Cleopatra’s Needle
Posted: January 8, 2013 Filed under: Upper West Side | Tags: TUESDAY TOILET TALK Comments Off on Cleopatra’s NeedleJetlagged and feeling like I’ve been hit by a ton of bricks by the abrupt beginning of the new semester, I decided to go for a walk down Broadway to get fresh air and check out Cleopatra’s Needle last night.
With Happy New Year streamers and colorful helium balloons reminiscent of an eight-year-old’s birthday party still hung, the place felt unpretentious and comfortable. The huge clock on the wall likely makes it a good spot to count down to the New Year. And if you find the live music uninteresting, you can watch silent television at the bar.
The jam session hosted by pianist Roger Lent was similarly unpretentious yet colorful. A guy broke out in funny little dances to the side of the stage and an old lady got up to sing with her cassette tape recorder in hand, chatting up the audience. What guts she has. I hope that I can be as willing to try something new and potentially embarrassing when I’m at that age. Or now.
The two bathrooms are located to the left of the stage, immediately past the bar. The women’s bathroom was stocked with toilet paper in a child’s high chair. It had a small sink, a small wastebasket, a bigger wastebasket and a toilet that is prone to splashing up water higher from the bowl than you would predict. It may be a smart safety measure to step back when you flush.
On this assignment to Cleopatra’s Needle, I realized that the men’s room correspondent is not only needed to document the men’s room, but also to act as a buffer between me and unwelcome suitors. The man hitting on me clearly did not understand that I don’t care who his uncle’s father is or what venues he books acts for. If he was romping around Manhattan in the ’80s and he sees me sitting there with my cup of tea, talking about being in school, doesn’t he realize that I may not even have been born in the ’80s? He left me his phone number, guaranteeing his placement on the Do Not Call list.
Soils from South Africa who played in the session kindly said that he could tell I’m from the West Coast because I have a warmth about me; however, this Cali sunshine doesn’t extend so far to shameless men looking to pick up girls. Soils tells us how to say, “Where’s the restroom” in Zulu –
Garage
Posted: December 25, 2012 Filed under: Greenwich Village | Tags: TUESDAY TOILET TALK Comments Off on GarageA restaurant that touts live jazz seven days a week, the Garage was relatively quiet when I arrived past midnight last Tuesday, technically Wednesday. The place seemed somewhat like a caricature, a cartoon character’s home with its humongous chandelier, a Christmas tree spinning upside-down from the ceiling and oversized wooden carvings of silverware and handyman tools. Large glowing orange orbs hung from the ceiling amidst the excessive holiday decorations depicting Santa Claus.
In addition to the upside-down tree, there were five smaller Christmas trees that I could see and more potted poinsettias than I could count. The Garage also seemed to be counting challenged, billing the ensemble of saxophone, guitar, bass and drums as a trio. Bassist Dave Baron led the quartet with Francesco Ciniglio on drums, Alex Wintz on guitar and Lucas Pino on tenor sax.
My first time finally meeting Lucas after seeing him around quite a bit, he first introduced himself as a photographer and then revealed that he is a pathological liar. Well, at least he is honest. Look out for his Thanksgiving album release—it’s sure to give Charlie Brown’s Holiday Hits a run for its money.
When you pull back the curtain under the restrooms sign, you’ll notice a 2 to 1 ratio of women’s to men’s bathrooms, with the women’s rooms on either side of the men’s in the center. A large hand sanitizer dispenser and a payphone furnish the dimly lit area. The storage for paper towels, cleaning supplies and such is located in a closet inside the women’s room on the left side. The women’s toilets are situated lower than usual so be aware if you sit instead of squat that the drop is greater than you’d expect.
Dave volunteered to be the men’s room correspondent and took photos of the men’s room for us. Watch out KMac, your “friend” is trying to steal your gig.
On this merry day, I’d like to give a shout-out to my friend Tierney for her sweet gift, a book of photos of bathroom signs from various countries with indoor plumbing. I received another book from my sister: The Birth and Death of the Cool by our favorite historian Ted Gioia, who deemed JAZZ TOILET the worst of hundreds of jazz blogs. I may take up my sister’s suggestion and do a book review in the new year.
Pianist Nial Djuliarso, who sat in on a few tunes, tells us how to say, “Where’s the restroom?” in Indonesian –
Fat Cat
Posted: December 11, 2012 Filed under: Greenwich Village | Tags: TUESDAY TOILET TALK Comments Off on Fat CatIt seems like people are always going to Fat Cat to hang out. Right off the Christopher St./Sheridan Sq. station, the place is bustling with people inside and out on the sidewalk. Upon entering, you’ll flash your ID and pay a small cover in exchange for a wristband and a Fat Cat stamp, which may stain your hand for days after.
There were too many people for my liking and I tried my best to not get jabbed by anyone playing pool, as I strained to carry on conversations with friends in the spacious basement space abuzz with everyone’s chatter. It wasn’t so bad once we were able to get a ping-pong table in one of the netted areas off to the side.
The band added to the noise and quite frankly, it made little difference who played what. Though there was a small attentive crowd on the couches surrounding the performance area, the majority was much more interested in playing games like chess, scrabble, shuffleboard and imbibing great amounts of beer. Likely because of that last interest, the place had large and clearly marked restroom signs in prominent places.
And while it wasn’t my kind of scene, I was glad to be there to celebrate a college buddy’s birthday. Many move out here from California for graduate school or work and I’ve a number of good friends from both undergrad and high school out here now. In densely populated Manhattan, I’ve randomly run into familiar faces from home quite a few times, passing by someone and thinking a moment later, “Hey, that’s the girl from rhetoric class freshmen year.”
The women’s restroom maintained the seedy dive feel of the rest of the place. The toilet in one of the two stalls was leaking slightly and there was a bit of graffiti on the wall, which surprisingly, I haven’t seen in the other clubs. I tried to get a peek into the men’s room but didn’t have a chance, as guys kept going in and out. In fact, in hovering near the restrooms, I noticed that the men’s room often had a line, maybe even more than the women’s did.
Other than the nightlife activities, Fat Cat offers other services, from chess to music lessons. Growing up, my dad, sister and I used to play ping-pong on the piano bench to determine who would have to do the dishes; I could take ping-pong lessons and show them up this Christmas.
Wojtek from Poland tells us how to say, “Where’s the restroom?” in Polish —
ShapeShifter Lab
Posted: November 27, 2012 Filed under: Brooklyn | Tags: TUESDAY TOILET TALK Comments Off on ShapeShifter Lab“Should we sit in the first row?”
We settled on the second of the five rows in the front section, as that would require only 80% focus on the music, according to Jack. Jack provides emergency tech support for us and restored the blog when I inadvertently made the entire site crash. He once again saved the day by assessing that the requirements of front row seating would be incongruent with our 80% brain capacity to pay attention to the band, after an early morning of Black Friday shopping and an even earlier morning at the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade a day prior.
Though waiting for over three hours with popsicle toes, surrounded by angry people wanting to see oversized balloons of Hello Kitty and SpongeBob was worth doing once, parades are more fun when viewed on television—but not so with musical performances. Live performances are incomparable to recordings and I was excited to see four different bands live Friday night for the OutNow Records release party.
I was particularly interested in seeing drummer George Schuller again, remembering his gig years ago at Korzo in Brooklyn and thinking to myself that I would want my group to sound like his. RIBBS, the quartet he performed with this time sounded nothing like my memory of his group. The Yoni Kretzmer 2Bass Quartet that followed them had bassist twinsies with matching beanies, glasses and earth tone tops. 9 Volt, the last group we stuck around for rocked.
Jack photographed the men’s room for us. The men’s room seems a bit cramped, with similar square footage as the women’s room but partitioned off into three sections for the toilet, urinal and sink.
The women’s room felt open, bare and white, like the rest of ShapeShifter Lab. It had no mirror but perhaps they are still working on finishing up the restroom, as it is a somewhat new venue. The flower-shaped tiles on the spacious cement floor was a nice touch.
At ShapeShifter Lab, you can choose to sip on tea and use the free Wi-Fi at one of the back tables by the bar while listening to live music—like a jazz café of sorts. Or you can sit in one of the rows and admire the color changing light against the white brick wall behind the performers. Dress warmly because it gets chilly in there. I suppose the cool air is a part of its Brooklyn converted warehouse space charm.
I’m glad our West Coast emergency tech support, as well as another college friend Amy, could join us for this assignment. I love Jack and Amy so much that I may start an indie rock band named after them.
Dorjee from Tibet tells us how to say, “Where’s the restroom?” in Tibetan –
Thanksgiving
Posted: November 22, 2012 Filed under: Ken® | Tags: voicekwon Comments Off on Thanksgiving
JAZZ TOILET is more than just a girl and her Ken® doll. In the spirit of Thanksgiving, I’d like to acknowledge the team that has been helping this blog run:
Eunice, Graphic Designer/Analyst
KMac, Men’s Room Correspondent
Angela, Advisor
Casey, PR Guru
Jack, West Coast Emergency Tech Support
Jo, Unprofessional Legal Advisor
Thank you also to the dedicated readers, the welcoming clubs and musicians/friends who contributed translations of “Where’s the restroom?” in their native tongue. I must head downtown now to watch the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade. Happy Thanksgiving everyone!