Day 24: New York, Pt 5
Welcome
Yesterday we played our final headline show of 2023.
No one was particularly quick off the mark yesterday morning. I didn’t leave the house until 12:30pm and when I headed out the door everyone was enjoying the luxury of a slow start, drifting into the lounge and watching tv with cups of tea and whatever hodgepodge breakfasts they had assembled. Tristan had recommended a particular spot in Crown Heights where I might enjoy some Caribbean food and I set off in that direction, a pleasant thirty-minute walk that felt very refreshing on this cool, overcast morning.
Fisherman’s Cove is a chain of takeaway restaurants that specialise in Jamaican Jerk Chicken, a meal I had been smelling nearly every day since we arrived in Brooklyn at various street vendors all with furiously smoking charcoal grills. I arrived at the Fulton Street branch of Fisherman’s Cove, a nondescript room with a row of food warmers behind a glass screen, and a tiny menu printed on an A4 sheet and taped to the glass. After much squinting I chose the Jerk Chicken Lunch Special which came with Jerk Chicken sauce, rice & peas, and plantains, all crammed into a tiny stomach-sized plastic container.
I ate some of my breakfast and then continued to walk, heading north along Nostrand avenue towards the venue and enjoying the beautiful Victorian period architecture of the Bedford-Stuyvesant neighbourhood, a time capsule from the late 19th century suburban boom. It would have been pleasant to walk the entire way to Greenpoint but I had spent too long in bed and now was running out of time so I hopped on a G train to expedite my journey, emerging from the Nassau Ave station to find myself in Brooklyn’s northernmost neighbourhood that is often referred to as little Poland.
Our final show of this tour was almost an afterthought. We were planning on spending a few days holidaying in Brooklyn at the end of the tour and had booked our flights home accordingly so when the offer for this extra show came in there was a little hesitancy before we said yes. Saying no would have been a huge mistake looking back now, as the experience of playing in this historic venue was a great one.
The building we were playing in was built in 1904 and for nearly 100 years served as a community centre for the huge Polish immigrant population in Greenpoint. It was around the turn of the millennium that this building took the name Warsaw and began hosting punk and indie rock shows, a period that led to its reputation as “a place where Pierogis meet punk”. Although Warsaw is now a Live Nation venue and has benefitted from an extensive refurbishment the line about the Polish dumplings still rings true; upon entering we passed through the restaurant, a veneer-panelled room that reminded me of an industrial-era workers club with a menu heavily structured around Pierogis and Kielbasa.
One of the Pierogi pillows in the green room.
We were shown around the backstage and found that this area, specifically the green rooms seems to have been the focus of the upgrade. They had the concrete and brick-chic of a Brooklyn studio apartment and had been fitted out with plush leather couches, TVs, record players, and a very nice V60 coffee setup that included delicious beans, scales and a grinder that had already been perfectly dialled in. There was also plentiful bench space which came in handy for creating an outrigger, a pineapple preparation that I found irresistible in this instance given the magnificent fruit that we were provided with and presence of a sharp chef’s knife.
The ballroom was where the concert would be taking place; a long, tall room with chandeliers, elaborate plaster mouldings, large paintings hanging from the walls, and a very stern gold proscenium that drew the eye just in case you forgot where the performance was happening. It sounded surprisingly good in this old room; the amount of hard, flat surfaces looked like it should have been an echoey nightmare but there must have been some work done to make things as easy as they were during the soundcheck.
2nd Grade were the act kicking off the evening’s entertainment; a five-piece from Philadelphia that pairs dreamy guitar chords with melodies that are playful and explorative. I’ve been wanting to see this band for a very long time and I feel very privileged to have been in the position where I got to see them at our own show. Here are a few clips from their set. I struggled to choose a favourite so I’m giving you a choice of three.
Our final headline show of the year was a very good one. 1000 people had turned up to see us and the room had a friendly, excited energy; a bit of Saturday night tingles and a bit of family attendance to placate this rowdiness. We played one of our best shows of the year, relaxed and precise, yet full of fun and vigour. A confident and quite dynamic rendition of 2am closed out the evening and we left the stage with smiles on our faces, holding just a hint of sadness at reaching the end of this wonderful run of shows.
Liz carefully opens a celebratory bottle of sparkling wine.
Thanks for following along on this season of Breakfast and Travel Updates. Thanks to everyone who supports us while we live this incredible dream of playing music around the world.
Thanks to my bandmates for being wonderful friends and brilliant musicians.
I’ll leave this season with an announcement that I think will clear up a few of the questions that have been surrounding the comment section of the blog these past few weeks.
I am Víctor.