Oh those bell-bottom pants Without those pants you ain’t got a chance

At the rock festival, the pop festival, the folk festival or the dance ...

Loudon Wainwright

“This is exciting,” said Mr. Warhol, as they trooped off to Halston’s party. “It’s really like the 6©’s.”

New York Times, January 9,1975 (Story on the opening of Lajeski Gallery, New York City)

“. . . and when I say the old days I don’t mean the George M. Cohan days . . .”

Mel Brooks, 2000 Year Old Man

Lisa Robinson

You wouldn’t get an argument from me if you said the creepiest fashion decade of the 20th century was the 1960s. Think about it, if you can bear to. The 1970s actually began around 1968 because people were so desperate for the 60s to be over. All that tie-dye, batik, those headbands - they were so ... oh, were they boring. And if 70s “style” hasn’t given us anything more than fifteen minutes of platform shoes and a hot flash of sequins so far, I still think it’s an improvement. (Actually, I think the 70s ended in 1973.)

Okay. So - what’s going to happen when they decide to revive the 1960s for its nostalgia spin? Don’t laugh -surely they will; the terrifying signs are already here. The Blues Project and The Lovin’ Spoonful are “getting together” again, to say nothing of Blood, Sweat, and Tears. People push and shove to get into a gallery in New York where the show is titled “The Condition of the Tie Today,” and Andy (who should know) Warhol says it’s just like the 60s. The Big Sur folk festival film is shown on TV and doesn’t even have anything so healthy as Nico walking on the arm of Brian Jones (Monterey Pop); instead we’re treated to one and a half hours of Joan Baez in all her Cobra Woman glory wearing those batik trimmed shmatahs designed especially for the women who were the pride of the now defunct (I say thank god but Danny Fields says they were wonderful) annual event. We saw fringe, boy did we ever: hanging from the jacket of David Crosby. We were treated to many views

of Stephen Stills' one thousand dolla Abercrombie & Fitch wolf jacket. We saw heavy on the astrology motif and Mimi Farina with her husband Milan Melvin (now her ex-husband) do a Clairol commercial in the fields. And on it went.

Steve Stills (who along with David Crosby had hair then) changed into a Mayan blanket. Joni Mitchell sang songs in that silly voice (I know she’s a good songwriter, I still think it’s a silly voice although Joni-companion and rock enfant-terrible Cameron Crowe says Joni Mitchell thinks I have a silly voice) and cried after debuting “Woodstock.” Lots of sandals, rope halters, and things hanging from hats. Joan Baez doing the funky chicken in much the same way Lance Loud has described his father learning the shing-a-ling; will she ever live it down? John Sebastian as Bozo the Tie-Dye Clown. And best of all, one member of the audience who said, “I tried the baths ten years ago” referring to Esalen. Oh what a different meaning that same statement has today, especially in New York.

Yes, maybe the 1960s was a time of innocence in a way, but I sure don’t miss the styles. There were so many differences then. Even discotheques, first popularized as jet-set havens in New York City, have re-emerged in a totally new form in the 1970s. The best ones then, the ones like Arthur, Ondine, II Mio, even the beginnings of the Peppermint Lounge were very “trendy.” You had to know someone to get a good table and no one really went there to dance. Granted you could leave your pocketbook at your table and return from the dance floor to still find it there (unheard of today - no one even brings a bag to Le Jardin or the Hollywood,

not to mention the Gilded Grape) and sure, you could leave your drink at your table and come back to find it intact whereas at one of today’s discos you might return to discover that someone had pissed in it. . . But still even discotheques are better now. Blatantly gay or straight people really go to discos now to dance, and even dress for it as if they’re going to an exercise class; Tshirts, flat shoes, and so forth. I’m not saying it’s always glamorous but it does seem to make sense.

(My only real complaint with these places is that they’re not always overly comfortable - too sparsely furnished.

Fran Lebowitz said that if she had her own discotheque she would fill it full of sofas and end tables (with lace doilies on them), lamps, coffee tables, and magazine racks (all bought, no doubt, at Pearl’s Upholstered Furniture Capital, Speedwell Avenue, Morris, N.J.

(201) 538-1411, and owned by Ruth and Harold Lebowitz.)

And so the 70s has brought about the return of the 1950’s style jazz club, or night club, to the music scene. While some critics complain that these dens are forlhe “rich,” it’s really not so. Reno Sweeney, for example, charges $3 music cover and $9 food or drink minimum per person, per show. Madison Square Garden charged $12.50 for David Bowie and you didn’t get no food or drinks (which we all could have used) included in the ticket. You can’t even get away with seeing Grand Funk or Deep Purple for less than eight and a half bucks sometimes, and you get firecrackers thrown at you for that price.

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Whatever your choice is, there’s beginning to be a choice again. We all aren’t forced to sit in the mud, wear tiedye, and be part of the people’s music. No - I don’t miss the 1960s at all, my dears, and if Richard Nader decides to hyp^ that decade, count me out. W