Hilly Kristal, R.I.P.

[xrebelheartsx]

http://www.iht.com/articles/ap/2007/08/29/america/NA-GEN-US-Obit-Hilly-Kristal.php

 

 

NEW YORK: Hilly Kristal, whose rock club CBGB served as the birthplace of the punk rock movement and a launching pad for bands like the Ramones, Blondie and the Talking Heads, has died after a battle with lung cancer, his son said Wednesday. He was 75.

 

Kristal, who lost a bitter fight last year to stop the club's eviction from its New York home of 33 years, died Tuesday at Cabrini Hospital, said his son, Mark Dana Kristal.

 

As the club headed toward its final show with Patti Smith in October, Kristal was using a cane to get around and showing the effects of his cancer treatment. He was hoping to open a Las Vegas version of the infamous venue that opened in 1973.

 

"He created a club that started on a small, out-of-the-way skid row, and saw it go around the world," said Lenny Kaye, a longtime member of the Patti Smith Group. "Everywhere you travel around the world, you saw somebody wearing a CBGB T-shirt."

 

At the club's boarded-up storefront Wednesday morning, a spray-painted message read, "RIP Hilly, we'll miss you, thank you." There were also a dozen candles, two bunches of flowers and a foam rubber baseball bat — an apparent tribute to the Ramones' classic "Beat on the Brat."

 

U.S. Army officer reprimanded in Abu Ghraib case

 

While the club's glory days were long past when it shut down, its name transcended the venue and become synonymous with the three-chord thrash of punk and its influence on generations of musicians worldwide.

 

The club also became a brand name for a line of clothing and accessories; its store, CBGB Fashions, was moved a few blocks away from the original club, but remained open.

 

"I'm thinking about tomorrow and the next day and the next day, and going on to do more with CBGB's," Kristal told The Associated Press last October.

 

Kristal started the club in 1973 with the hope of making it a mecca of country, bluegrass and blues — called CBGB & OMFUG, for "Other Music For Uplifting Gourmandisers" — but found few bands to book. It instead became the epicenter of the mid-1970s punk movement.

 

"There was never gourmet food, and there was never country bluegrass," Dana Kristal said Wednesday.

 

Besides the Ramones and the Talking Heads, many of the other bands that found frenzied crowds at CBGB during those years became legendary — including Smith, Blondie and Television.

 

Smith said at the venue's last show that Kristal "was our champion and in those days, there were very few."

 

The club hosted hardcore and punk acts throughout the years, becoming a landmark in the Bowery neighborhood that was transformed by late-1990s development.

 

Throughout the years, CBGB had rented its space from the building's owner, the Bowery Residents' Committee, an agency that houses homeless people.

 

In the early 2000s, a feud broke out between the two entities when the committee went to court to collect more than $300,000 (€219,600) in back rent from the club, then later successfully sought to evict it. By the time it closed, CBGB had become part museum and part barroom.

 

Kristal was born in Hightstown, New Jersey, where he grew up on a farm. He moved to New York City when he was 18, nurturing dreams of becoming a singer and singing on stage at Radio City Music Hall.

 

He later became the manager of the Village Vanguard, the legendary jazz club in Greenwich Village, where he booked acts like Miles Davis.

 

Possibly inspired by his managing of the club, he decided to open his own place featuring bluegrass in 1970, called Hilly's on the Bowery, which became CBGB.

 

Kristal is survived by his son, daughter Lisa Kristal Burgman and her husband Ger, two grandchildren, "and the thousands of artists and musicians who played the club," the family said in a statement.

 

A private memorial service was planned, with a public memorial service expected sometime in the future. Contributions in Kristal's name can be made to the American Cancer Society or the Hilly Kristal Foundation for Musicians and Artists.

[twinky the kid]

boooo!

that sucks ass.

rip

[Some1]

I remembered walking into cbgb's. Plywood stage run down hole it was everything I expected it was awesome one of the top places I wanted to play at least once in my life. It was great being around so much history and walking on the stage that so many other people I looked up to had before.

[Big Bruno]

Damn. RIP.

[Theo Huxtable.]

 

RIP

[xrebelheartsx]

haha when my girl called from work and i told her, she went "billy crystal?"

[Ape Shit]

i got the chance to play there too. it was awesome seeing that shitty yet legendary bathroom in person.

[IrishCarBombs]

wheres CACASHREFUND with his r.i.p billy crystal images? hahaha

[Theo Huxtable.]

i'll miss his high-forehead and his afro-centric curls.

[Seffiks]

damn thats to bad

 

R.I.P

[MAR]

haha when my girl called from work and i told her, she went "billy crystal?"

my dad said the same thing. I was surprised too. He's a huge music buff.

[ClueTwo]

 

O.G.........

[23rakim45]

RIP

[De sign]

RIP.

seemd like a awesome man.

[fermentor666]

RIP.

 

I'm sad I never got to go in there. And why the fuck did that reporter have to say "three-chord punk rock"?? Has he not ever heard Bad Brains?

[Jackson]

Lung cancer sucks, by the time I get it, there will be a cure.

RIP

[MountHolyoke]

this is really a shame. RIP. the man was a hero to me and many others.

[geezpot]

RIP Hilly Kristal and CBGB.

 

[autoteller]

the man single handedly helped skyrocket an entire genre just for taking a chance, and going with something that was uncertain. talk about balls right there

[CACashRefund]

 

 

[Theo Huxtable.]

LOL glad you did it