"We were doing parties in Staten Island that were completely packed; Manhattan didn't want anything to do with us." Three New York visionaries discuss the city's '90s heyday.
'90s nightlife in New York conjures images of Party Monster, jacking disco house and a rotating cast of mega clubs that saw thousands of revellers pass through their doors each weekend. From Limelight and Sound Factory to Palladium and countless others, clubbing was hitting its stride in New York, while producers like Joey Beltram, Frankie Bones and Damon Wild were producing game-changing 12-inches. But it was also the beginning of a decline, catalysed by the rollout of Mayor Rudy Giuliani's discriminatory policies that slowly gutted the club scene and the communities that called it home.
To honour Resident Advisor's partnership with Wire Festival in Brooklyn this weekend, we're revisiting a panel recorded at our 24/7 party at Nowadays in 2018. We tasked the beloved Brooklyn fanzine Love Injection with presenting discussions covering five decades of dance music history. In this panel, Strictly Rhythm cofounder Gladys Pizarro, DJ and producer Lenny Dee and drag superstar and vogue performer Kevin Aviance spoke with journalist (and former RA staffer) Max Pearl about the rise and fall of the city's club scene during its golden decade. They also discussed how the city was sequestered, forcing many artists at the vanguard of '90s-era techno to make music and throw their own parties as the scene grew and shifted beneath the weight of city-wide reforms.
"We were doing parties in Staten Island that were completely packed; Manhattan didn't want anything to do with us," said Lenny D. "So when we were doing it, we were making parties out in Brooklyn. A lot of music at that time was made here in Brooklyn—Joey Beltram, Frankie Bones, Tommy Musto, Damon Wild. So we had this scene where we're making great music, but no one's letting us play, so we're just going to do it ourselves."
Listen to the episode in full.
