Kansas City, New York
In 1990, a 13-year-old who wanted to know what went on inside of Max's Kansas City during the late '60s and early '70s would have to search for clues. He would pour over passages in Jim Carroll's Downtown Diaries enough times and listen over and over to the Velvet's Live at Max's, recorded in 1970, pausing especially for the few snippets of unmuffled dialogue (Lou Reed telling the crowd to dance; Carroll asking a waiter for "a double Pernod"). He would take a walk up to Park avenue South and East 17th Street, see what was there and try to blot it out with an imagined black-andwhite marquee moon. If he did all that, a mental picture might begin to come into focus: andy Warhol's red-lit court and its swirl of artists, drag queens, superstars and speed freaks.
Fast-forward 20 years and the mystery is gone forever. a similarly-minded teen who hasnt already ODd on Maxs related reminiscence from websites, books like Please Kill Me and rock magscan plunk down $25 for Maxs Kansas City: Art, Glamour, Rock and Roll, a photo history out this week of the clubs two main iterations, which together lasted from 1966-82. The book is edited by gallerist Steven Kasher and features essays by a number of the clubs regulars. Besides photos of the usual suspects like Warhol and Reed, readers can get a glimpse of all sorts of Maxs related errata: tranny Rene Ricard getting blown by an unidentified who looks curiously like a young Steve Rubell, a picture of the restaurant menu (steak and lobster tails for $11.95) and a seating chart as zealous as anything created by Monkey Bars staff. Photos of the superstars and painters who made Maxs the focal point for the late 1960s art and fashion worlds are prefaced with a hagiographic essay penned by Factory hand Steven Watson. as the Factory era gives way to glitter-rock, we are treated to glam icons like Bowie and Iggy, while would-be famous punks (a notchthin Patti Smith and Tom Verlaine; a pre-Ramones baby-faced Dee-Dee) signal the beginnings of another period still. Mick Jagger makes an appearance covered in an ascot, fedora and shades. There are odder choices: a photo of Bonnie Raitt looks like it could have been taken inside any venue in the country.
To be sure, Maxs wouldnt have been the magnet for artistic talent it was if it didnt leave a few choice curiosities for this new volume. Even the most vapid of the clubs scenesters are more seasoned and interesting looking than the hottest poseurs who fill todays party photo blogs. I couldnt help wondering what later life brought an unidentified glitter kidher long brown hair framing an enticing faraway gaze. You can chart a secret drug trend history by examining the scenesters eyes: from sleepy drunk in the beginning to speed-dilated pupils in the later 60s, the Quaalude stupor of glam then into the hard-edged heroin constricted pupils of late-70s punks who played the clubs second, more rock-centric incarnation. Its interesting to note that already by then, Maxs cool-factor was created by nostalgia for the Velvets-era. For all of the venues purported musical influence, its crowd capacity never exceeded a hundred.
A sketched proposal of Forrest Meyers laser beam installation is compelling still, but most enlightening of all is an interview of Maxs first owner Mickey Ruskin conducted by iconic scenemaker Danny Fields shortly before the club closed for the first time in 1974. Our Maxs-centric new York would never be the same, Fields writes by way of introduction. already, the tone of prelapsarian longing had set in as the two go over a closing era. But Ruskin knows a thing or two about the club business. He thanks Warhol for making Maxs a success, while acknowledging that he also doomed it to obsolescence by attracting the Factorys legions of followers followers who stayed when the kingpin left. a truly hot nightspot has always been lightning in a bottle, but the most valuable insight found in the book is Ruskins answer to Fields question, What is commercial? His reply: Taking a situation and draining it.