CBGB

The infamous music club CBGB that opened in The Bowery in December 1973 will be closing it's doors on 30 October 2006. Sadly, after 33 years the New York City nightclub is shutting because the lease has expired and the owner, Hilly Kristal, has been presented with an eviction notice.

The full name of the club is CBGB OMFUG which, according to the owner stands for Country Bluegrass Blues & Other Music For Uplifting Gormandizers. Although the word gormandizer is usually used to describe someone who can not stop eating, in this case it refers to an eater of music.

Despite the fact that the club was originally meant to feature CBGB music & poetry, 5 months after opening it began to attract unsigned bands playing original music and quickly became the birthplace of American punk.

Televsion were the first band to obtain a residency in CBGB and shortly after they started playing in March of 1974 other "street acts" followed such as Patti Smith, The Stillettoes (featuring Debbie Harry from Blondie) and of course the Ramones.

These bands as well as Talking Heads and numerous hardcore punk bands found a home in CBGB because it was the only venue in New York that had one rule for unsigned bands: all original music and no covers.

Now that the club is facing closure, Kristal claims to be looking at another venue in Manhattan but has been rumored to already have made a deal to open the club again in 2008 in Vegas!

In the meantime, he is said to be preparing to take every single possible thing he can carry out the door with him when he shuts the place down. Whether he intends to just open another club with the original furnishings or try to sell them all on eBay remains to be seen. Either way October 30 will be a sad day and the end of an incredibly important piece of music history.

Bands such as The Ramones, Blondie and Talking Heads owe their careers to CBGB but other bands that played there through the years include:

AC/DC
The B-52s
Beastie Boys
The Clash
Elvis Costello
The Dandy Warhols
Green Day
Guns 'n' Roses
Joan Jett & The Blackhearts
The Libertines
Pearl Jam
The Police
Smashing Pumpkins
The Strokes
They Might Be Giants