DISGRACELAND - Bonus Episode: Crime and Grime in 1977 NYC, Great Music Cities, CBGB Qu'est-ce que c'est?

Episode Date: July 11, 2024

This week in the After Party, Jake talks about the unique social conditions that created the vibrant 1970s NYC music scene that birthed Talking Heads, the subject of this week's episode. Crime, grime, sanitation strikes, baseball, blackouts - Jake covers it all, plus your emails texts, and voicemails. What are the best books and films about 1970s New York? Where were you when the lights went out? Let Jake know at 617-906-6638, [e-mail], or on socials @disgracelandpod, and come join the After Party.To cop some new merch, head to disgracelandpod.com/merch now!To hear an extended version of the After Party and more from the DISGRACELAND community, become a Disgraceland All Access member at disgracelandpod.com/membership. To learn more about listener data and our privacy practices visit: https://www.audacyinc.com/privacy-policy Learn more about your ad choices. Visit https://podcastchoices.com/adchoicesSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

This is exactly right. Double Elvis. Hey guys, welcome to Disgraceland, which is brought to you by Double Elvis. This week, we have a brand new episode on Talking Heads in the Disgraceland feed. And for our All Access members in our Patreon and Apple subscription feeds, have you heard our recent episode on Whaling Jennings? Get in here. Check that out.

And make sure you're all signed up for our All Access content, either on Apple podcast or on Patreon, to hear the Wayland episode along with all other exclusive episodes and content. that we have going on over there. And over in the feed for Musicland Stories, that's the fiction show from my company Double Elvis, produced in partnership with Starglow Media. We are just over halfway through our third season,

featuring super imaginative storytelling combined with the sounds of bamba, reggaeton, meringue, and salsa. So check that out as well. All right, people, let's get into it. Hey, discos, need a little more disgrace land in your life? Just a touch to get you through? Yeah, me too.

This is the podcast that comes after the podcast. Welcome to Disgraceland, the After Party. Welcome to the Disgraceland bonus episode, a little thing we like to call the after party. This is the show after the show, the party, after the party, the bridge to get you from one full episode of Disgraceland to the other, the backyard to dig into the dirt. On this bonus episode, we are talking about 1977 in New York City. It's the greatest time and place to be alive ever in the world. the history of humanity. I'm not sure. We're going to get into that because we are also talking about Talking Heads, which were featured in this week's full episode of Disgraceland. And of course,

we're going to get into some of the research that helped us put that episode together. As always, your voicemails, your texts, and a whole lot of rosy. All right, this goes, let's get into it. 1977, New York City, Talking Heads release what becomes their first hit, Psycho Killer, which may or may not have been intentionally written about serial killer David Berker, a.k.a. the son of Sam, who was in that very year of 1977, terrorizing New Yorkers like the psycho killer that he was. Psycho killer was a perfect, perfect song for the time. Okay? Guys, the lyric, of course, Kess Kursay, all that. The tune, it's just the way it feels,

the way it sounds. It's super tight. And I mean that in like a tense way. I don't mean it in like it was played tight and everybody played together. This is a ton of in the way that that that song feels just like there was a ton of tension in the summer of 1977 in New York City for a major part of 1977, not just the summer. The summer got really fucked up, but really all of 1977 in New York. The song, of course, like I mentioned, it's got that weird French hook that gives it this bit of sophistication, you know, makes it, oh, so Trey New York, Psycho Killer, Kess Kersay, that hook, blaring. from New York City car stereo speakers, transistor radios, boom boxes, that hook, that Kesskersey,

it was, I got to think, embedded in the subconscious of Nile Rogers and Bernard Edwards from the band Sheik, who at that exact moment in time, right when cycle killers out there, permeating, you know, the subconscious, like I said, of New Yorkers, it's being blasted through speakers everywhere. Those two dudes, Now Rogers and Bernard Edwards from Sheik are saying, down to write their first hit that also included a sophisticated bit of en francais in the hook but with 100% less irony and they give us they freak say chic it's just a reminder that psycho killer nailed the moment okay 1997 new york city possibly one of the greatest moments in human history when it comes to the creation of great music so much

societal drama leading to so much incredible music. You've got, like I mentioned, the son of Sam running around, randomly shooting women, the 44 caliber killer, as he was called shot and killed six people, wounded 11, and freaked everybody out in the process. New York City was scared, and some of you were there, and you can speak about this with more insight than I can. I'm only going off of the books that I've read, the documentaries that I've watched, some people that I've spoken to, of course, the music that I've listened to, and even the movies, Son of Sam, the Summer of Sam, I should say, the Spike Lee film really kind of nails it in a Spike Lee kind of way. But during that time, like I said, you got Berkowitz running

around. You also have, there's no internet, of course, but the tabloid newspapers, they have the attention of everybody. They're piling on to this. whole this whole serial killer thing that's happening in part they're trying to draw the killer out but they're also of course stoking all this fear with their sensationalist headlines and their non-stop coverage new york city itself literally a mess okay trash everywhere new york city's broke new york city can't afford to pay it's city workers so the garbage workers just stopped working they went on strike and the trash piled up everywhere on street corners like look at the pictures go back Google pictures from New York City in 1977.

There's trash everywhere. And I'm not talking about just like, you know, candy wrappers blowing down the street. I'm talking about piles and piles of garbage on street corners. So you get that going on. The Bronx, huge part of New York City, was on fire. Again, literally on fire. Large swaths of worthless real estate burning nightly,

huge buildings being burned to the ground, set a flame largely by landlords looking to get out from under bad real estate investments through fire insurance scams. Just crazy stuff happening in 77. And close by also in the Bronx nearby at Yankee Stadium, massive drama playing out all summer and all fall between their egomaniac star Reggie Jackson, their old school manager, Billy Martin,

and megalomaniac owner George Steinbrenner. Every night, every night it seemed. There's all this drama playing out everywhere. at Yankee Stadium, AKA the Bronx Zoo, Benchings, brawls, beamball, all of it. As the Yankees are scrapping their way to their 21st World Series win. Championship, I should say, hurts me to say. They had to go through the Red Sox to get there. I haven't even mentioned all this, all this, and I haven't even mentioned the blackout yet.

Okay, just imagine the city you live in right now, or the town or whatever, the state. Imagine where you're at. And imagine everything I just mentioned. You got a serial killer. You have garbage piling up. you have buildings burning, you have the tabloids going crazy, you have this insane baseball thing that's happening, this baseball team that's captured the imagination of everybody. And then in the middle of all that, the lights go out everywhere, literally, all the electricity. It's the summer. It's

sweltering out. It's so hot. No air conditioners, no lights. Just imagine that. Okay, right in the middle of a heat wave. Can you imagine how freaked out you would be? It's insanity. Okay. There were more fires. Of course, there's looting when the blackout happens. More was riots. $300 million in damages. Businesses get destroyed. People's homes get destroyed. So my point is that psycho killer by Talking Heads, we get into it in this week's episode on Talking Heads. It just, I've thought about this subject a lot in my life, but this episode really, really made me think about it again. Okay, this incredible mix of activity, of human drama, of human failure, murders, garbage, arson, egos, huge personalities, serial killers, blackouts, looting,

violence, all of it contributed to quite possibly the greatest music of all time. 177 didn't just inspire cycle killer by the talking heads, which came out in December of that year, fully steeped in all the chaos of the 12 months prior. But consider the music released in 1978 by New Yorkers and New York adjacent artists. Okay, I understand I'm going to mention some artists here that aren't from New York, but we're definitely in and around New York

in 1977, taking in all of this influence and putting it into the music that they released in 1978, Blondie's Parallel Lines album, Bruce Springsteen's Darkness on the edge of town, Billy Joel's 52nd Street, Ramones Road to Ruin, and of course the Rolling Stones, one of the greatest New York albums of all times, some girls, okay? And again, I know it's written by Brits, but it is about as New York of a record as you're going to get. And I haven't even yet mentioned anything about how 1977 also inspired an entire new genre of music. And I'm not talking about punk rock. I'm talking about hip-hop, okay?

Punk rock, the roots of punk rock started much earlier, late 60s with the stooges and Velvet Underground and early 70s with the New York dolls. But hip-hop comes later, and 77 is part, very much, part of the time where that spark, that first atomic bomb of influence happens. The Bronx might have been burning, but it was also a cauldron of inspiration,

cooking up a whole new kind of music that in 1978 resulted in music obsessive's first hearing about the likes of DJ Cool Herk, the Tretcherist Three, the Cole Crush brothers, all hip-hop pioneers from New York who would go on to build a genre that would completely change the music industry for the next half century. That all started in 1977 and New York City. It gave us Talking Head Cycle Killer, featured in this week's episode of disgrace, but it also gave us so much more. Has there ever been a time in place that's been more influential on music than New York City in 1977? I don't know, man. I don't know. I'm thinking and I'm having a hard time coming up with something. If there is, what is it? Is it Seattle in the 90s? Is it L.A. in the 80s?

Is it Topanga Canyon in the 60s? Detroit in the 60s? Motown, all that. Does anything compete with New York City in 1977. Get at me in the Patreon chat. Let me know. We'll chop it up in the chat. Or you can hit me up at Disgraceland Pod on Instagram, on X, on Facebook. You can call me, send me a text. Let me know.

Let me know what is the time in place. Again, that's better than New York in 1977. Is it Seattle in the 90s? Is it L.A in the 80s? Is it Topanga Canyon in the 60s? Detroit in the 60s? Is anything compare with New York City in 1977? What am I forgetting?

Let me know. Send me a text. Call me, leave me a voicemail. 617-906-66-36-38 Kesskerse. All right, back into it here. Guys, I should have mentioned this at the top. If things sound a little different to you today, it's because I'm recording in a different place.

I'm recording in this crazy burn. I'm doing a little working vacation for the next few weeks before my actual vacation, which means I'm traveling with my family, but I'm working. They're not. And I'm set up in this barn and it's wild. I'm on the third floor. I can literally smell hay and horseshit and that's not a bad thing. And, you know, I'm trying to do this. I don't quite yet know how it's going to sound in the final mix, but to me it feels good.

It feels right. I kind of want to keep talking to you guys. I don't want to stop. I'm into this. But I just wanted to let you know if there's a difference in the sound quality, that is why. hopefully it's not too too much of a difference. Speaking of quality, we have some quality merch for you, disgrace land merch. All right, our all access members got first crack at it.

Then we opened it up to everybody else a few weeks back. Case you didn't hear or forgot, go to disgracelandpod.com slash merch. All right, we got new disgrace land shirts. Got this cool rockerola shirt as well. It's based on the Coca-Cola logo. You can probably figure out what that is.

And, of course, we have some pins. Go grab that before it's all gone. All right, sources for this week's episode. This is a thing we've been talking about recently in like the last six months in these after-party episodes. We've been making a point to talk about the sources and the source material. I think this is something that a large part of you care about. We talked a lot before about recommendations about books and music and television.

And this gives you a good insight into the books and music and television that directly contributes to the making of these episodes. we approached this story with the idea for this episode to kind of tell an A and B story of equal weight between David Byrna of the Talking Heads and David Berkowitz, aka the son of Sam, two Dave's, two Davids, I should say. We wanted to show how some of their similar characteristics,

like maniacal focus, ego, unique writing style, trouble relating with other people. Sorry, I don't know why I'm laughing, I shouldn't be. We wanted to show how those unique and similar characteristics could be channeled toward, in one case, case creativity and in the other case, destruction. David Byrne, of course, was able to find his community and creative outlet, his quirks, his drive, his focus, all the weird character traits that make up David Byrne made him famous. And David Berkowitz wasn't quite able to find that connection

that he felt he was cut off from in society. And he channeled his rage and his focus and his lack of connection toward destroying the world that rejected him, or at least trying to. So we used a bunch books for this one, okay? Both for the true crime angle and for the music angle. First, let's talk true crime and world building. There's a great, great, great, great, great, great book. I read it long before. I started disgrace. I'm called Ladies and Gentlemen, the Bronx is burning. 1977, baseball politics in the battle for the soul of a city by Jonathan Mahler. If you guys want an expansion on what I was talking about at the beginning of this episode, this is the book to go to. It perfectly encapsulates and experience.

spans on everything I just mentioned. It even gets more into the music. It's everything. I remember my dad recommended this book to me and he was like, it's everything you love. It's baseball. It's punk rock. It's politics.

Get into it. I don't love politics, but I'm interested in history. I think that's what he meant. And this book just nails the fucking history. The fiscal crisis that I mentioned that New York was going through the subway. I didn't even mention the subway strikes, but the garbage strikes, the Yankees.

I didn't mention the Mets. I'm kind of saving the Mets guys for the, for the disgrace land, the disco sports fans out there, there's a 1986 Mets episode that I'm about to start researching. But of course, the birth of punk rock is well covered in this book as is Studio 54, which I did not mention. Spike Lee's Summer of Sam does an amazing job at melding all of these different elements as well that made up the world of New York in 1977, especially the disco piece of it. And sort of this part of disco that doesn't get a lot of historical traction,

but I feel like Spike Lee nailed it. And it's so weird that, sorry for speaking slowly here, I'm trying to articulate this in the best way. There's this thing in Summer Sam where disco has permeated the working class outer boroughs of Manhattan. Of course, that's part of Saturday Night Fever. It's a huge piece of it. But I think nowadays, aside from Saturday Night Fever,

when we think of disco, we think of sort of like the elite Manhattan Studio 54 version of it. And you really get into the working class character element of disco with Spike Lee's storytelling. Great film, if you haven't seen it. Check that out as well. We also, for the true crime side of this, we looked at this book called The Ultimate Evil,

The Search for the Sons of Sam by Marquis. Mari Terry. This gets into some admittedly pretty bonkers conspiracy theories that we didn't, we didn't really touch upon in this episode, including speculation that David Berkowitz did not act alone. If anybody wants to sidebar that in Patreon, I'm happy to talk about it and happy to hear your theories, happy to hear why you might believe in this conspiracy theory here that David Berkowitz did not act alone. But a lot of the details that we use that have been exhaustive researched come from this book, this Mari Terry book, was a reporter for The New York Post.

And this book was the inspiration for the Netflix series, The Sons of Sam, A Descent Into Darkness, which we can recommend as well. Guys, I can't get enough of this era, 1977, in New York City. If I haven't mentioned any books, documentaries, films, even records, anything from this era that you guys think I might be interested in, jump into the Patreon chat.

Let's talk about it there. Let's share some links. You can always hit me up, as you know, at Graceland Pot on Instagram and X. And of course, you can call me 617-90666-6638 and send me a text or leave me a voicemail, just like Lisa from the 425. Lisa here, a podcast member of yours. And I have some weird ones for you. I've got Chenate O'Connor, would be a...

good, an interesting one to, um, kind of look into. Marky Mark and the funky bunch just because, uh, Marky Marks kind of a piece of shit. And I don't think people know that. Um, and then also Chris Cross. Chris Cross has, uh, some tragedy. Um, all right. Thanks. Bye. Lisa, thank you so much.

Thanks for your new listenership out there, all the way out there in Seattle. We appreciate it. Sheenade O'Connor. Yes. That would be a very interesting one. a very sad one. I'm hesitant to dig into that. I'm in a good headspace, Lisa. I'm not going to lie. I'm feeling good. It's the summer. Things are a little bit stressful, but, you know, that's a stress I can handle. Got no dark thoughts going on. No depression lately, guys. I'm feeling good.

Sheenade O'Connor, Lisa, feels like she's going to bum me out, though. But being bummed out by subject matter has never deterred me in the past. Just, you know, I'm trying to have like a, you know, a cool, easy, breezy summer here, Lisa. So I don't know that I'm going to get into Chenade anytime soon, but perhaps in the future, Chenate is on the list. You'll be happy to know. Chris Cross, however, do you mean Christopher Cross?

Sailing? That Christopher Cross? Or do you mean Chris Cross? Warm it up, kid. That Chris Cross. Let me know. Who else did you mention? I can't remember.

Lisa, callback 617-906663. Callback anytime. Great to have you. Thanks for becoming a newly minted disco. All right, who else we got here? Let's hear from Mike in the 812. Hey, Jay. This is Mike from the 812 calling to talk about a really good music scene.

It's the one here in my hometown of Bloomington, Indiana. It stretches way back into the 1920s and 30s. Not only do we have Hogi Carmichael, but we've got a few other really amazing people that have been. come out of the Bloomington scene as far as alternative or punk or, you know, weirdo music. We've got the MX80 sound. We've got the connections to the Zero Boys. And there's a whole bunch of other really great music that has come out of Bloomington, Indiana.

Does it compare to scenes like New York or Chicago or a lot of. Angeles? No, it doesn't, but it's all really, really good music. And here's a shameless plug. If anybody wants to hear more about it, check out my podcast called Down in Bloomington. And you can find that anywhere where you find your podcast. Rock and Rolla. Yo, Mike, thanks for the call. No disrespect to Bloomington, Indiana. But when you're reaching back to the 20s and 30s for your influence. to make your point. I'm kidding and I'm being a smart ass.

I get you. No disrespect to Hogi Carmichael. All right. I think Hockey Carmichael shows up in our Miles Davis episode. I'm not sure if you've heard that, Mike. But thanks for the call. Appreciate it. I got nothing but love for Indiana.

I want you to know that. Gave Boston Larry Bird, okay? 617-90666-3-38 guys. From the 202, Detroit is the biggest music city. Good God. Danielle from the 202. chiming in on the conversation we've been having here that Mike was talking about too regarding

the greatest music scenes which cities have spawned them let's see 201 writes in you need to do an episode on Robert Johnson you know I have done an episode on Robert Johnson and it's in the archive it's right there it's in the disgrace land archive 201 go check that out guys this is a problem this is a good problem it's a problem I never anticipated I would be having it's why we do these rewind episodes We release one archive episode per week on Fridays because new listeners come in and we have now over 150 episodes or something and they're not aware of all the subjects

we have covered in the past. So for you 201, that Robert Johnson episode, one of my phase, by the way, it's waiting for you. 636 writes him, man, I think he did Bourdain justice and described and explained his past and his present and his feelings so beautifully and really projected what an awesome human being he was and what he was capable of in an awesome way.

He had some dark demons, a lot of us do. I think you touched on that perfectly and just strong enough and gently enough to make us all feel all caps. Thanks, Jake. Love your stories. You got it 636. That was a tough episode to write.

Sort of to the point I was kind of making light about earlier about taking on dark subjects. That was a real dark one. Anthony Bourdain, of course, met a lot to a lot of people, myself included. I never even met the man. but I was touched by everything that he brought into this world. So, yeah, I'm glad he liked it.

Lots of people texting in here about Detroit. I'm sorry, Detroit's great. Detroit gave us Motown. Detroit gave us the Silver Bullet Band. Detroit gave us the white stripes. Detroit gave us Alice Cooper. Detroit gave us, who am I forgetting? So many more.

The sites. Lots of garage, great garage rock as well. And, you know, I didn't mean to shit on Detroit at all. That was not my intent. I love Detroit. I do. I love it as a city. I think it's one of the great American cities.

I know it's fallen on hard times in the past, obviously, but still, there's a vibrant part of Detroit that exists to this day. And Detroit has given so much to this country, including the music that it has generated. So no shade intended at all for Detroit. 617-906-6638. A lot of text, a lot of voicemails for you. This one here, 859 writes in. Jake, all exclamation points.

You finally did the Waylon and Lane episodes. All, all caps and continues with all caps. But we have to pay for it on Patreon. Come on, man. Yes, you do. You don't have to pay for them specifically. It's not like you're going into a store and buying a record. We have a Patreon where you get an extra free episode per month

on top of not having any ads in your episodes on top of having access to this always on chat. And I did not select Elaine Staley episodes in Wayland. Jennings' episodes, excuse me, to be exclusive for any other reason. Then it just kind of worked out that way. I'm not exactly sure what the thinking was for the programming, for what was going to be exclusive this year and what was going to be wide. But yeah, you got to pay five bucks to get a fifth,

a fifth full disgrace land episode per month. And I give you guys a little contact. when we started this podcast for the first one, two, three, four, four years, five years, five years. For the first five years, we only released 24 episodes per year. And now, of course, we're releasing five per month sometimes, most times. Yeah, most times. And one of those, yeah, one of those you get paid for. Dem's the breaks, but you get more than that. So I hope you dig it. We got a lot more coming your way in the exclusive feed. And you know what I should do?

I should probably talk to you guys a little bit more and get your feedback on which episodes should be exclusive and should be available everywhere. So you bring up a good point and I'm going to think about it. Come back to you guys. Also, I'll be back in a flash to talk about some more stuff here in Disco Land. All right, later.

All right, we are back. And as I mentioned at the top of the show and I was just talking about, we have this insane story that we were originally going to tell you in this Talking Heads episode. It's a crazy story, but we did not get to it in the actual episode. But if you're part of our All Access Members Club, you can hear it in the All Access version of this bonus episode. Okay.

And like I was saying, for five bucks a month, you're going to get a lot. You're not only going to get this extra content here in the bonus episode. You're going to get that extra full episode, like Elaine Staley and Wayland Jennings episodes that we were just discussing. and you're also going to get access to merchandise before anyone else. And we have an always on chat with myself and fellow discos where we can all sort of chop it up and talk about whatever we want to talk about, including these exclusive episode subjects, Chris Cornell, Basquat, Hunter S. Thompson, etc.

Okay? You got to go over and sign up either via Apple Podcast or Patreon. Either way, it's a bargain, man. It's worth it. And it's a way for us to connect on a deeper level. so I hope you join me as an all-access member. I will be back in a flash. All right, let's recap, shall we, number one.

There's more after-party to listen to right now. All you got to do is go to disgracelandpod.com slash membership and sign up to become an all-access member. But if that ain't your bag, then number two. Right now in your feed, this week's brand new episode on Talking Heads coming tomorrow, rewind episode on James Brown. Next week in the disgrace land feed, a brand new episode on Alfred Hitchcock. Five, my number is 617-907.

66638. Call me on the telephone or text me, right? Number six, remember, no one cares about these stories more than you do. And well, that's a disgrace. And now, my moment of bliss, in honor of this week's episode on Talking Head, it's me reading you, the Billboard Hot 100 for the week of August 6, 1977, the week that David Berkowitz, aka the son of Sam, was finally arrested. Number one, I just want to be you, Andy Gibb.

Last week, one. Peak position, one, weeks on chart, 16. Number two, I'm in you. Peter Frampton, last week, two, peak position, two, weeks on chart, 11. Number three, best of my love, the emotions, last week, six. Peak position, three, weeks on chart, nine. Number four, my heart belongs to me, Barbara Streisand, last week, four, peak position, P. Position. Four. Weeks on chart. 12.

Five. Do you want to make love? Peter McCann. Last week is seven. Five. Weeks on chart. Number six. Number six. The do wrong wrong.

Sean Casson. Last week. Five. Peak position. Talking and start mixing.