprised anymore.

Have fun.
Gamal

Groupon, Martinis, Patua, Rock and Roll Tours and How You Failed Nightlife

Nightlife News for May 11, 2011
Compiled by Gamal Hennessy

Culture
Drinking
Mastering the Martini
Long before Mad Men made the drink famous among 21st century drinkers, luminaries like Dorothy Parker, F. Scott Fitzgerald, and Ernest Hemingway were sipping martinis at the Knickerbocker. Today, bartenders as close as Pegu and PDT and as far away as the M Bar in Hong Kong and the Plaza Bar in Buenos Aires

Rock and Roll Tours
A new tour will trace the history of rock music in New York City with stops at venues like CBGB, Don Hills, Max’s Kansas City, and the Mudd Club.

Business
Groupon/ Live Nation Deal
The mega online discount site and the mega live concert promoter are in talks to create a double mega summer concert deal.

Patua
Paul Seres will bring a 3 floor rooftop/ restaurant/event space to the prime space between the Port Authority and Penn Station.

Opinion
Are You the Problem with New York Nightlife?
 There is a certain type of nightlife patron that tries to prove his superiority by expressing a disdain for modern nightlife. I wrote about this type of patron in my 2009 piece If Nightlife is Dead, then You Killed It. Late last year, I described them in my series On Retros, Realists, and Rebels. This week, Good Night Mr. Lewis confirms some of the same ideas. Nightlife has definitely changed. But if you can’t find a place or a party that you like in 2011, maybe its not nightlife’s fault. Maybe its you…

Summer Bar List 
Guest of a Guest offers its list of the top summer bars to compete with Urban Daddy’s outdoor venues from two weeks ago.

Have fun.
G

Above 6, Dead Promoters, Jazz Battles and Spring Cocktails

Nightlife News for May 3, 2011
Compiled by Gamal Hennessy

Culture
Jazz Battles
Before rappers were gunned down in their cars, rival musicians competed with each other in the legendary rap battles of the 1980s. Before the rap battles, jazz bands competed with each other in live shows to see who had the better sound. The Jazz Shrine will be recreating those musical battles on May 11th when two huge 15+ piece bands perform at the Alhambra Ballroom in Harlem. It’s a much better alternative to the lingering violence in hip hop.

Crime
Conviction for a Promoter Killer
Party promoter Omar Trent was shot and killed in August of 2009 after a fight broke out at his event. Last week Londell Squire was convicted for the death. Sentencing takes place on May 17th.

Drinking
Spring Cocktails
The better cocktail lounges in the city launch new drinks every season the way designers launch new clothing collections for Fashion Week. The cocktail trends for Spring 2011 include a lot of pineapple, grapefruit, lemon and sweet pea puree. The difference between Spring fashion and Spring cocktails is that the cocktails taste better.

New Venues

Above 6 at 6 Columbus
A new rooftop lounge opens up in the Columbus Circle/ Lincoln Center Area to offer you an alternative view to the Empire Hotel…

Have fun

G