PUNK MISTRESS

I went to my first punk show at age 15 and never looked back. It was in an old tenement in the Lower East Side called ABC No Rio. ABC was founded as a squat in 1980 but in 1997 became a self-owned radical community center after they bought the building from the City for $1. They had a zine library, computer lab, gallery space, silkscreen studio, and most importantly, punk gigs. The weekly hardcore matinees every Saturday were my life after that first gig. ABC, CBGBs, St. Marks Place, Tompkins Square Park, and Alt Coffee were mostly where I spent my teenage years growing up in New York City.

ABC, being a community space, was run by volunteers. Anyone could volunteer at the Saturday Matinees and, when I got a little less wild, I decided to do my part for our community. The money from the matinees went to the bands and the building fund. I started booking the weekly shows there and did my part to keep the lights on. I was recently interviewed about my contributions to ABC and thought I’d share parts of the interview here:

- Tell me about your background in punk and how you heard about ABC No Rio.
My background in punk really begins with my first gig at ABC No Rio, unless you count my love of the Ramones as a background. I met a kid in lunch detention who took me to see my first show. I never looked back after that and ABC was like the foundation for the rest of my life. It was the first place I ever felt like I belonged and that it was appropriate to exist. I think I showed up with my misfit crew of friends every Saturday at 3pm after that even if there wasn’t a gig.

- What were your first impressions of the place?
My first impression was freedom. I thought punk was dead and had died with Sid Vicious or something in 1979 at the Chelsea Hotel. When I heard underground punk shows were still happening and went to ABC No Rio, it was like my teenage fantasy had come true.
It meant so much to me feeling like I belonged to a part of something and was not just a spectator. Just being at ABC No Rio felt like being a part of something bigger than myself. I immersed myself in DIY culture as much as I could after finding ABC.

- What was your role as far as being involved with ABC?
I was always friendly with the volunteers and/or getting yelled at for drinking or loitering on the sidewalk out front. I got sober and started volunteering a few years after I started going to ABC. I got involved with fundraising for the building fund and doing stuff like stamping hands and working the door at the Saturday gigs. Shortly after, I started booking shows and that was my primary capacity, besides fundraising and general helping out. When I started booking gigs, I also started to do stuff like feed the touring bands when Food Not Bombs granted us access to their kitchen. One of the volunteers was a really good chef and we were able to make cheap vegan meals with donated food. I was really inspired by Euro punk hospitality and thought that it was important to take care of the bands that were helping us to raise money to keep the building going. The matinees may have started as a reaction to CBGBs fucked up violent matinees, but by the time I started booking shows, the money generated from the gigs was the sole revenue used to keep the building running. We would take a third from the door.

I just found my old template that I used to send to bands with general information:

ABC takes a third to pay for electricity, insurance, heating, et cetera. The building runs off the money generated by shows. The rest goes to bands. If you were wondering about anything monetary, that's basically the breakdown and usually around 6 or 7, we'll feed you. Just go up to the second floor in the Food Not Bombs kitchen, there's usually something meat-free to eat. Bring equipment- we have three mics, three mic stands, and a PA- if you think you need it, bring it. If you cannot play or break up, please have the courtesy to let ABC No Rio know that you will not be playing before the day of the show. P.S. We're taking donations for our distro. All money generated goes to the ABC No Rio building fund.

It was sort of amazing how many bands would break up the day before playing a gig at ABC and fail to tell us.

- Any quirks of ABC No Rio shows?
The bodega on the corner would always sell beer to punks with a coffee cup. This was because, in order to get away with drinking at the gigs after No Rio banned drinking at shows, you’d have to put your booze in a coffee cup. Whenever punks from other places saw photos of ABC gigs, they thought that NYC punks were really into coffee…little did they know! Also, we had a cat named Cookiepuss who was often found in the zine library. It was really fun to “show off” ABC No Rio to touring bands because the building held so much history and had all the neat stuff like the zine library with all the old Maximumrocknroll issues to the print shop to the amazing graffiti in the back with pieces by widely respected artists like Sane.

- Is there a future for alternative community spaces on the Lower East Side, as the area hits mass gentrification levels?
If the economy crashes and burns and rich people are able to work remotely, then I see a mass exodus and rents becoming more affordable again in Manhattan. As rejects of society, we will always find a way to carve out space for ourselves. I hope that the Lower East Side comes back to its former glory but that would probably mean a total economic collapse for NYC.

- Can Punk/HC still be an alternative path for new generations & where does ABC No Rio fit in?
I don’t understand how you can be a punk if you’ve never gotten a physical flyer for a punk show. Punk has to be earned and I don’t see younger “punks” earning anything except for followers online. ABC No Rio will fit into the modern-day punk scene, if the new building ever gets built, as an all ages safe space for alternative art and culture. Hopefully this will get new generations to hang out offline and have a home for subversive creativity and community activism again.

- How did being involved with the space impact your life, then & now?
I never would have been able to move to San Francisco and be a coordinator at Maximumrocknroll if it wasn’t for my DIY foundation in punk at ABC No Rio. If my first show was at a place like CBGBs, I would have just been a spectator but at ABC No Rio, I could actually be a real part of punk. There was no difference between a hardcore matinee volunteer and someone attending the show because anyone could volunteer- you just needed to show up at 2pm-ish before the gig. If you couldn’t afford to get in, you could volunteer. If you were an underage kid, you could get in. ABC No Rio made punk accessible, and by doing that, created a less hierarchical space that showed me what true scene unity could look like, where punk was fun and not a scene to be seen. I don’t think I’ll ever experience the punk purity of ABC in my lifetime again- it was a special place and a special time that spanned decades. Being able to see political bands in a political space, where I was respected as a young woman and had a voice, that gave me the courage to do stuff like book shows, be in bands, go on tour, write for MRR, and eventually do my own record label and distribution. ABC is the ultimate DIY icon of what punk can be if you put in the blood, sweat, and tears- literally.

ABC is a very special place for me, and I hope you know me better after reading this. Punk may be a phase for some, but it shaped my politics and I still have all my vinyl records- punk is a part of my identity today. ABC No Rio was recently torn down to build a building that is up to code and not decaying. The building I experienced was falling apart and it would have cost as much to renovate it as it would to rebuild it completely. The new building will be one of the most energy efficient buildings in NYC when it’s completed. You can donate to ABC No Rio building fund here to help resurrect this magical space.

Forever Punk,

Your Mistress Ramona Ryder