1 00:00:16,890 --> 00:00:19,350 New York City during the 1970s 2 00:00:19,380 --> 00:00:22,760 was a beautiful, ravaged slag... 3 00:00:25,900 --> 00:00:27,630 Impoverished and neglected 4 00:00:27,660 --> 00:00:31,630 after suffering from decades of abuse and battery. 5 00:00:31,670 --> 00:00:34,360 She stunk of sewage, sex, 6 00:00:34,400 --> 00:00:36,710 rotting fish, and day-old diapers. 7 00:00:36,740 --> 00:00:39,570 She leaked from every pore. 8 00:00:44,680 --> 00:00:47,650 No wave was the waste product of "Taxi Driver," 9 00:00:47,680 --> 00:00:52,380 Times Square, the Son of Sam, the blackout of '77... 10 00:00:52,410 --> 00:00:54,240 The desperate need to violently rebel 11 00:00:54,280 --> 00:00:57,350 against the complacency of a zombie nation 12 00:00:57,380 --> 00:01:01,180 dumbed down by sitcoms and disco. 13 00:01:03,150 --> 00:01:05,670 We were howling with delight, 14 00:01:05,700 --> 00:01:07,260 laughing like lunatics 15 00:01:07,290 --> 00:01:10,220 in the madhouse that was New York City... 16 00:01:11,780 --> 00:01:14,400 Thrilled to be rubbing up against the freaks 17 00:01:14,440 --> 00:01:17,680 and other outcasts who somehow... 18 00:01:17,710 --> 00:01:20,270 for some unknowable reason, 19 00:01:20,300 --> 00:01:22,650 had all decided to run to land's end 20 00:01:22,680 --> 00:01:27,340 and, all at once, scream their bloody heads off. 21 00:01:30,240 --> 00:01:31,760 It's our fucking park! 22 00:01:33,520 --> 00:01:35,420 ♪ I took a walk through this 23 00:01:35,460 --> 00:01:38,420 ♪ Beautiful world 24 00:01:38,460 --> 00:01:43,290 ♪ Felt the cool rain on my shoulder 25 00:01:43,330 --> 00:01:47,230 ♪ Found something good in this 26 00:01:47,260 --> 00:01:49,640 ♪ Beautiful world 27 00:01:49,680 --> 00:01:54,270 ♪ I felt the rain getting colder 28 00:01:55,820 --> 00:01:58,790 ♪ La, la Sha la, la, la, la 29 00:01:58,820 --> 00:02:01,170 ♪ Sha la, la, la, la 30 00:02:01,210 --> 00:02:04,930 ♪ Sha la, la, la Sha la, la, la, la 31 00:02:04,970 --> 00:02:08,420 ♪ Sha la, la, la, la, la 32 00:02:23,300 --> 00:02:24,950 Nothing but a bunch of crack heads, 33 00:02:24,990 --> 00:02:27,230 Dope fiends and motherfuckers 34 00:02:35,340 --> 00:02:39,620 This is a show about a very special place... 35 00:02:42,350 --> 00:02:44,730 A very special time... 36 00:02:47,390 --> 00:02:50,600 And some very special people. 37 00:02:50,630 --> 00:02:54,290 So much happened, so much began 38 00:02:54,330 --> 00:02:57,640 on New York's Lower East Side. 39 00:02:57,680 --> 00:03:01,340 Those buildings are still there. 40 00:03:01,370 --> 00:03:02,780 Yeah, all of them. 41 00:03:02,820 --> 00:03:06,370 Yeah, I mean, I know every corner I ever drank 42 00:03:06,410 --> 00:03:08,380 by order of, like, preference, you know, 43 00:03:08,410 --> 00:03:10,000 'cause there was some, you know, 44 00:03:10,030 --> 00:03:11,660 you'd really rather not to go to. 45 00:03:11,690 --> 00:03:14,000 That was, like, sort of, like, you know, a last resort. 46 00:03:14,040 --> 00:03:15,380 Yeah. 47 00:03:15,420 --> 00:03:16,870 Somewhere, uh... 48 00:03:16,900 --> 00:03:19,630 there was a hole, a big hole in the wall right there. 49 00:03:19,660 --> 00:03:24,010 Basically like a car-sized hole in a wall. 50 00:03:24,050 --> 00:03:27,400 You'd step into an abandoned space. 51 00:03:27,430 --> 00:03:29,540 I didn't know any spots down there. 52 00:03:29,570 --> 00:03:31,070 I mean, people would take me, of course. 53 00:03:31,090 --> 00:03:33,400 - Yeah, yeah. - But it was not my regular. 54 00:03:33,440 --> 00:03:37,650 My regular was here, at Executive and Laredo 55 00:03:37,680 --> 00:03:40,750 were my preferred. 56 00:03:40,790 --> 00:03:42,820 But for a while, I had to go specifically... 57 00:03:42,860 --> 00:03:44,720 - Hot zone. - Yeah. 58 00:04:02,330 --> 00:04:04,400 The Lower East Side was in many ways 59 00:04:04,430 --> 00:04:05,950 the cradle of New York. 60 00:04:07,470 --> 00:04:09,710 The Lower East Side was in many ways 61 00:04:09,750 --> 00:04:11,300 the cradle of New York, 62 00:04:11,340 --> 00:04:13,510 where new arrivals first settled, 63 00:04:13,550 --> 00:04:16,060 built communities, and later, moved on, 64 00:04:16,100 --> 00:04:19,000 only to be replaced by others. 65 00:04:30,110 --> 00:04:31,870 In the New York City of the '70s, 66 00:04:31,910 --> 00:04:34,600 nearly bankrupt, riddled with corruption, 67 00:04:34,640 --> 00:04:37,530 the Lower East Side, particularly Alphabet City, 68 00:04:37,570 --> 00:04:39,400 was left to fend for itself. 69 00:04:43,510 --> 00:04:48,410 Huge swaths of it abandoned, ruined, or simply empty. 70 00:04:51,380 --> 00:04:54,620 Much of it became an open-air supermarket for drugs, 71 00:04:54,660 --> 00:04:58,350 whole blocks taken over by organized drug gangs. 72 00:05:02,080 --> 00:05:04,560 Rents were cheap, and the neighborhood started 73 00:05:04,600 --> 00:05:06,630 to attract a newer, highly energized, 74 00:05:06,670 --> 00:05:10,430 and creative group of people who wanted to make things... 75 00:05:10,460 --> 00:05:15,050 Music, poetry, movies, and art. 76 00:05:21,540 --> 00:05:25,130 It seemed at the time, everybody was a star 77 00:05:25,170 --> 00:05:29,450 and, for a while at least, that it was a golden time. 78 00:05:29,480 --> 00:05:30,900 But it was dangerous. 79 00:05:30,930 --> 00:05:33,380 You lived down here, you had to be tough 80 00:05:33,420 --> 00:05:36,870 and talented and often very quick. 81 00:05:41,700 --> 00:05:43,500 Now... 82 00:05:43,530 --> 00:05:46,150 things are different... 83 00:05:46,190 --> 00:05:48,090 very different. 84 00:05:48,120 --> 00:05:49,950 Everybody together. Ready? 85 00:05:49,990 --> 00:05:52,470 One, two, three. 86 00:05:52,510 --> 00:05:55,200 Pick those feet up six inches and hold. 87 00:05:55,230 --> 00:05:57,960 Bring that arm over. Pin the wrist, let's go. 88 00:05:57,990 --> 00:05:59,750 Is everybody clear? Yes. 89 00:05:59,790 --> 00:06:01,830 - I can't hear you. - Yes! 90 00:06:01,860 --> 00:06:03,900 Okay, on three. One, two, three, let's go. 91 00:06:12,940 --> 00:06:15,560 ♪ My love, what's your number? 92 00:06:15,600 --> 00:06:17,770 ♪ Don't know if I'll survive 93 00:06:17,810 --> 00:06:20,500 ♪ Street crime and violence 94 00:06:20,530 --> 00:06:22,570 ♪ All I see is grime 95 00:06:22,610 --> 00:06:24,950 ♪ But one thing that I know 96 00:06:24,990 --> 00:06:30,200 ♪ That's why I love, love, love my life 97 00:06:32,820 --> 00:06:35,720 So, I mean, this is pretty much some of the last remnants 98 00:06:35,760 --> 00:06:37,210 of what the Lower East Side 99 00:06:37,240 --> 00:06:39,520 kind of used to be like, you know? 100 00:06:39,550 --> 00:06:42,140 Good, old-school, no elevator. 101 00:06:43,630 --> 00:06:45,460 You didn't live in this building? 102 00:06:45,490 --> 00:06:47,530 No, this wasn't the building I lived in. 103 00:06:47,560 --> 00:06:50,670 This is a squat, though, that actually became legal. 104 00:06:50,700 --> 00:06:53,260 I was actually in that building right there. 105 00:06:53,290 --> 00:06:54,880 When I lived in it, it was... 106 00:06:54,910 --> 00:06:58,880 You know, we had no windows, no front doors, you know? 107 00:06:58,920 --> 00:07:00,750 You'd find a door in the street. 108 00:07:00,780 --> 00:07:03,750 You'd put it up and chain it up yourself, you know? 109 00:07:03,780 --> 00:07:05,990 No running water, I used to... 110 00:07:06,030 --> 00:07:08,480 bathe in the fire hydrant in front of the building, 111 00:07:08,510 --> 00:07:10,690 and I used to sleep with my pit bull 112 00:07:10,720 --> 00:07:13,550 so rats wouldn't get too close to me at night. 113 00:07:13,590 --> 00:07:14,830 - Right? - You know? 114 00:07:20,210 --> 00:07:21,910 You actually grew up here. 115 00:07:21,940 --> 00:07:24,110 What was that like growing up... Growing up here? 116 00:07:24,150 --> 00:07:25,560 Being a little kid here? 117 00:07:25,600 --> 00:07:27,290 My main problem growing up down here 118 00:07:27,320 --> 00:07:28,910 was that I lived on a gang block. 119 00:07:28,950 --> 00:07:30,980 - Right. - The gang on my block 120 00:07:31,020 --> 00:07:32,740 was called the Hitmen, 121 00:07:32,780 --> 00:07:35,190 and, you know, they were no joke, right? 122 00:07:35,230 --> 00:07:37,510 And I remember, they would be hanging out on the stoop 123 00:07:37,540 --> 00:07:39,920 on the church across the street, smoking dust. 124 00:07:39,960 --> 00:07:41,860 All of them with their golf clubs 125 00:07:41,890 --> 00:07:46,210 and 007 knives, and everybody'd be listening to... 126 00:07:46,240 --> 00:07:47,860 of all things, Kraftwerk. Right. 127 00:07:47,900 --> 00:07:49,660 - "Trans-Euro Express." - Right. 128 00:07:49,690 --> 00:07:51,103 They'd be out there screaming "we're going to kill" 129 00:07:51,110 --> 00:07:53,660 the next [...] that comes out of that building, 130 00:07:53,700 --> 00:07:57,040 and I'm laying there, 131 00:07:57,080 --> 00:08:00,010 thinking, "Oh, I got to go to school tomorrow, man." 132 00:08:01,910 --> 00:08:04,670 I was never a violent person. 133 00:08:04,710 --> 00:08:06,253 You know, Christ, I was raised by hippies, 134 00:08:06,260 --> 00:08:09,160 but I was thrown into a crazy environment 135 00:08:09,190 --> 00:08:12,680 where I had no choice but to fight my way through it. 136 00:08:12,720 --> 00:08:15,100 I always had a cue ball and a sock in my pocket. 137 00:08:15,130 --> 00:08:16,550 I'd split your head open 138 00:08:16,580 --> 00:08:18,119 quicker than you could say "What the..." 139 00:08:20,860 --> 00:08:22,900 And it did turn me into a bit 140 00:08:22,930 --> 00:08:25,560 of a problem as a teenager, you know? 141 00:08:25,590 --> 00:08:26,940 I would guess. 142 00:08:26,970 --> 00:08:28,663 Wait a minute, I don't have to guess, I know. 143 00:08:31,840 --> 00:08:33,910 The first time I saw you, 144 00:08:33,940 --> 00:08:36,700 you were, famously, that 12-year-old drummer 145 00:08:36,740 --> 00:08:37,980 in the Stimulators. 146 00:08:38,020 --> 00:08:39,850 Your aunt was in the band. Yeah. 147 00:08:39,880 --> 00:08:41,710 That was the only reason we were allowed to play 148 00:08:41,740 --> 00:08:43,710 at most of the clubs is because 149 00:08:43,750 --> 00:08:47,130 I had a "relative" who was basically my legal guardian. 150 00:08:47,160 --> 00:08:49,060 I need to get a vanilla egg cream. 151 00:08:49,100 --> 00:08:50,613 What are you getting? Chocolate egg cream. 152 00:08:50,620 --> 00:08:51,860 - Chocolate egg cream. - Yeah. 153 00:08:51,890 --> 00:08:55,240 One vanilla, one chocolate. 154 00:08:55,270 --> 00:08:58,350 I got PTSD, man. It's like, I just feel like 155 00:08:58,380 --> 00:09:00,250 I'm seeing ghosts when I'm down here, man. 156 00:09:00,280 --> 00:09:03,080 I miss it, though. I tell you... As much as I paint it 157 00:09:03,110 --> 00:09:08,080 as this horror story, which it was, I loved it. 158 00:09:08,120 --> 00:09:12,120 You know, it'll always be a part of who I am. 159 00:09:12,150 --> 00:09:13,400 My man. Cheers. 160 00:09:13,430 --> 00:09:15,360 All right, Ray, thanks for the egg cream. 161 00:09:15,400 --> 00:09:17,610 That is a superb egg cream. 162 00:09:17,640 --> 00:09:19,160 They don't make them no better. 163 00:09:32,000 --> 00:09:34,180 You're always talking about what? 164 00:09:34,210 --> 00:09:35,870 I had a signed "The Last"... 165 00:09:35,900 --> 00:09:39,040 What is it? "The Last Words of Dutch Schultz." 166 00:09:39,080 --> 00:09:42,110 You came here first as a writer, as a poet. 167 00:09:42,150 --> 00:09:46,290 New York, in your mind, was where the writer's life was? 168 00:09:46,330 --> 00:09:48,640 Yeah, well, it was just the place 169 00:09:48,670 --> 00:09:49,980 that had the most stimulation. 170 00:09:50,020 --> 00:09:52,120 Was music even in the back of your head, 171 00:09:52,160 --> 00:09:53,990 or was poetry and writing? 172 00:09:54,020 --> 00:09:57,410 My model was Dylan Thomas when I was a teenager. 173 00:09:57,440 --> 00:10:01,340 You know, so being a drunken womanizer, 174 00:10:01,380 --> 00:10:03,000 that was my ambition. 175 00:10:29,920 --> 00:10:32,370 You woke up in your own lifetime, 176 00:10:32,410 --> 00:10:36,100 open up a paper, and realized, 177 00:10:36,130 --> 00:10:39,340 "There's, like, a million kids in Britain dressing like me 178 00:10:39,380 --> 00:10:40,930 and cutting their hair like me." 179 00:10:40,970 --> 00:10:44,970 And you have this inadvertent, tectonic effect 180 00:10:45,010 --> 00:10:47,210 on kids all over the world. 181 00:10:47,250 --> 00:10:51,810 Well, it wasn't inadvertent, but it was indirect. 182 00:10:51,840 --> 00:10:53,910 I mean, I wanted to have that effect. 183 00:11:03,260 --> 00:11:05,470 Other bands who responded 184 00:11:05,510 --> 00:11:07,860 to the way I was doing things got famous, 185 00:11:07,890 --> 00:11:11,790 so it ended up having this huge impact and influence. 186 00:11:11,830 --> 00:11:15,350 When I first saw a picture of the Sex Pistols, 187 00:11:15,380 --> 00:11:17,280 it was like... I just had to laugh. 188 00:11:17,310 --> 00:11:19,280 That's a charitable interpretation of events. 189 00:11:19,320 --> 00:11:22,280 Malcolm McLaren came to New York and saw the Voidoids 190 00:11:22,320 --> 00:11:24,870 and went back and built a boy band, 191 00:11:24,910 --> 00:11:27,430 and said, "You're going to dress like that guy." 192 00:11:27,460 --> 00:11:29,390 Yeah, I don't really look at it that way. 193 00:11:29,430 --> 00:11:30,880 Yeah. 194 00:11:30,910 --> 00:11:33,120 - All right. - I mean, ideas are free. 195 00:11:33,160 --> 00:11:35,400 I never resented that. Mmhmm. 196 00:11:35,430 --> 00:11:38,230 But it was funny and strange. 197 00:11:39,890 --> 00:11:43,130 Cheap rent brought a lot of people together. 198 00:11:43,170 --> 00:11:45,000 It wasn't just living spaces were cheap. 199 00:11:45,030 --> 00:11:47,140 There were venues where you could put 200 00:11:47,170 --> 00:11:48,900 whatever it was you did out there. 201 00:11:48,930 --> 00:11:52,900 Yeah, CBGB's didn't exist until we created it. 202 00:11:52,940 --> 00:11:54,450 I mean, we went and proposed 203 00:11:54,490 --> 00:11:56,970 that we be the house band there. 204 00:11:57,010 --> 00:11:59,530 This next number is called 205 00:11:59,560 --> 00:12:01,530 "I Belong To The Blank Generation" 206 00:12:03,460 --> 00:12:04,770 One, two, three! 207 00:12:12,370 --> 00:12:15,540 And then your band, the Voidoids... 208 00:12:15,580 --> 00:12:17,480 What were your expectations? 209 00:12:17,510 --> 00:12:18,860 I wanted everything 210 00:12:18,890 --> 00:12:21,410 that anybody who starts a band wants, 211 00:12:21,450 --> 00:12:24,930 but I didn't even quite realize 212 00:12:24,970 --> 00:12:28,000 how weird and uncommercial I was. 213 00:12:29,320 --> 00:12:34,080 I thought what I was doing was really catchy. 214 00:12:35,600 --> 00:12:39,150 Do we over-romanticize that period? 215 00:12:39,190 --> 00:12:40,220 Was it special? 216 00:12:40,260 --> 00:12:43,500 I think the creation of the mythology of the '70s 217 00:12:43,540 --> 00:12:45,880 kind of began in the mid-'90s. 218 00:12:45,920 --> 00:12:48,020 I can see why people who weren't there 219 00:12:48,060 --> 00:12:49,890 wish they were there, but it goes 220 00:12:49,920 --> 00:12:51,610 against all my instincts to think that way 221 00:12:51,650 --> 00:12:53,440 just because the idea is 222 00:12:53,480 --> 00:12:55,450 we didn't like where things were, 223 00:12:55,480 --> 00:12:57,450 so we decided to change them. 224 00:12:57,480 --> 00:12:59,310 Why are you here tonight? 225 00:12:59,350 --> 00:13:01,900 I guess we're just interested to see what's going on. 226 00:13:01,940 --> 00:13:05,110 We saw a bit in... I think it was "The New Yorker." 227 00:13:05,150 --> 00:13:08,040 More or less, to see what was happening. 228 00:13:08,080 --> 00:13:10,220 Simple as that. How about you? 229 00:13:10,250 --> 00:13:12,460 It's a fascinating place, I must say. 230 00:13:12,500 --> 00:13:15,190 It's probably one of the most interesting places in New York. 231 00:13:15,220 --> 00:13:16,850 Just simply the... 232 00:13:16,880 --> 00:13:19,330 the neon lights and the crowd here... 233 00:13:19,370 --> 00:13:20,990 It's all very interesting. 234 00:13:21,020 --> 00:13:23,200 - Would you come here again? - No. 235 00:13:32,000 --> 00:13:34,480 Have you ever considered writing a dish-y memoir? 236 00:13:34,520 --> 00:13:36,870 I mean, my God, it would be 800 pages long. 237 00:13:36,900 --> 00:13:38,070 Yeah, you know why? 238 00:13:38,110 --> 00:13:40,150 Because so many people are still alive. 239 00:13:40,180 --> 00:13:42,630 - I mean, people love you. - Yeah. 240 00:13:42,670 --> 00:13:44,010 They have to say that. 241 00:13:44,050 --> 00:13:45,880 How can you say something mean 242 00:13:45,910 --> 00:13:48,290 about somebody who might be mean back at you? 243 00:13:48,330 --> 00:13:50,670 It's an industry. Are you kidding me? 244 00:14:09,170 --> 00:14:10,970 People will ask, "What was it like 245 00:14:11,000 --> 00:14:12,900 the first time you saw Iggy?" 246 00:14:12,940 --> 00:14:14,110 And I didn't see him. 247 00:14:14,150 --> 00:14:15,970 I heard the music from down the hall. 248 00:14:16,010 --> 00:14:17,420 I mean, I thought, 249 00:14:17,460 --> 00:14:20,010 "This is the rock and roll I always wanted to hear"... 250 00:14:20,050 --> 00:14:22,330 Something that was this fierce. 251 00:14:22,360 --> 00:14:26,120 And yet, you could sense... There was a tune there. 252 00:14:26,160 --> 00:14:28,300 When I bought "Funhouse" in high school... 253 00:14:28,330 --> 00:14:29,260 Yeah. 254 00:14:29,300 --> 00:14:31,270 I was immediately ostracized. 255 00:14:31,300 --> 00:14:33,060 - Yeah. - This was defining music. 256 00:14:33,100 --> 00:14:35,200 And normal people didn't like it. 257 00:14:35,240 --> 00:14:38,070 The Ramones met because they were poor outcasts 258 00:14:38,100 --> 00:14:42,000 in a high school of 5,000 people who liked "Funhouse." 259 00:14:42,040 --> 00:14:43,450 - Right. - Okay? 260 00:14:43,480 --> 00:14:45,000 They had it all figured out, 261 00:14:45,040 --> 00:14:48,080 that they would sell as many records 262 00:14:48,110 --> 00:14:51,010 as the great record sellers would sell, 263 00:14:51,040 --> 00:14:53,080 and in a few years, they would have so much money 264 00:14:53,120 --> 00:14:56,150 that they would retire and never have to work again. 265 00:14:56,190 --> 00:14:57,640 Right, especially with each other. 266 00:14:57,670 --> 00:14:59,220 Yeah. 267 00:14:59,260 --> 00:15:01,950 Guess what. They had to say on the road for another... 268 00:15:01,990 --> 00:15:03,750 - 25 years. - Yes. 269 00:15:03,780 --> 00:15:05,300 You know where their greatest 270 00:15:05,330 --> 00:15:08,340 financial success has come from? 271 00:15:08,370 --> 00:15:10,580 "Hey, ho, let's go"... Right. 272 00:15:10,620 --> 00:15:15,240 Sung in football and soccer stadiums around the world. 273 00:15:15,280 --> 00:15:19,180 The Ramones' estates are gathering in more money 274 00:15:19,210 --> 00:15:23,460 from five seconds than they ever made in their... 275 00:15:23,490 --> 00:15:26,730 Is that the measure of greatness or eternity? 276 00:15:26,770 --> 00:15:28,740 It's one of them. 277 00:15:35,810 --> 00:15:37,500 So many people died. 278 00:15:37,540 --> 00:15:40,230 So many people didn't get recognized. 279 00:15:40,270 --> 00:15:42,470 Richard Hell's still living in the same apartment 280 00:15:42,510 --> 00:15:43,990 he lived in 40 years ago. 281 00:15:44,030 --> 00:15:45,620 Who likes to move in New York? 282 00:15:45,650 --> 00:15:47,200 He got a good deal. 283 00:15:47,240 --> 00:15:50,520 The neighborhood got all better around him, you know? 284 00:15:50,550 --> 00:15:52,280 Iggy was supposed the one 285 00:15:52,310 --> 00:15:55,210 who didn't make it most of all, 286 00:15:55,250 --> 00:15:57,520 and he's still there... The most dangerous. 287 00:15:59,180 --> 00:16:01,800 God sends us these signs that there are miracles, 288 00:16:01,840 --> 00:16:03,430 don't give up hope. 289 00:16:03,460 --> 00:16:06,020 What you believe is beautiful probably is, 290 00:16:06,050 --> 00:16:09,360 but not everyone will know it in time. 291 00:16:45,470 --> 00:16:47,820 Okay, my name's Hugh Mackie. 292 00:16:47,850 --> 00:16:52,270 I moved over here in '81 and started this shop in '86. 293 00:16:54,340 --> 00:16:55,820 When we opened this shop here, 294 00:16:55,860 --> 00:16:58,270 we were the only, like, business on the block. 295 00:16:58,310 --> 00:16:59,690 We were the only, like, real thing 296 00:16:59,720 --> 00:17:04,070 apart from just mayhem down here. 297 00:17:05,870 --> 00:17:07,840 Basically, it's been a one-man show 298 00:17:07,870 --> 00:17:09,490 with one person helping me, 299 00:17:09,530 --> 00:17:11,700 and we still fix old British bikes. 300 00:17:11,740 --> 00:17:14,880 We're really into it, but nowadays, 301 00:17:14,910 --> 00:17:17,500 there aren't so many people into it anymore, 302 00:17:17,540 --> 00:17:19,470 and the supply of bikes is dwindling. 303 00:17:22,890 --> 00:17:24,440 It's gotten to the point now 304 00:17:24,470 --> 00:17:26,580 where I'm the only bad thing on the block. 305 00:17:26,610 --> 00:17:29,480 I'm now the mess. I'm now the noise. 306 00:17:29,510 --> 00:17:31,790 I'm the scruffy building. 307 00:17:33,620 --> 00:17:35,790 It's not that anymore. It's just not. 308 00:17:35,830 --> 00:17:38,870 I mean, it's super-expensive restaurants, 309 00:17:38,900 --> 00:17:42,250 which come and go every five years. 310 00:17:42,280 --> 00:17:44,250 High-heeled girls with mink coats 311 00:17:44,290 --> 00:17:47,320 are out getting into fancy schnitzel restaurants, 312 00:17:47,360 --> 00:17:51,470 and they're standing on rats, and they think that's cool. 313 00:17:51,500 --> 00:17:52,880 What they don't know is that 314 00:17:52,920 --> 00:17:56,190 before the restaurants were here, there were no rats. 315 00:17:56,230 --> 00:17:58,510 So now all these, like, rich people are coming down here 316 00:17:58,540 --> 00:18:00,230 and standing on rats and think 317 00:18:00,270 --> 00:18:03,750 that's East Village, and it never was, you know? 318 00:18:03,790 --> 00:18:05,240 So... 319 00:18:45,450 --> 00:18:48,450 How hard was it to... If you're coming to New York, 320 00:18:48,490 --> 00:18:50,390 a section of New York that's completely broke... 321 00:18:50,420 --> 00:18:51,833 You are broke. You're going to be an artist, 322 00:18:51,840 --> 00:18:56,390 and not just art, but fairly confrontational. 323 00:18:56,430 --> 00:18:59,400 How committed do you have to be to do that, 324 00:18:59,430 --> 00:19:01,190 particularly at that time? 325 00:19:01,230 --> 00:19:03,330 I think that... 326 00:19:03,370 --> 00:19:05,610 contrarily, it hasn't been that hard. 327 00:19:05,640 --> 00:19:08,820 I feel like I've been very fortunate 328 00:19:08,850 --> 00:19:11,960 to have got to stay alive here, so... 329 00:19:11,990 --> 00:19:14,550 And I have everything I need. Look around us. 330 00:19:19,590 --> 00:19:22,560 It's a wonderful amusement park 331 00:19:22,590 --> 00:19:27,420 of good and bad ideas all happening at once. 332 00:19:27,460 --> 00:19:29,290 You know how people immigrate here 333 00:19:29,320 --> 00:19:32,770 to start a new life and to dream big? 334 00:19:32,810 --> 00:19:35,710 I felt like I needed to do that as well, 335 00:19:35,740 --> 00:19:38,020 just like the way that people did 336 00:19:38,050 --> 00:19:39,640 at the turn of the century. 337 00:19:39,680 --> 00:19:43,650 You move to New York to immigrate to a new land, 338 00:19:43,680 --> 00:19:46,990 to start... a new life. 339 00:19:47,030 --> 00:19:51,450 And that's really what the Lower East Side is all about. 340 00:19:55,900 --> 00:19:59,870 You know, it was an extremely rare and wonderful time. 341 00:19:59,900 --> 00:20:03,770 I think only now do I realize how fortunate I was 342 00:20:03,800 --> 00:20:06,600 that I got to experience a neighborhood 343 00:20:06,640 --> 00:20:09,600 that had Jack Smith on 1st Avenue, 344 00:20:09,640 --> 00:20:11,500 that had the Living Theatre, 345 00:20:11,540 --> 00:20:14,470 that had Jonas Mekas on 2nd Street. 346 00:20:14,510 --> 00:20:16,890 Who thrilled you back then? 347 00:20:16,920 --> 00:20:20,030 Who was doing stuff that you just thought 348 00:20:20,060 --> 00:20:21,480 just, "Holy shit", 349 00:20:21,510 --> 00:20:24,620 this is really incredible and inspiring"? 350 00:20:24,650 --> 00:20:29,490 Um, well, gosh. Um, luckily, my friends 351 00:20:29,520 --> 00:20:32,070 that I was working with were very inspiring. 352 00:20:32,110 --> 00:20:34,900 I loved Joe Coleman's work. 353 00:20:46,020 --> 00:20:48,440 The Lower East Side at that time 354 00:20:48,470 --> 00:20:49,990 was a destination for me. 355 00:20:50,020 --> 00:20:52,960 There was something, you know, that compelled me, 356 00:20:52,990 --> 00:20:56,370 you know, to just be there, and I would paint it. 357 00:20:56,410 --> 00:20:59,860 Squeeze in. Yeah. Wow. 358 00:20:59,900 --> 00:21:02,590 Wow. 359 00:21:02,620 --> 00:21:04,520 Oh, yes, you were telling me about this guy. 360 00:21:04,560 --> 00:21:07,560 Yeah, yeah, and here, if you want to use this... 361 00:21:07,590 --> 00:21:10,080 It's beautiful. 362 00:21:20,880 --> 00:21:23,820 You know, all the paintings are novels, you know? 363 00:21:23,850 --> 00:21:26,340 You know, so it's a dense story, 364 00:21:26,370 --> 00:21:28,720 and the more that you look, the more that you learn. 365 00:21:28,750 --> 00:21:31,720 And it's in nonlinear time, you know? 366 00:21:31,750 --> 00:21:33,830 Like, you're exploring, you know, at your own pace, 367 00:21:33,860 --> 00:21:35,690 whatever you want to look at. 368 00:21:35,720 --> 00:21:38,450 And someone else might start in a different place, 369 00:21:38,490 --> 00:21:41,420 and, you know, it might tell a different story. 370 00:21:47,600 --> 00:21:49,120 The performance art, at what point... 371 00:21:49,150 --> 00:21:51,710 So you came to paint, or did you come to paint before? 372 00:21:51,740 --> 00:21:55,430 No, I came to paints, but the paintings were... 373 00:21:55,470 --> 00:22:00,130 like, implosions, where I was studying the world around me 374 00:22:00,160 --> 00:22:02,130 and myself inside, 375 00:22:02,160 --> 00:22:07,070 and the performances became literal explosions. 376 00:22:14,660 --> 00:22:16,490 I learned violence from my old man. 377 00:22:16,520 --> 00:22:17,940 So I was angry, you know? 378 00:22:17,970 --> 00:22:20,460 When your house is on fire, you know, 379 00:22:20,490 --> 00:22:21,770 you don't read poetry, 380 00:22:21,800 --> 00:22:24,460 and you don't, you know, sing a folk song. 381 00:22:24,500 --> 00:22:26,600 You know, you got to scream. 382 00:22:37,650 --> 00:22:39,890 I missed all the great art of the time. 383 00:22:39,930 --> 00:22:43,210 I came for heroin, and I came for music. 384 00:22:43,240 --> 00:22:45,830 Other than that, I didn't live here. 385 00:22:45,860 --> 00:22:48,620 But, man, a lot of people didn't make it, 386 00:22:48,660 --> 00:22:51,770 and I remember, I guess around 1980, 387 00:22:51,800 --> 00:22:54,910 it was like... something is happening, 388 00:22:54,940 --> 00:22:56,630 and no one knows what it is. 389 00:22:56,670 --> 00:22:57,910 - You mean the AIDS? - AIDS. 390 00:22:57,940 --> 00:22:59,840 Yeah, yeah, a lot of that time 391 00:22:59,880 --> 00:23:04,640 exists in my mind like a dream, like an opium dream. 392 00:23:10,580 --> 00:23:12,550 I have these people that I love 393 00:23:12,580 --> 00:23:16,860 that would just, like, drop out and fall out. 394 00:23:16,890 --> 00:23:19,860 I'm a little bit sad that I wasn't there. 395 00:23:19,900 --> 00:23:23,520 I wasn't present, you know, for them, 396 00:23:23,560 --> 00:23:27,530 because I was too off in this other world. 397 00:23:32,120 --> 00:23:34,220 But for me, it was still something 398 00:23:34,260 --> 00:23:36,880 of great beauty to see that time. 399 00:23:36,910 --> 00:23:38,950 You have Wall Street tycoons 400 00:23:38,990 --> 00:23:41,610 fighting for huge amounts of wealth, 401 00:23:41,640 --> 00:23:46,580 and you have, like, bums fighting over, like, pennies. 402 00:23:46,610 --> 00:23:48,550 And it has, like... 403 00:23:48,580 --> 00:23:52,860 you know, a primal, like, awe. 404 00:24:04,320 --> 00:24:05,980 It's for Passover, matzo brei... 405 00:24:06,010 --> 00:24:07,087 Special matzo, special days. 406 00:24:22,170 --> 00:24:23,790 - Yes, sir. - I've been coming here 407 00:24:23,820 --> 00:24:25,200 since 1966. 408 00:24:25,240 --> 00:24:27,860 - Over 50 years. - Only 5 years. 409 00:24:27,900 --> 00:24:29,000 It's family. 410 00:24:36,350 --> 00:24:38,630 So everyone should come, but not too many people. 411 00:24:38,670 --> 00:24:39,770 Yeah. 412 00:25:28,230 --> 00:25:30,023 This is one of the places that Keith, Harry, and I 413 00:25:30,030 --> 00:25:31,650 would love to come here. 414 00:25:31,680 --> 00:25:33,200 Jean-Michel would join us, 415 00:25:33,240 --> 00:25:35,023 and we would have good meals here on the regular. 416 00:25:35,030 --> 00:25:36,650 And it was consistently the exact... 417 00:25:36,690 --> 00:25:38,303 You know it's great when you can go someplace... 418 00:25:38,310 --> 00:25:40,233 They have the exact same food. Come on, this is it? 419 00:25:40,240 --> 00:25:42,660 - It's still the same? - Still exactly the same. 420 00:25:42,700 --> 00:25:44,800 - That's encouraging. - Which is great, it's great. 421 00:25:44,840 --> 00:25:45,970 I mean, you know, even though 422 00:25:46,010 --> 00:25:48,220 there's a hotel three doors away... 423 00:25:48,250 --> 00:25:49,980 - Right. - And high rises going up, 424 00:25:50,010 --> 00:25:51,810 we can still have a decent meal. 425 00:26:03,440 --> 00:26:05,820 You brought hip-hop culture 426 00:26:05,860 --> 00:26:08,310 to a very finite number of people initially 427 00:26:08,340 --> 00:26:10,960 on the Lower East Side. Yeah. Mmhmm. 428 00:26:11,000 --> 00:26:13,240 Totally changed the world. 429 00:26:13,280 --> 00:26:15,690 Everybody get funky 430 00:26:18,080 --> 00:26:19,840 Everybody get funky 431 00:26:21,800 --> 00:26:24,150 Teenagers at that time were doing something interesting, 432 00:26:24,180 --> 00:26:27,150 so I wanted to find some people 433 00:26:27,190 --> 00:26:29,710 that would listen to these ideas, 434 00:26:29,740 --> 00:26:31,990 and that's what lead me to the Lower East Side 435 00:26:32,020 --> 00:26:33,440 and to connect with... 436 00:26:33,470 --> 00:26:35,060 I guess you met Glenn O'Brien. 437 00:26:35,090 --> 00:26:36,270 Glenn O'Brien, yeah. 438 00:26:36,300 --> 00:26:37,850 Everybody get funky 439 00:26:37,890 --> 00:26:38,990 Glenn was key to it all, 440 00:26:39,030 --> 00:26:40,410 because I would read his column 441 00:26:40,440 --> 00:26:42,440 in "Interview" magazine, and it was just brilliant, 442 00:26:42,480 --> 00:26:44,760 and I met him, and he embraced me 443 00:26:44,790 --> 00:26:48,000 and invited me to be a part of "TV Party," 444 00:26:48,040 --> 00:26:49,730 which was this underground... 445 00:26:49,760 --> 00:26:52,140 Oh, I remember it well. I watched it at the time. 446 00:26:52,180 --> 00:26:54,910 Hi, and welcome to "TV Party." 447 00:26:54,940 --> 00:26:56,420 Fred, why don't you tell us 448 00:26:56,460 --> 00:26:59,150 a little bit about what the Holy Land looks like? 449 00:26:59,190 --> 00:27:01,220 I want you to know... 450 00:27:02,460 --> 00:27:05,160 That I've been to the Holy Land, 451 00:27:05,190 --> 00:27:09,020 and the Holy Land is so funky. 452 00:27:09,060 --> 00:27:10,300 How funky is it? 453 00:27:10,330 --> 00:27:12,200 It's funky! It's funky! 454 00:27:12,230 --> 00:27:14,890 And through that connection is where I met 455 00:27:14,930 --> 00:27:17,790 all these people that listened to all these ideas I had, 456 00:27:17,820 --> 00:27:22,170 and that was David Byrne, Chris Stein and Debbie Harry, 457 00:27:22,210 --> 00:27:25,180 and so many amazing people that were just like, 458 00:27:25,210 --> 00:27:27,390 "Yeah, tell me more." 459 00:27:56,520 --> 00:28:00,210 What I think is under-celebrated 460 00:28:00,250 --> 00:28:02,870 about you guys in particular was your kindness. 461 00:28:02,900 --> 00:28:05,840 You were famously really, really supportive 462 00:28:05,870 --> 00:28:07,940 of the people you came up with... 463 00:28:07,980 --> 00:28:09,840 Your contemporaries and people around you 464 00:28:09,880 --> 00:28:11,360 who weren't doing as well. 465 00:28:11,400 --> 00:28:13,253 You know, let each other sleep on each other's floors. 466 00:28:13,260 --> 00:28:14,533 Well, there was nothing at stake. 467 00:28:14,540 --> 00:28:16,160 There was nothing at stake. 468 00:28:16,190 --> 00:28:17,750 And I mean this in a good way. 469 00:28:17,780 --> 00:28:19,510 You were writing hits from the beginning. 470 00:28:19,540 --> 00:28:21,370 I mean, these are enduring songs 471 00:28:21,410 --> 00:28:23,370 that people are still listening to and hold up. 472 00:28:23,410 --> 00:28:25,820 I just think a lot of people had low expectations. 473 00:28:25,860 --> 00:28:28,100 You didn't. I mean, you had a plan, yes? 474 00:28:28,140 --> 00:28:31,760 Well, no. If we had a plan, we would have made more money 475 00:28:31,800 --> 00:28:34,250 and not got so completely fucked over... 476 00:28:34,280 --> 00:28:36,520 - Yeah. - By the industry, as it were. 477 00:28:36,560 --> 00:28:38,530 - We had a plan to survive. - Yeah. 478 00:28:38,560 --> 00:28:41,010 We had a plan to keep going, doggedly. 479 00:28:46,020 --> 00:28:49,260 But I think the thing that was so attractive about that period 480 00:28:49,300 --> 00:28:51,120 was you weren't locked in 481 00:28:51,160 --> 00:28:53,440 to one format or one form, you know? 482 00:28:53,470 --> 00:28:56,990 It was just... Everybody was doing everything. 483 00:28:59,620 --> 00:29:04,170 You introduced the entirely revolutionary notion 484 00:29:04,210 --> 00:29:06,280 that street art... Mmhmm. 485 00:29:06,310 --> 00:29:08,000 Was in fact, really art. 486 00:29:11,630 --> 00:29:13,560 The painting that we did on the street 487 00:29:13,600 --> 00:29:16,940 was coming from a place that pop art came from as well... 488 00:29:16,980 --> 00:29:21,090 Like popular culture, magazines, advertising, comics. 489 00:29:21,120 --> 00:29:22,430 And so some of the first people 490 00:29:22,470 --> 00:29:24,470 to buy paintings from me and Jean-Michel 491 00:29:24,500 --> 00:29:26,570 was Chris and Debbie from Blondie. 492 00:29:26,610 --> 00:29:28,580 And then they also commissioned 493 00:29:28,610 --> 00:29:31,160 me, Lee Quiñones, and Jean-Michel 494 00:29:31,200 --> 00:29:32,580 to do sets and art 495 00:29:32,610 --> 00:29:35,030 and participate in their music videos... 496 00:29:35,070 --> 00:29:36,100 Some of the very first. 497 00:29:37,550 --> 00:29:40,590 Your support and work with Fab 5 Freddy... 498 00:29:40,620 --> 00:29:43,250 I mean, look at the soundtrack to the whole world now. 499 00:29:43,280 --> 00:29:44,490 It's hip-hop. 500 00:29:44,520 --> 00:29:46,520 That connection, that crossover there, 501 00:29:46,560 --> 00:29:49,600 you guys put considerable muscle and gravitas. 502 00:29:49,630 --> 00:29:51,840 I talked to all these record company guys, 503 00:29:51,880 --> 00:29:55,260 and I'd say 98% of them told me it was a fad. 504 00:29:55,290 --> 00:29:56,600 It's not going to last. 505 00:29:56,640 --> 00:29:58,610 It's going to go away in five years. 506 00:29:58,640 --> 00:30:02,330 And you recorded a song that was hugely... 507 00:30:05,300 --> 00:30:08,060 Well, I will say, you know, like, we're... 508 00:30:08,100 --> 00:30:09,620 I'm very proud of the fact 509 00:30:09,650 --> 00:30:11,930 that, you know, we created a format 510 00:30:11,960 --> 00:30:14,930 that didn't exist in rap until then, 511 00:30:14,970 --> 00:30:18,490 and that is that we wrote a song that had a rap in it. 512 00:30:18,520 --> 00:30:20,280 Yeah, those guys were sampling still. 513 00:30:20,320 --> 00:30:23,220 The rapping was only scratching and sampling, 514 00:30:23,250 --> 00:30:26,080 so we, you know, 515 00:30:26,120 --> 00:30:28,360 made it viably commercial. 516 00:30:31,570 --> 00:30:33,160 And then, you know, you had another 517 00:30:33,190 --> 00:30:35,370 earth-shattering event... "Wild Style." 518 00:30:35,400 --> 00:30:37,640 I had an idea that we could make a movie 519 00:30:37,680 --> 00:30:41,130 and show that this rapping, this dancing, 520 00:30:41,170 --> 00:30:44,130 and this DJ'ing was one thing. 521 00:30:44,170 --> 00:30:46,550 Electro 522 00:30:46,580 --> 00:30:48,280 So I was on a trip to Germany 523 00:30:48,310 --> 00:30:50,280 not long after the film had aired, 524 00:30:50,310 --> 00:30:52,250 and I see these kids break-dancing. 525 00:30:52,280 --> 00:30:53,742 I'm like, "What the hell is going on?" 526 00:30:55,460 --> 00:30:59,390 As I got closer, I noticed the moves the kids were doing 527 00:30:59,430 --> 00:31:02,120 were the exact same moves that the Rock Steady Crew 528 00:31:02,150 --> 00:31:03,670 does in "Wild Style." 529 00:31:03,710 --> 00:31:07,400 But I then knew that this was going to translate globally. 530 00:31:09,160 --> 00:31:10,710 I remember that film opening. 531 00:31:10,750 --> 00:31:12,710 That was a nuclear bomb. Yep. 532 00:31:12,750 --> 00:31:15,170 And it ended up being, like, the second-highest grossing... 533 00:31:15,200 --> 00:31:16,550 Second to "Terms of Endearment," 534 00:31:16,580 --> 00:31:18,550 which not many people think about now, 535 00:31:18,580 --> 00:31:20,690 but, yeah, we did well. 536 00:31:20,720 --> 00:31:22,590 You got to love that moment of corporate terror 537 00:31:22,620 --> 00:31:24,590 in the film industry when people are looking 538 00:31:24,620 --> 00:31:27,420 at the weekend grosses, and it's like, "What's this?" 539 00:31:29,180 --> 00:31:32,150 "Who is this audience that did not appear in our metrics?" 540 00:31:32,180 --> 00:31:34,430 Yeah, it was a great experience. 541 00:31:34,460 --> 00:31:38,120 Electro 542 00:31:55,550 --> 00:31:59,620 I came to the Lower East Side back in 1964. 543 00:32:01,560 --> 00:32:06,390 When I came here, the changes was already in motion. 544 00:32:07,630 --> 00:32:10,050 There was the heroin epidemic, 545 00:32:10,080 --> 00:32:13,050 the beginning of the homeless epidemic. 546 00:32:13,090 --> 00:32:17,330 And there I was, witnessing all these changes. 547 00:32:19,230 --> 00:32:21,330 That's the history of the Lower East Side. 548 00:32:21,370 --> 00:32:23,650 They did not have to go back and find themselves 549 00:32:23,680 --> 00:32:25,270 on the Lower East Side. 550 00:32:25,300 --> 00:32:27,690 Probably every day, or every week, 551 00:32:27,720 --> 00:32:30,000 just by walking through it... 552 00:32:31,520 --> 00:32:34,210 That's my connection to the neighborhood. 553 00:32:34,240 --> 00:32:37,070 That's the neighborhood connecting to me... 554 00:32:37,110 --> 00:32:40,080 You know, to photograph that before that change. 555 00:32:40,110 --> 00:32:42,630 They have that running history. 556 00:32:42,670 --> 00:32:46,430 My main thing now is to keep a running record. 557 00:32:46,460 --> 00:32:49,810 So I started the 4th Street Photo Gallery here, 558 00:32:49,850 --> 00:32:52,260 and it's been history ever since. 559 00:32:52,300 --> 00:32:55,780 I'm still here. I'm surviving. 560 00:33:34,860 --> 00:33:36,270 You started making films 561 00:33:36,310 --> 00:33:38,340 before you knew how to make films. 562 00:33:38,380 --> 00:33:40,590 Yeah, yeah, the oddball thing about it is, 563 00:33:40,620 --> 00:33:42,210 knowing so little, 564 00:33:42,240 --> 00:33:44,420 being an amateur was so helpful. 565 00:33:44,450 --> 00:33:47,700 Who knew that you could hire a casting director? 566 00:33:47,730 --> 00:33:49,220 No, it was just like, 567 00:33:49,250 --> 00:33:51,840 "Hey, you play that, you play that," you know. 568 00:33:51,870 --> 00:33:54,290 "Which one of our friends are going to be around for this?" 569 00:33:54,320 --> 00:33:56,570 Exactly, "are you going to be around next Tuesday?" 570 00:33:56,600 --> 00:33:57,780 'Cause I"... you know... 571 00:34:00,470 --> 00:34:04,470 I saw myself more as like an experimental filmmaker. 572 00:34:04,510 --> 00:34:06,750 You know, like the Godard films, for example, 573 00:34:06,780 --> 00:34:08,973 they were inspiring 'cause I could say, "I could do that." 574 00:34:10,750 --> 00:34:12,170 I owe a lot to Amos. 575 00:34:12,200 --> 00:34:14,310 No, I saw "The Foreigner." 576 00:34:14,340 --> 00:34:16,380 It was amazing. The whole scene was there. 577 00:34:16,420 --> 00:34:18,210 Everybody was there. It was really... 578 00:34:18,240 --> 00:34:20,730 - Yeah, that was a big night. - I got so charged up. 579 00:34:20,760 --> 00:34:22,800 And I was sure I was going to make films. 580 00:34:25,560 --> 00:34:27,770 And your first film as a student film? 581 00:34:27,810 --> 00:34:30,120 My first film was a student film... 582 00:34:30,150 --> 00:34:31,740 "Permanent Vacation." 583 00:34:31,780 --> 00:34:34,920 They say people like myself are crazy, you know, 584 00:34:34,950 --> 00:34:37,260 'cause, well, you know... 585 00:34:37,300 --> 00:34:39,750 NYU film school made a mistake, 586 00:34:39,780 --> 00:34:44,200 so I had a $12,000 budget for my first film. 587 00:34:44,240 --> 00:34:47,270 Which is enormous for the time. 588 00:34:47,310 --> 00:34:48,650 It was huge for me. 589 00:34:48,690 --> 00:34:50,380 But the root of the word "amateur" 590 00:34:50,410 --> 00:34:52,760 is "the love of a form," 591 00:34:52,800 --> 00:34:56,770 and "professional" means you are doing it for money. 592 00:34:56,800 --> 00:34:58,530 So I still hope 593 00:34:58,560 --> 00:35:01,810 that I consider myself an amateur, for sure. 594 00:35:04,260 --> 00:35:06,290 What was the budget on your first film? 595 00:35:06,330 --> 00:35:08,290 - Oh, man. - $12. 596 00:35:08,330 --> 00:35:09,640 Yeah. 597 00:35:09,680 --> 00:35:11,920 Well, it depends on what you call "first film," 598 00:35:11,950 --> 00:35:15,960 but "Blank Generation" was like, $2,200. 599 00:35:18,990 --> 00:35:22,550 I started shooting bands, and it was more, 600 00:35:22,580 --> 00:35:25,690 "How do you shoot music with a silent camera?" basically. 601 00:35:25,730 --> 00:35:29,560 And then, "Unmade Beds" was, like, my first narrative film. 602 00:35:29,590 --> 00:35:32,390 It was, like, about $4,000. 603 00:35:32,420 --> 00:35:33,940 I think on "Unmade Beds," 604 00:35:33,980 --> 00:35:36,940 someone from "The New York Times" called it 605 00:35:36,980 --> 00:35:41,260 "the cinematic equivalent of kindergarten scribbling." 606 00:35:41,290 --> 00:35:44,300 And Amos put that on his posters... "New York Times." 607 00:35:44,330 --> 00:35:46,950 And that was the most, like, punk-ass move. 608 00:35:48,610 --> 00:35:50,340 So, yeah, so what do you think now 609 00:35:50,370 --> 00:35:52,300 when you walk around the neighborhood? 610 00:35:52,340 --> 00:35:53,960 You know, you paid some dues 611 00:35:54,000 --> 00:35:55,450 to walk down back in the day, 612 00:35:55,480 --> 00:35:57,310 and now it's projectile-vomiting frat boys 613 00:35:57,340 --> 00:35:58,860 with baseball caps on backwards. 614 00:35:58,900 --> 00:36:00,350 Oh, man. 615 00:36:00,380 --> 00:36:01,900 Does this give you a sinking feeling, 616 00:36:01,930 --> 00:36:03,560 make you angry, or are you just resigned? 617 00:36:03,590 --> 00:36:06,010 I wish I would have bought real estate, that's for sure. 618 00:36:08,010 --> 00:36:09,600 The thing that I always tell myself 619 00:36:09,630 --> 00:36:13,220 is, "Look at the history of New York City." 620 00:36:13,260 --> 00:36:16,330 And it's always about hustling and... 621 00:36:16,360 --> 00:36:17,640 - Change. - Change. 622 00:36:19,050 --> 00:36:21,610 And if you want it to stay the same, 623 00:36:21,640 --> 00:36:23,990 man, you got the wrong historical spot, 624 00:36:24,030 --> 00:36:28,750 because they're used to be a Native American trading post 625 00:36:28,790 --> 00:36:30,620 on the tip of Manhattan. 626 00:36:30,650 --> 00:36:32,620 It's now Wall Street, you know? 627 00:36:32,650 --> 00:36:35,490 ♪ - I just don't want to go 628 00:36:35,520 --> 00:36:38,040 ♪ Out in the streets no more 629 00:36:39,420 --> 00:36:42,040 ♪ I just don't want to go 630 00:36:42,080 --> 00:36:46,320 ♪ Out in the streets no more 631 00:36:46,360 --> 00:36:48,770 ♪ Because these people, they give me 632 00:36:48,810 --> 00:36:52,780 ♪ They give me the creeps anymore 633 00:36:52,810 --> 00:36:56,020 ♪ Too many creeps, too many creeps 634 00:36:56,060 --> 00:36:59,340 ♪ Too many creeps, too many creeps 635 00:36:59,370 --> 00:37:02,060 ♪ Too many creeps, too many creeps 636 00:37:02,100 --> 00:37:05,030 ♪ Too many creeps, yeah 637 00:37:05,070 --> 00:37:06,520 Do you want to come in for a minute? 638 00:37:06,550 --> 00:37:08,410 Yeah, sure, I'd love to take a peek. 639 00:37:08,450 --> 00:37:10,063 I'd be interested in looking at your dope bags. 640 00:37:10,070 --> 00:37:11,490 Yeah, here's some. 641 00:37:11,520 --> 00:37:12,970 I got this guy who was a bank robber, 642 00:37:13,010 --> 00:37:14,630 and he was going to jail. 643 00:37:14,660 --> 00:37:16,723 He hooked me up with this. This is from the early '80s. 644 00:37:16,730 --> 00:37:18,390 Oh, wow. Air Mail. 645 00:37:18,420 --> 00:37:19,940 - Air Mail. - Yeah, with 12th Street. 646 00:37:19,980 --> 00:37:21,500 - Yep. - Oh, I might have 647 00:37:21,530 --> 00:37:22,770 to put my glasses on for this. 648 00:37:22,810 --> 00:37:25,670 - It's a treasure. - DOA, I remember. 649 00:37:25,710 --> 00:37:29,060 - Poison, you must remember. - Poison, yes, of course. 650 00:37:29,090 --> 00:37:32,920 Evidence, the Psycho. I remember all of those. 651 00:37:32,960 --> 00:37:36,990 - Did you ever do Hellraiser? - No, I don't remember, ever. 652 00:37:37,030 --> 00:37:38,820 Toilet. There it is. 653 00:37:40,140 --> 00:37:42,720 Classic, right? You know, you were- 654 00:37:42,760 --> 00:37:44,660 You knew you were doing something bad 655 00:37:44,690 --> 00:37:47,110 when you bought a product called "Toilet" 656 00:37:47,140 --> 00:37:49,560 and, you know, shot it in your arm, or... 657 00:37:49,590 --> 00:37:53,320 Oh, man, memories. Yeah. 658 00:37:58,150 --> 00:38:00,670 I mean, basically, your reputation is 659 00:38:00,710 --> 00:38:05,400 the godfather archivist of all things Lower East Side. 660 00:38:05,440 --> 00:38:08,990 You were here pointing your camera at stuff 661 00:38:09,030 --> 00:38:10,820 since the early '80s. 662 00:38:13,620 --> 00:38:15,410 I probably have one of the largest 663 00:38:15,450 --> 00:38:18,140 inner-city photograph collections of anybody. 664 00:38:18,170 --> 00:38:20,760 I used to know everybody that went by. 665 00:38:20,800 --> 00:38:23,700 That neighborhood thing is, like, really important to me. 666 00:38:23,730 --> 00:38:25,150 So I photographed the Puerto Ricans, 667 00:38:25,180 --> 00:38:26,700 the Dominicans, 668 00:38:26,730 --> 00:38:28,740 the drag queens from the Pyramid Club, 669 00:38:28,770 --> 00:38:31,600 basically the whole hard-core scene in '87. 670 00:38:31,640 --> 00:38:33,430 I was more interested in, like, 671 00:38:33,470 --> 00:38:35,360 the eccentric people, the unique people. 672 00:38:37,640 --> 00:38:40,580 You were at the battle of Tompkins Square Park, 673 00:38:40,610 --> 00:38:43,030 which is sort of the Gettysburg of the Lower East Side. 674 00:38:44,790 --> 00:38:47,760 I remember it had essentially become clogged 675 00:38:47,790 --> 00:38:49,860 with nodding junkies... Right. 676 00:38:49,900 --> 00:38:52,590 Homeless people who'd set up permanent camp. 677 00:38:52,620 --> 00:38:55,800 - It was dangerous. - It was genuinely dangerous. 678 00:38:55,830 --> 00:38:59,910 When the police came down and decided to clean the park, 679 00:38:59,940 --> 00:39:02,460 the question is, who won? 680 00:39:02,490 --> 00:39:03,870 Well, in the beginning, we did. 681 00:39:03,910 --> 00:39:08,050 It's our fucking park! It's our fucking park! 682 00:39:08,090 --> 00:39:11,470 It's our fucking park! 683 00:39:11,500 --> 00:39:13,077 You know, you have to remember, in 1988, 684 00:39:13,090 --> 00:39:15,060 they couldn't close a 10 1/2-acre-square park 685 00:39:15,090 --> 00:39:17,160 on the Lower East Side, 686 00:39:17,200 --> 00:39:19,170 not with 450 riot cops... 687 00:39:20,820 --> 00:39:22,930 Horses, helicopters... They couldn't do it. 688 00:39:22,960 --> 00:39:26,170 - Maybe we get the better city. - We don't got no weapons. 689 00:39:26,210 --> 00:39:28,620 They got 9 millimeters down there! 690 00:39:28,660 --> 00:39:31,040 They got shotguns and machine guns! 691 00:39:31,070 --> 00:39:33,073 There were big bomb fighters in the middle of Avenue A. 692 00:39:33,080 --> 00:39:34,660 Buses couldn't come down,. 693 00:39:34,700 --> 00:39:36,560 Cars couldn't come down. They were stuck. 694 00:39:36,600 --> 00:39:37,933 You were on the news a lot, I remember. 695 00:39:37,940 --> 00:39:39,243 - A lot, yeah. - You were the most, like, 696 00:39:39,250 --> 00:39:41,640 despised man in... Yes, yes. 697 00:39:41,670 --> 00:39:43,555 NYPD, you were not their favorite photographer. 698 00:39:43,570 --> 00:39:44,980 Let's put it that way. 699 00:39:50,580 --> 00:39:52,060 This went on for four years. 700 00:39:52,100 --> 00:39:53,550 There were multiple riots, 701 00:39:53,580 --> 00:39:55,690 hundreds and hundreds of arrests. 702 00:39:56,860 --> 00:40:00,550 Four years here of real, solid conflict. 703 00:40:00,590 --> 00:40:02,860 The cops eventually got organized. 704 00:40:04,830 --> 00:40:06,660 I think this was the beginning 705 00:40:06,700 --> 00:40:08,870 of the sort of police-state mentality in America. 706 00:40:12,010 --> 00:40:13,460 I remember Tompkins Square. 707 00:40:13,500 --> 00:40:15,530 After the police fenced it off, 708 00:40:15,570 --> 00:40:19,950 it was, in a lot of people's minds, the end of an era. 709 00:40:19,990 --> 00:40:21,710 And, yeah, when they cleared off the drugs, 710 00:40:21,750 --> 00:40:23,260 a lot of people think, "Hey, great. 711 00:40:23,300 --> 00:40:24,820 "We're now going to have a neighborhood, 712 00:40:24,850 --> 00:40:26,470 and everything's going to be safe." 713 00:40:26,510 --> 00:40:28,030 And then in came the gentrification, 714 00:40:28,060 --> 00:40:30,023 and so the whole concept of America is being wiped out, 715 00:40:30,030 --> 00:40:32,300 because you can't pull yourself up by the bootstraps anymore 716 00:40:32,310 --> 00:40:34,000 'cause you can't get in the game. 717 00:40:35,860 --> 00:40:38,000 Gentrification has affected the whole city. 718 00:40:38,040 --> 00:40:41,730 You have to now make a huge amount of money to be here. 719 00:40:41,770 --> 00:40:43,840 You know, they got the skyscrapers in Midtown 720 00:40:43,870 --> 00:40:45,740 that are sold... millions of dollars apartments, 721 00:40:45,770 --> 00:40:48,740 and nobody lives in them, and they're empty. 722 00:40:48,770 --> 00:40:50,770 I live in one of those big, empty buildings... 723 00:40:50,810 --> 00:40:52,980 - Yeah. - With absentee owners. 724 00:40:53,020 --> 00:40:54,773 Is that all that's going to be left in New York? 725 00:40:54,780 --> 00:40:57,160 Yes. New York, there was always something 726 00:40:57,190 --> 00:40:58,710 that brought it back, 727 00:40:58,750 --> 00:41:01,160 but once you fill it with the corporate world, 728 00:41:01,200 --> 00:41:02,890 it's never going back. 729 00:41:02,920 --> 00:41:06,130 So we turned a corner that we will never go back again. 730 00:41:06,170 --> 00:41:07,270 And so it's over. 731 00:41:07,310 --> 00:41:09,000 - It's over. - It's over. 732 00:43:10,090 --> 00:43:12,190 You know I have my eye on the octopus. 733 00:43:12,230 --> 00:43:15,400 Okay, then I'm going to go straight into the... 734 00:43:15,440 --> 00:43:17,300 Straight, you're going to go straight? 735 00:43:17,330 --> 00:43:19,363 You're finally going straight. A little too late for that. 736 00:43:19,370 --> 00:43:20,890 Oh, my God, I'm impressed. 737 00:43:20,920 --> 00:43:22,750 Can you verify exactly what "straight" means? 738 00:43:22,790 --> 00:43:24,310 - No. - No way, honey. 739 00:43:24,340 --> 00:43:26,720 Even when you're straight, you're not straight. 740 00:43:36,320 --> 00:43:38,770 Did you expect to make a living from your art? 741 00:43:38,800 --> 00:43:40,320 - No, of course not. - How do you... 742 00:43:40,360 --> 00:43:43,050 No, I just was happy I didn't have to suck dick 743 00:43:43,080 --> 00:43:45,220 in an Iranian shoe store. 744 00:43:49,370 --> 00:43:51,230 First of all, I thought I would come to New York 745 00:43:51,270 --> 00:43:52,920 to do spoken word, but spoken word 746 00:43:52,960 --> 00:43:54,750 didn't really exist, so I started 747 00:43:54,790 --> 00:43:56,750 Teenage Jesus and the Jerks. 748 00:44:01,380 --> 00:44:04,900 I really had to make the most hideous yet precise den 749 00:44:04,930 --> 00:44:06,350 I possibly could as a tantrum 750 00:44:06,380 --> 00:44:08,350 against all of music and all of society. 751 00:44:08,390 --> 00:44:12,040 Little orphans running through the bloody snow 752 00:44:12,080 --> 00:44:14,910 Little orphans running through the bloody snow 753 00:44:14,940 --> 00:44:16,700 Little orphans running 754 00:44:16,740 --> 00:44:18,780 Through the blood, through the blood, through the... 755 00:44:18,810 --> 00:44:20,120 There were a lot of freakish, 756 00:44:20,160 --> 00:44:22,230 "never could have happened at any other time"... 757 00:44:22,260 --> 00:44:24,780 It seems to me... bands who had a ready-made audience, 758 00:44:24,820 --> 00:44:26,330 okay, as you did. 759 00:44:26,370 --> 00:44:28,510 You could basically say, "I am a rock star"... 760 00:44:28,540 --> 00:44:30,348 Well, hang on, wait, wait, reel it back, wait. 761 00:44:30,370 --> 00:44:32,410 - "I am a star." - No, no, no. 762 00:44:32,440 --> 00:44:34,340 First of all, I never said I was a fucking star. 763 00:44:34,380 --> 00:44:39,380 No, but, I mean, not by word, but by deed and deportment. 764 00:44:39,420 --> 00:44:42,520 We are great, aren't we? 765 00:44:42,560 --> 00:44:45,840 First of all, I'm not a star. I'm not an icon. 766 00:44:45,870 --> 00:44:47,490 That might be your midnight fantasies. 767 00:44:47,530 --> 00:44:49,313 You walked into a club, people knew who you were. 768 00:44:49,320 --> 00:44:51,003 I didn't walk into any place thinking I'm a star. 769 00:44:51,010 --> 00:44:52,423 I walked in thinking I had shit to do. 770 00:44:52,430 --> 00:44:54,360 But I wouldn't say I was a catalyst. 771 00:44:54,400 --> 00:44:57,370 I'd say I was a cattle prod to get people to do shows. 772 00:44:57,400 --> 00:45:00,370 Booking shows, curating shows, it's just what I do. 773 00:45:00,400 --> 00:45:02,090 It's like, "Let's go, let's do it." 774 00:45:02,130 --> 00:45:03,473 And when people would ask me to do things, 775 00:45:03,480 --> 00:45:05,410 I'd go, "Yeah, I want to do it, of course." 776 00:45:05,440 --> 00:45:07,130 - Pardon me. - People were... Beautiful... 777 00:45:07,170 --> 00:45:09,380 Doing things because they had to do it, 778 00:45:09,410 --> 00:45:13,240 not because of any other grand idea. 779 00:45:13,280 --> 00:45:15,000 So what made you happy back then? 780 00:45:15,040 --> 00:45:17,560 I mean, did you have any happy moments? 781 00:45:17,590 --> 00:45:19,110 Happiness was not the goal. 782 00:45:19,150 --> 00:45:21,560 Satisfaction was the goal, as it still is. 783 00:45:21,600 --> 00:45:24,840 My anger is on a global level. It's never on a personal level. 784 00:45:24,880 --> 00:45:26,430 I'm very happy. 785 00:45:26,460 --> 00:45:29,290 I'm happy to have octopus with you tonight, my dear. 786 00:45:29,330 --> 00:45:30,990 Thank you very much for inviting me. 787 00:45:31,020 --> 00:45:33,190 - Um... - Mmm. 788 00:45:33,230 --> 00:45:34,850 Good? 789 00:45:34,890 --> 00:45:36,030 - Perfect. - Yeah. 790 00:45:36,060 --> 00:45:37,300 When was the last time 791 00:45:37,340 --> 00:45:38,990 you had something this good in your mouth? 792 00:45:39,030 --> 00:45:40,473 I know you eat well, but this is, like... 793 00:45:40,480 --> 00:45:42,580 Yeah, it's been a while. This is pretty incredible. 794 00:45:42,620 --> 00:45:43,900 Mmm. 795 00:45:43,930 --> 00:45:45,590 Why are you here tonight? 796 00:45:45,620 --> 00:45:48,000 To see the Dead Boys. 797 00:45:48,040 --> 00:45:51,180 - Why? - 'Cause they're great fucks. 798 00:45:53,630 --> 00:45:56,460 - How do you know? - 'Cause I fucked them. 799 00:45:56,490 --> 00:45:58,940 Who do you want the run-down on? 800 00:45:58,980 --> 00:46:01,050 - Did you throw the, uh... - Yeah, I did. 801 00:46:01,080 --> 00:46:02,360 It was my present. I'm Lunch. 802 00:46:02,400 --> 00:46:04,360 They do a song called "I Need Lunch." 803 00:46:04,400 --> 00:46:05,470 I'm Lydia Lunch. 804 00:46:05,500 --> 00:46:09,200 Why did you throw that? What was it? What was it? 805 00:46:09,230 --> 00:46:12,580 They were used tampons. Genuinely used, new ones. 806 00:46:12,610 --> 00:46:14,200 Why did I give them to them? 807 00:46:14,240 --> 00:46:16,890 Because they're going to eat them in the second set. 808 00:46:26,940 --> 00:46:28,250 You were featured prominently 809 00:46:28,280 --> 00:46:32,460 in many of the best-known films of the era. 810 00:46:32,500 --> 00:46:35,190 Most of which sucked. 811 00:46:35,220 --> 00:46:36,910 I was trying to be a reflection 812 00:46:36,950 --> 00:46:38,120 of the reality at the time. 813 00:46:38,160 --> 00:46:39,950 This why I made the films I made, 814 00:46:39,990 --> 00:46:41,230 especially with Richard Kern. 815 00:46:41,260 --> 00:46:42,470 Just drop me off. 816 00:46:42,510 --> 00:46:44,850 Where are you taking me, anyway? 817 00:46:44,890 --> 00:46:46,960 My house. 818 00:46:46,990 --> 00:46:48,270 So we did this horribly 819 00:46:48,300 --> 00:46:50,100 violent film called "Fingered" 820 00:46:50,130 --> 00:46:52,860 that was based on real things that had happened to me. 821 00:46:57,420 --> 00:47:00,490 It was not glamorous. It was not pretty. 822 00:47:00,520 --> 00:47:02,660 It was offensive, but I'm trying to work out 823 00:47:02,700 --> 00:47:04,150 my psychosexual problems, 824 00:47:04,180 --> 00:47:05,940 because I know I'm not alone in them, 825 00:47:05,980 --> 00:47:09,640 by making films and speeches that will address the situation 826 00:47:09,670 --> 00:47:11,530 that I know other people suffer from. 827 00:47:11,570 --> 00:47:13,290 Okay, this was a film, very influential, 828 00:47:13,330 --> 00:47:16,130 far beyond the imaginings at the time. 829 00:47:16,160 --> 00:47:17,680 We didn't think that when we did it. 830 00:47:17,710 --> 00:47:19,672 We didn't give a shit. We just wanted to make a film 831 00:47:19,680 --> 00:47:21,890 and get it out there because we had to do something 832 00:47:21,920 --> 00:47:24,130 because we were burning and our blood was on fire. 833 00:47:32,420 --> 00:47:35,010 Looking back, though, was it all that? 834 00:47:35,040 --> 00:47:38,150 Was it a golden period? Are you nostalgic? 835 00:47:38,180 --> 00:47:40,050 - No. - Okay. 836 00:47:40,080 --> 00:47:41,530 I am golden. 837 00:47:41,560 --> 00:47:43,390 It's always a golden period for me. 838 00:47:43,430 --> 00:47:45,453 Look, we have a golden piece of asparagus, it's golden. 839 00:47:45,460 --> 00:47:49,160 - So do you have any sense of... - No. 840 00:47:49,190 --> 00:47:50,610 I fucking don't. 841 00:47:50,640 --> 00:47:53,160 Those were the bad old days, baby. 842 00:47:53,200 --> 00:47:55,410 You try living on peace of black beauties. 843 00:47:55,440 --> 00:47:57,193 You try giving hand jobs under the table today, 844 00:47:57,200 --> 00:47:58,680 take your first band to Europe. Oh! 845 00:47:58,720 --> 00:48:01,000 You want to go back to that, you go back to that. 846 00:48:01,030 --> 00:48:03,310 How were you living? I know the same, hand them out. 847 00:48:03,340 --> 00:48:05,590 So no sentimentality? No nostalgia at all? 848 00:48:05,620 --> 00:48:07,310 I'm doing too much shit all the time. 849 00:48:07,350 --> 00:48:08,940 I still have shit to do. 850 00:48:08,970 --> 00:48:10,740 Why am I boo-hooing when I've just been on tour 851 00:48:10,770 --> 00:48:13,150 from October from next October? I'm not stopping. 852 00:48:13,180 --> 00:48:15,360 Youth... would you want to go through that again, 853 00:48:15,390 --> 00:48:17,190 or is it that overrated? Youth? 854 00:48:17,220 --> 00:48:18,733 Don't I look good for my age? Hell, yeah. 855 00:48:18,740 --> 00:48:21,090 Shit, well, then what do you want from me? 856 00:48:21,120 --> 00:48:22,570 The older I get, the better I taste. 857 00:48:22,610 --> 00:48:25,020 What can I say? It's like wine, baby. 858 00:48:25,060 --> 00:48:27,710 Did something special happen then, or am I just... 859 00:48:27,750 --> 00:48:30,440 My whole life is special, because I'm still alive, 860 00:48:30,480 --> 00:48:32,743 doing what I want to fucking do with who I want to do it with. 861 00:48:32,750 --> 00:48:34,310 To me, I'm not living in the past 862 00:48:34,340 --> 00:48:36,170 because I'm living in the present. 863 00:48:36,210 --> 00:48:37,650 It's in New York, get used to it. 864 00:48:37,690 --> 00:48:39,620 It has never changed. It had a golden moment here. 865 00:48:39,660 --> 00:48:41,590 It probably had a golden moment in the '40s, too. 866 00:48:41,620 --> 00:48:43,320 I'm not sure. I wasn't here. 867 00:48:43,350 --> 00:48:45,730 Maybe the '60s, we weren't here. 868 00:48:45,770 --> 00:48:48,770 - So it was all bullshit? - No, none of it was bullshit. 869 00:48:48,800 --> 00:48:51,320 It happens when it happens, and things change, 870 00:48:51,360 --> 00:48:54,050 and time is not what it once was as anywhere. 871 00:48:54,090 --> 00:48:56,330 If you've done one thing, you're living in the past, 872 00:48:56,360 --> 00:48:58,207 and that's your glory day, that's your glory day. 873 00:48:58,230 --> 00:48:59,540 This is my glory day. 874 00:48:59,570 --> 00:49:01,330 I'm here, talking to you, eating octopus. 875 00:49:06,410 --> 00:49:08,750 I got my boots on his knees. And I'm like... 876 00:49:08,790 --> 00:49:10,690 And if only his dick was big enough, 877 00:49:10,720 --> 00:49:14,000 he'd be fucking me now, but we'r going to go have a cigarette. 878 00:49:14,040 --> 00:49:15,520 Got that? Thank you. 879 00:49:15,550 --> 00:49:17,250 We'll be back. 880 00:49:36,330 --> 00:49:39,510 I try to make paintings that are so beautiful 881 00:49:39,540 --> 00:49:42,130 that I get lost while I'm doing them. 882 00:49:44,270 --> 00:49:46,410 And you just hope that other people 883 00:49:46,450 --> 00:49:49,140 get lost in it the same way. 884 00:49:51,450 --> 00:49:53,660 You know I have a John Lurie over my bed. 885 00:49:53,700 --> 00:49:55,110 Oh, you posted that. 886 00:49:55,150 --> 00:49:56,700 That was nice that you posted that. 887 00:49:56,730 --> 00:49:59,560 Sometimes, you know, you get these letters and stuff. 888 00:49:59,600 --> 00:50:00,873 It's like, "Your painting saved my life," duh-duh-duh. 889 00:50:00,880 --> 00:50:02,710 - Yeah. - But then sometimes, 890 00:50:02,740 --> 00:50:04,430 because I don't have any shows... 891 00:50:04,470 --> 00:50:07,050 - Oh, that's great. - It feels pathetic, you know? 892 00:50:07,090 --> 00:50:08,710 Well, this is incredible to me. 893 00:50:08,750 --> 00:50:10,750 - What? - You don't have shows, 894 00:50:10,780 --> 00:50:12,300 like, regularly. That's insane. 895 00:50:12,340 --> 00:50:14,093 And it's sick, and it's wrong, and I don't even 896 00:50:14,100 --> 00:50:15,603 want to complain about it. You complain about it. 897 00:50:15,610 --> 00:50:16,643 - I'm complaining about it. - Yeah, okay. 898 00:50:16,650 --> 00:50:17,820 I am bitter. 899 00:50:17,860 --> 00:50:19,580 Because I'm going to die one day, 900 00:50:19,620 --> 00:50:21,313 and they're going to be worth a lot of money. 901 00:50:21,340 --> 00:50:22,760 Right. 902 00:50:22,790 --> 00:50:25,590 So my paintings are going to be on the same TV station 903 00:50:25,620 --> 00:50:27,210 as Wolf Blitzer. 904 00:50:27,250 --> 00:50:28,460 Oh, they are, yes. 905 00:50:28,490 --> 00:50:31,490 This is really a breakthrough for me. 906 00:50:31,530 --> 00:50:33,840 - He's a big art fan. - He is not. 907 00:50:33,870 --> 00:50:35,320 I don't... 908 00:50:41,640 --> 00:50:43,330 I, like, came to New York 909 00:50:43,370 --> 00:50:44,913 'cause I was kind of, like, on this Coltrane thing. 910 00:50:44,920 --> 00:50:47,300 I wanted to find God through music. 911 00:50:47,340 --> 00:50:50,480 Like, I started meeting all these amazing people. 912 00:50:50,510 --> 00:50:52,170 They were irreverent. 913 00:50:55,240 --> 00:50:58,380 The energy was enormous, 914 00:50:58,420 --> 00:51:00,900 and it was probably more fun 915 00:51:00,940 --> 00:51:03,250 than anybody's ever had in human history 916 00:51:03,280 --> 00:51:04,870 for about a year or two. 917 00:51:04,910 --> 00:51:07,870 But there was no discipline, which... 918 00:51:07,910 --> 00:51:09,623 I mean, I've like people who can play their instrument 919 00:51:09,630 --> 00:51:10,803 like they just found it on the street. 920 00:51:10,810 --> 00:51:12,500 - Mm-hmm. - But they can't 921 00:51:12,530 --> 00:51:15,330 just do it once... They got to work on it. 922 00:51:16,920 --> 00:51:18,610 I mean, I was a serious saxophone player. 923 00:51:18,640 --> 00:51:20,270 I came here as a saxophone player. 924 00:51:20,300 --> 00:51:22,750 I had to hide the fact that... I know, right? 925 00:51:22,790 --> 00:51:24,240 I had to hide. I mean, I really did. 926 00:51:24,270 --> 00:51:25,820 I would practice for two hours every day, 927 00:51:25,860 --> 00:51:28,200 but I would, like... I wouldn't tell people. 928 00:51:30,170 --> 00:51:33,350 So these are eggs... Mmhmm. 929 00:51:33,380 --> 00:51:36,900 Which you could get, you know, at the store. 930 00:51:36,940 --> 00:51:38,770 If you live in a good neighborhood, 931 00:51:38,800 --> 00:51:41,250 they will even deliver them to your house. 932 00:51:41,290 --> 00:51:45,570 And then you take water... 933 00:51:45,600 --> 00:51:47,260 which... 934 00:51:47,290 --> 00:51:49,360 I know you go to all these exotic places, 935 00:51:49,400 --> 00:51:52,400 but they used to say that New York had the best water. 936 00:51:52,440 --> 00:51:55,300 - That is true. - You think it's still true? 937 00:51:55,340 --> 00:51:57,650 I haven't heard anything to say otherwise. 938 00:51:57,680 --> 00:51:59,650 - Do you drink it? - Yeah, I do. 939 00:51:59,680 --> 00:52:01,170 And then you boil them. 940 00:52:04,720 --> 00:52:08,660 And then I serve them to you. Outstanding. 941 00:52:08,690 --> 00:52:11,280 I am grateful and honored. 942 00:52:14,460 --> 00:52:16,600 What I'm really curious... Because I've seen your show, 943 00:52:16,630 --> 00:52:17,870 and I watch you sit down. 944 00:52:17,910 --> 00:52:20,530 You eat, like, some mouse head soup, 945 00:52:20,570 --> 00:52:22,530 and then you go "Mmm, it's delicious." 946 00:52:22,570 --> 00:52:24,990 Just curious to see when you eat the hard-boiled egg 947 00:52:25,020 --> 00:52:26,493 if you're going to say, "This is delicious." 948 00:52:26,500 --> 00:52:27,750 As long as there's not, like, 949 00:52:27,780 --> 00:52:29,580 a half-term chicken fetus in there, 950 00:52:29,610 --> 00:52:31,820 which wouldn't be the first time for me, by the way, 951 00:52:31,850 --> 00:52:33,820 I'll be thrilled. 952 00:52:38,620 --> 00:52:40,830 We really felt like the universe 953 00:52:40,860 --> 00:52:43,900 was between Houston and 14th Street 954 00:52:43,940 --> 00:52:48,350 and Bowery and Avenue C, you know? 955 00:52:48,390 --> 00:52:49,980 And if you went outside there, 956 00:52:50,010 --> 00:52:52,740 you were a phony, you were a traitor. 957 00:52:52,770 --> 00:52:54,570 It's like, "We're done with you." 958 00:52:54,600 --> 00:52:56,430 You might as well be an accountant. 959 00:52:56,470 --> 00:52:58,470 What about film? I mean, as it turned out, 960 00:52:58,500 --> 00:53:01,850 you ended up appearing in work by Amos Poe, Jim Jarmusch. 961 00:53:01,880 --> 00:53:04,580 All very seminal films. And I made my own. 962 00:53:04,610 --> 00:53:05,750 I made my own films, too. 963 00:53:05,780 --> 00:53:08,030 But it was kind of just like... 964 00:53:08,060 --> 00:53:10,000 you go downstairs, you run into a friend. 965 00:53:10,030 --> 00:53:11,613 You say, "You want to get a cup of coffee?" 966 00:53:11,620 --> 00:53:12,893 Then that's... You know what I mean? 967 00:53:12,900 --> 00:53:14,620 Like, there's nothing to it, 968 00:53:14,660 --> 00:53:15,893 and everybody's making these movies, 969 00:53:15,900 --> 00:53:17,590 and so I do a little music for that, 970 00:53:17,620 --> 00:53:20,250 I act in that one, and I'll hold the boom on that one. 971 00:53:20,280 --> 00:53:22,490 You know, like, I didn't think about it that much. 972 00:53:22,530 --> 00:53:23,490 You know? Right. 973 00:53:23,530 --> 00:53:26,360 And so... 974 00:53:26,390 --> 00:53:27,770 Look at that. 975 00:53:30,500 --> 00:53:33,950 I'm not eating this shit. Here's a plate. 976 00:53:36,820 --> 00:53:38,750 Thank you. Eggs, the perfect food. 977 00:53:38,780 --> 00:53:40,890 Thank you, sir. Eat that. 978 00:53:40,920 --> 00:53:44,550 I don't think I've ever cooked for anybody before. 979 00:53:44,580 --> 00:53:46,890 Oh, well, I'm honored, sir. 980 00:53:46,930 --> 00:53:48,760 So, looking back... 981 00:53:48,790 --> 00:53:52,660 is there a danger of over-romanticizing 982 00:53:52,690 --> 00:53:54,900 that place and that time, 983 00:53:54,940 --> 00:53:58,420 given the downside and the body count? 984 00:53:58,460 --> 00:54:00,670 I don't know. Does it have to end badly? 985 00:54:00,700 --> 00:54:02,080 I mean, I'm glad I survived it. 986 00:54:02,120 --> 00:54:03,810 I'm glad I still got my own liver. 987 00:54:03,840 --> 00:54:07,360 I'm glad I lived through it, but it's kind of... 988 00:54:07,400 --> 00:54:09,810 I don't know. I don't know how to add that up. 989 00:54:09,850 --> 00:54:10,950 Mm-hmm. 990 00:54:10,990 --> 00:54:12,640 I'm sure glad I didn't miss it. 991 00:54:14,850 --> 00:54:18,930 ♪ - It doesn't pay to try 992 00:54:18,960 --> 00:54:22,550 ♪ All the smart boys know why 993 00:54:22,590 --> 00:54:26,800 ♪ It doesn't mean I didn't try 994 00:54:26,830 --> 00:54:29,560 ♪ I just never know why 995 00:54:31,460 --> 00:54:34,460 ♪ Feel so cold and all alone 996 00:54:36,010 --> 00:54:40,090 ♪ Baby, you're not at home 997 00:54:40,120 --> 00:54:43,810 ♪ And when I'm home 998 00:54:43,850 --> 00:54:47,440 ♪ Big deal, I'm still alone 999 00:54:54,130 --> 00:54:56,900 ♪ Feel so restless, I am 1000 00:54:58,590 --> 00:55:02,450 ♪ Beat my head against a pole 1001 00:55:02,490 --> 00:55:06,600 ♪ Try to knock some sense 1002 00:55:06,630 --> 00:55:10,910 ♪ Down in my bones 1003 00:55:10,940 --> 00:55:14,840 ♪ And though they don't show 1004 00:55:14,880 --> 00:55:19,160 ♪ The scars aren't so old 1005 00:55:19,190 --> 00:55:22,920 ♪ And when they go 1006 00:55:22,960 --> 00:55:26,860 ♪ They let you know 1007 00:55:26,890 --> 00:55:31,070 ♪ You can't put your arms around a memory 1008 00:55:31,100 --> 00:55:35,380 ♪ You can't put your arms around a memory 1009 00:55:35,420 --> 00:55:39,660 ♪ You can't put your arms around a memory 1010 00:55:39,700 --> 00:55:41,730 ♪ Don't try 1011 00:55:43,560 --> 00:55:46,500 ♪ Don't try 1012 00:55:48,220 --> 00:55:51,880 ♪ You can't put your arms around a memory 1013 00:55:51,920 --> 00:55:56,160 ♪ You can't put your arms around a memory 1014 00:55:56,200 --> 00:56:00,650 ♪ You can't put your arms around a memory 1015 00:56:00,680 --> 00:56:04,520 ♪ You can't put your arms around a memory 1016 00:56:04,550 --> 00:56:08,070 ♪ You can't put your arms around a memory 1017 00:57:09,170 --> 00:57:11,270 You didn't say the egg was delicious. 1018 00:57:11,310 --> 00:57:13,270 - Oh, no, you're right. - You did not. 1019 00:57:13,310 --> 00:57:16,000 - But I ate two of them. - You ate two of them. 1020 00:57:16,030 --> 00:57:18,170 Silence is the highest compliment. 1021 00:57:18,210 --> 00:57:20,173 Just the gnashing of my jaws... You didn't say they- 1022 00:57:20,180 --> 00:57:22,900 - On those delicious, delicious eggs.