1969 Ads: Ungano's, Part 1

Selected Voice ads for Ungano's from January to June, 1969. They advertised just about every week, and I think I got all of 'em except for the issues missing from the archive. (I split the year into two parts only because the Blogger editor can get a little unwieldy if you upload too many images into one post.)



1/9/69 issue.

1/16/69 issue.

1/30/69 issue, Dom-free.

2/6/69 issue--Mitch Ryder had left them by that point IIRC...

Also 2/6/69, accompanied by one for some Upper East Side place called Geordie's Apple Pie.

3/6/69 issue.

3/20/69 issue.

4/3/69 issue.

4/10/69 issue.

5/1/69 issue.

5/8/69 issue.

5/15/69 issue.

5/22/69 issue.

5/29/69 issue.

6/5/69 issue.

6/12/69 issue.

6/19/69 issue.

6/26/69 issue--plus bonus nearby "Westhampton Rock Festival" ad.

Another year for me and you

Only one day left 'til FREE Stoogemania at Yonge-Dundas, so I couldn't be happier to locate these holy grails in the 8/28/69 ish of the Voice today.

Oh yeah, LED ZEPPELIN just happened to play there a few days earlier, 8/29 and 30. The links have better images of the ads and other artifacts from the shows.

Lots more Pavilion and many other '69 ads to come. Sorry to bisect them like this, but the little Google Archives viewing window doesn't accommodate the full length of these particular ads.

Update-o-rama

Last night's (9/22/2005) archive of WFMU's Aircheck show presented excerpts from the final broadcast (dated 8/28/69) of FMU's original freeform incarnation, featuring DJs Kevin Taylor and Danny Fields. It's a cool listen all around, but it holds particular fascination for me as it includes an announcement for the MC5/Stooges show at the New York State Pavilion. Contrary to the dates listed on an MC5 giglist page, Kevin and a fellow DJ named Bill announce it as happening on September 3, 1969. Here's a partial transcription:


Bill: Well, another thing I think is kinda really relevant right this minute is the fact that next Wednesday night, that's September 3, uh, the Pervilion, Flushing Meadow Park--
Kevin: [Corrects Bill on the proper pronunciation of Pavilion...]
Bill: Flushing Meadow Park, now I said that right, with my "bext accent"...Now this is next Wednesday night, you're gonna have the MC5, the Stooges, and a third group yet to be announced.
Kevin: David Peel and the Lower East Side'll be there too.
Bill: Probably the third group.
Kevin: No, there's a fourth group.
Bill: Oh really?
Kevin: There's one more after that.
Bill: And that's only for what, 3 bucks?
Kevin: 3 bucks for the whole night. Starts about 8 o'clock, 8:30.
Bill: And in case the, uh, the train, you're taking the Willets Avenue, the F or E or whatever it is and you get stuck four stations this side of Flushing Meadow, you'll still hear it, just open the window--
Kevin: Sure will--
Bill: Wow, that's gonna be somethin'.
Kevin: The MC5 come on hard and strong--
Bill: Hard and strong, and they don't stop--
Kevin: Right on...[brief discussion of MC5's sense of tuning and dynamics]...[T]he Pavilion is one of the nicest situations for music on the East Coast, man, it's just very together. It's in the old New York State Pavilion.
Bill: The State Pavilion, yeah, I remember being in there--
Kevin: It's all open, it's like a big carousel, and they have, uh, barbecue pits set up upstairs, food, and they have mango punch there, for those of you who are into mangoes--they're really exciting fruits--
Bill: Can you imagine freaking out on mango punch, man?
Kevin: Aw, it's goooood stuff--
Bill: Wow--
Kevin: And if you stay around long enough, they give it away free, so you don't have to spend any money buying it. After about 2 o'clock when they start emptying things out, then you wanna stick around and you get free mangoes and you get free hot dogs and junk, y'know--
Bill: Great!
Kevin: It's good. Plus Lenny the P works there, so--
Bill: Oh does he?
Kevin: Yeah, Lenny's the doorman.
Bill: I didn't know that.
Kevin: Oh sure, he's been there for half the summer now.
Bill: No kidding.
Kevin: Sure, Lenny's into, uh, working at rock & roll concerts now. He's doing a good job, man, y'know, he's uh, y'know, being as righteous as possible.
Bill: Yeah well, I'll never forget the photo of him in the, uh, priest's hat, he looked so righteous.
Kevin: Like Tim Conway in that photo--y'know, the guy from, um, McHale's Navy. BURP! That's something I've been wantin' to do for a long time, really. I did it one night, one night I had my dinner, I'd just finished my dinner and I had to turn the microphone on, and as a good Irishman always does, I always belch after my meals, and boy I let out one--hoo-wee!
Bill: Well, in many places that kinda shows appreciation for what you eat--it's not like, real bad, necessarily.

They go on to rap about the trials and tribulations that had recently faced the station and the importance of freeform radio--plus they thank their supporters, including staff members at the Fillmore East, Zacherle, and Richard Robinson.

Speaking of whom--yesterday I read a couple of recently eBayed back issues of Rock Scene. In the March '75 issue, Wayne County's advice column includes the following exchange:

Dear Wayne,
I'm a trendy made! [sic.--should be male.] When at Club 82 which lavatory should I use, men's or women's?
Jack Zipp, N.Y., N.Y.

Dear JZ: The 82 has changed a lot since it became the well-known hangout for the in-crowd and superstars. At the beginning, it was perfectly okay for men either dressed as men or women to use the same bathroom. Now all that has changed. The 82 has become famous and has been invaded by a younger, and much straighter crowd. Lots of complaints were made by the girls about the men coming into "their" bathroom. The main reason I used the women's room there was because the men's was so absolutely disgusting. Also, a lot of times, I was in full drag. Now that the 82 is no longer after hours and is trying to be more legitimate, they have stopped men from using the women's bathroom and have stopped drag queens from even coming into the 82. Apparently, the owners of the 82 are obeying the law after a friendly reminder from their local gendarme.

The same issue has a pic of John Phillips and then-wife Genevieve Waite seated beside "an antique organ--one used by Nico when she used to perform at Steve Paul's The Scene." The February '78 issue has a Debbie Harry spread which includes a few photos of the Stillettoes at Club 82 (in one shot the gals are backed by the Dolls). It also has a feature on bands from Toronto's Crash and Burn club--but that's beyond my purview.

Midtown strutter's ball(room)

HOTEL DIPLOMAT--108-116 W. 43rd Street, just west of 6th Avenue. Haven't located any historical details on the hotel itself, though it does apparently have a file at the New-York Historical Society. I gather the place had a rather, uh, diplomatic policy when it came to events bookings and clientele. At various times it played host to jazz performers (such as Miles Davis and Albert Ayler), salsa bands, Libertarian conferences, Chilean solidarity meetings, civil rights poets, Abbie Hoffman drug busts, art exhibitions, and drag balls. On motherboardsnyc.com, Hattie Hathaway remembers, "I was friendly with the desk clerk and took many johns there, though it was a fully operational normal hotel...There was even a fully operational coffee shop that included that archaic NYC phenomenon--the soda jerk--who made fierce cherry-lime rickies and egg creams. People would come from all over the city for them." A decadent-but-classy discotheque called Le Jardin operated in the basement during the mid-'70s. But I'm most concerned with the rock shows held in the hotel's ballrooms, ca. '69-'79.

A late '60s pamphlet attributed to George Metesky entitled F*ck the System, which gave advice on how to scam free stuff in NYC, advised the following: "The Group Image--Performs every Wednesday night at the Hotel Diplomat...and you can get in free if you say you have no money (sometimes). If you promise to take your clothes off it's definitely free. If you ball on the dance floor, you get a season's pass."

The MC5 headlined a benefit for the Liberation News Service on May 13, 1969. Also on the bill were Children of God, the Pageant Players, and the Pablo Light Show. Dig the power-to-the-people poster.




Robert Christgau mentions some kinda hippie benefit show featuring Communications Workshop and Season of the Witch in this July 30, 1970 Village Voice article.

From Nina Antonia's Too Much Too Soon (London: Omnibus, 1998): On May 29, 1972, the New York Dolls played their second date in the Palm Room of the Diplomat Hotel, where the Pox had debuted. Adjacent to the Times Square porn palaces and peep shows, the Diplomat gig was organized in conjunction with the Warhol crew and featured Jackie Curtis in a support slot. At the bottom of the bill was a band called Shaker, whose drummer, Jerry Nolan, rather impressed Billy [Murcia...how prophetic.-Ed.]. The event, advertised as an "Invitation Beyond the Valley," garnered a couple of lousy reviews in the theatrical sections of local papers. Some of the Dolls' very early appearances baffled critics who were unsure as to whether they were a theatrical troupe, a rock act, or both.

The Dolls played the venue again on March 16 the following year; openers were the Brats, featuring erstwhile Doll Rick Rivets.

KISS booked the Diplomat themselves for some of their earliest Manhattan dates--July 13 and August 10, 1973. Check out the flyers here and here. Click here for personal recollections from Paul Stanley and Gene Simmons (who describes the Diplomat as "a hotel for hookers and junkies"). Click here for fan/observer accounts and photos from the gig, offering a rare glimpse of primitively primordial KISS kostumes.



Television also played a couple of their earliest gigs ever in the hotel's Crystal Room--April 5 and 10, 1974.



Seems like the place was a haven for hip-hop's originators as well--Kurtis Blow writes of watching Grandmaster Flash DJ there ca. 1977 in the liner notes to Rhino's History of Rap Vol. 1.

The Buzzcocks, Mission of Burma, and the Monochrome Set, September 15, 1979.

The Police, with The The, in the Grand Ballroom, September 27-29, 1979.

Neon Leon, dates unknown.

That's all the names I've been able to track down thus far, though there were surely others. What became of the Diplomat is unclear; this site claims the building is "now home to many of the North African/Senegalese," whatever that means--but I'm skeptical.

UPDATE 7/20/2007--Just discovered magictramps.com, which has images of flyers for three shows the Magic Tramps played at the Diplomat Ballroom. Can't purloin them, you'll have to click on the link to see them. The years weren't clearly listed, but hints were given in fine print on each flyer; my guesstimates are in parentheses.

• Satan's Celebration: A Rock and Occult Festival, Halloween Night ('72?), with Elephant's Memory (probably sans John or Yoko), Ruby and the Rednecks, Chris Rush, White Satin, Suzan Bader, Satan the Eternal Fireman, and various witches, occultists and psychics.
• The First International Costume Glitter Ball, Saturday, December 30 (1972?), with Satan's Angels of the Universe, Shaker, and the Harlots of 42nd Street.
• "Strut Yo' Stuff," an "Easter Parade" show on Sunday, April 14 (1974?) with Canon, Street Punk, and the Harlots of 42nd Street.

I also recently found two archived NY Times articles that shed more light on the history of the building.

UPDATE 5/23/2010: I am appallingly late in discovering this, but blogger NYCDreamin' of This Ain't the Summer of Love wrote a much more detailed and exhaustive account of Hotel Diplomat history in early 1999. He kindly acknowledged my post, but truly went to research lengths that I could not achieve...or rather (perhaps more accurately), that I in my laziness could not be bothered with. Bravo!!!

UPDATE 9/17/2013:  You'll want to get your mitts on the latest KISS tome by Ken Sharp, Nothin to Lose: The Making of KISS 1972-1975, which includes a lengthy discussion of the band's stint at the Dip.  By the way, I located a bunch of Hotel Diplomat ads while I was perusing the Voice archives a couple years ago--just click on the Hotel Diplomat tag on the list at the right to see them.  Also, get a load of these goodies I found on the Bay last night.

Yesterday...And Today, at the "Tent of Tomorrow"

NEW YORK STATE PAVILION--in Flushing Meadows-Corona Park, situated northeast of where the Grand Central Parkway and the L.I.E. intersect. It's a crying shame that one of the few structures deemed fit to remain from the 1964 World's Fair--a Philip Johnson-designed building, no less--has been left to such derelict, decrepit rot. There's pipe-dream talk of using the structure's bones as the basis of an Air & Space Museum. More likely it will meet the same wrecking-ball fate as the old Aquacade/Amphitheater--but I hear a new pool is slated for construction at that site, so who knows? For historical background and pictures of the Pavilion past and present, click here, here, and here.




This page is particularly informative on the brief late '60s/early '70s period when the Pavilion was actually in use, first as a cultural institution, then as a roller rink called "Roller Round." Seems like a few rock shows were held there in '69. Steppenwolf, Spooky Tooth, and Rhinoceros shared abill on August 1-2, 1969. Charles Aybar, who worked at the building during that time and is frequently quoted on the nywf64.com page, believes the Byrds played there, but I found no reference to it on a Byrds info site. Similarly, the Grateful Dead is listed here as having played the Pavilion on July 11 and 12, 1969--but I couldn't find a reference to these shows elsewhere. This and other Led Zeppelin websites list a mystery March, 1970 show, but I'm highly dubious--no exact date is cited, and there'd be no logic to an open-air show in cold March when they were easily headlining the likes of Madison Square Garden by then.

[UPDATE 9/28/2007: An exiled Brooklynite named Lewis recently hipped me to the following: "Yes there was a Led Zeppelin show at the Pavilion. I know because I was there. I think the '70 date is wrong, it was more likely '69 since it was early in their career, the same time period when I saw them play at Central Park. And it could have been March because it was not an open air facility, it was definitely indoors. I almost certainly was stoned but I definitely would have noticed if I was outdoors, as opposed to being indoors." Now, this blows my mind. Were temporary walls erected inside the Pavilion during the concert era? Or was the round snack bar building adjacent to the site--later converted into the Queens Theatre in the Park--used for the rock and roll shows?]

[UPDATE 12/15/2012:  Jeez, so embarrassing. Obviously I dropped the ball here--but when I put this post together seven years ago, I guess there weren't many super-comprehensive Zep sites around.  August 29 and 30, 1969!] 

But I'm quite sure about this one, and boy do I wish I could have been there--David Peel and the Lower East Side, The Stooges (apparently in their NYC debut), and the MC5 on September 3, 1969! Here are some eyewitness accounts from Please Kill Me by McNeil and McCain, p. 63 (New York: Grove Press, 1996):

Steve Harris: Iggy looked at the audience, picked his nose, somebody threw a beer can, Iggy threw it back, sang a couple of lines, somebody threw another bottle, the bottle broke on the stage, and Iggy rolled around on it and cut himself all over the place...Alan Vega: The Stooges launched into one of their songs, and the next thing you knew, Iggy was diving off the stage onto the concrete, and cutting himself up with a broken guitar. It wasn't theatrical, it was theater...but with Iggy, this was not acting. It was the real thing. Iggy's set ended in twenty minutes, and somebody had the f**kin' genius to play Bach's Brandenburg Concerto through the speaker system. The audience was throwing bottles and roses at him. I swear it was beautiful...It changed my life because it made me realize everything I was doing was bullshit...the MC5 were one of my favorite bands, but I couldn't watch them after the Stooges. They knew it, too. They were just boogying their ass off all night trying, but baby, they knew they were outdone by Iggy.

And here's some further reportage from Clinton Heylin's From the Velvets to the Voidoids (New York: Penguin, 1993):

On 29, August 1969 both of Detroit's arch-exponents of garage-rock shared a New York bill, at the State Pavilion in Queens. Though the Stooges would later make some of their most infamous appearances in New York, on this occasion they were watched by just a small enclave of New York rock fans who had come to see what all the fuss was about with these Detroit punks. Iggy's final act before leaving the stage was to pick up two drumsticks and "cut long welts into his chest with the tips of the drumsticks."

I know of no other Pavilion shows, and certainly none as cool as that.



After the roller rink operation was shut down, and the unstable fiberglass roof panels were removed rather than repaired, the building was pretty much left to its own devices. I have fond childhood memories of roller-skating and bike-riding over the New York State map on the Pavilion's then still-smooth terrazzo floor (now hopelessly cracked and weed-strewn), and my older brother used to regale me with tales of climbing the towers and making mischief on the observation deck. One of my high school friends had a brother in a band that briefly had a major label contract; I'm "senior momenting" on the band's name, but I distinctly recall that their CD longbox featured pictures of them inside the Pavilion. The site's photogenic potential was also realized in The Wiz, Men in Black, and the video for They Might Be Giants' "Don't Let's Start." But the ravages of time, weathering, vandalism, and neglect have taken their ostensibly irreparable toll on the "Tent of Tomorrow." The Pavilion has been fenced off from public access for many years, and only the most intrepid or morbidly curious of urban explorers dare go beyond the gates. Few ruins have ever looked so anachronously futuristic.





[UPDATE 5/14/2010: I went to see Iron Man 2 last night, and much to my surprise a CGI restoration, or should I say re-imagining, of the fairgrounds plays a major part in the film!!! The Unisphere and particularly the Pavilion are prominently featured, as is a scale model for the so-called "1974 Stark Expo," which was basically a replica of a '64 World's Fair scale model as far as I could tell. See the Bowery Boys and the NY Daily News for more details. And here's a report about current efforts to restore the Pavilion.]


[UPDATE 6/17/2010: Here's an ad for the 1969 season from the 6/5/69 issue of the Village Voice. It's a tad incomplete, so I'll keep looking for revised versions of the ad in the archives.]

[UPDATE 6/25/2010: Here are more 1969 Pavilion ads.]

[UPDATE 11/15/2010:  I recently finished Out of the Vinyl Deeps: Ellen Willis on Rock Music (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2011), and among its many delights is a 1969 piece about the Pavilion entitled "Summer of Love in Queens."  It's a review of a Joe Cocker/Grateful Dead show held there, and includes this description of  the milieu:

At the Pavilion, it soon became evident that the rest of the crowd shared our expansive mood.  They kept coming in, thousands of happy kids--almost five thousand by the end of the evening.  The Pavilion was large enough to accommodate everyone without strain.  The ground level served as a huge round dance floor; on the balcony there were tables and chairs, the food concession (the main culinary attraction was tacos, a beautiful idea, though the reality was mediocre), and a nice view of the park.  The atmosphere was totally relaxed.  As in the San Francisco ballrooms, people were free to dance, crowd in front of the stage, sit in a corner, wander around, eat, or do whatever impulse dictated.  There were no intrusive guards or cops.]

[UPDATE 3/15/69 issue:  Revised and improved post on 1969 Pavilion ads here.]