At this very point in time, we are as far away from April Fools' Day as we will be for the entire year, so take a deep breath and revel in the moment. Now take one further moment to digest what could have been the greatest April Fools' prank of them all, but was too sad to be fake. As was announced last Friday, the movie poster for the upcoming CBGB's film was unveiled, which means that a) there's a CBGB's movie and b) there's a movie poster to accompany it. It is possibly the jankiest shit of all time, see above.
Over the years, the esteemed punk rock venue that spawned bands like the Ramones, Blondie, Iggy Pop, Patti Smith, and “others,” has been destroyed, brought down, dishonored, and beaten into a bloody steaming pulp of nothingness [see: John Varvatos], as if the place never existed at all. It's gotten to the point where we've even lost track of if the place was really that great in the first place (you guys, it was). The first hit came when the venue closed in 2006 because the toilets were too unclean or the rent was too damn high or whatever dumb shit the Bowery Residents' Committee made claims about, and since the last show in October of that year, nothing has ever been the same. In a series of “how can we shit all over the greatest punk venue to ever exist,” the great name of Hilly Kristal's venue continues to lose meaning entirely.
Here is a list of terrible things, real and imagined, that have happened or likely will happen to besmirch the name of CBGB ever-further. We present you with:
How to Piss on the Grave of CBGB
- Why don't we turn it into a clothing store shilling faux-punk leather paraphenilia for prices well above an affordable price bracket?
- How about we open up a photo gallery called Morrisson Hotel where we'll sell photos of bands long dead to men in their 60s with nostalgia complexes?
- And then we'll close it because no one buys art anymore because there are 3D printers
- Let's make a movie about it and make sure that Taylor Hawkins, drummer of Foo Fighters, has a starring role as Iggy Pop because his ego is probably feeling the burn from the assinine attention that Dave Grohl keeps raking in
- Speaking of Iggy Pop, can we get an Iggy lookalike to film a workout vid reminiscent of 5-Minute Abs? Gotta keep it tight, you know?
- We think it's time CBGB got some true rock 'n' roll cred, so let's strike up a deal with Hard Rock Cafe, build a rollercoaster in Times Square, where the cars are the shapes of rolled-up $20-dollar bills, and the theme music is “Crazy Train” and you die at the end
- We could make a fortune from melting down rare precious vinyl into the shape of high-end jacuzzis and bathtubs because nothing says a love for the origins of punk like bathtime
- The wallpaper and graffiti on the old walls of CBGB, which John Varvatos so honorably left up when he inhabited the venue, should be torn down and just burned in a shitty fire in an alley while bums collectively pee on it because that is what the punks would have wanted (actually, we might enoucrage this one)
- Or maybe we should buy out John Varvatos with the profits from Patti Smith's Just Kids and reopen a venue that only Patti Smith can play at, every night, forever
Just for the record, Rupert Grint is in this movie. End it.
