In 1981 the end of Studio 54’s most famous era occurred when Steve Rubell and Ian Schrager sold the building to Mark Fleischman. One of Fleischman’s plans was to start a regular Wednesday night concert series, and the first show of that series featured Lene Lovich on September 23, 1981.
The event attracted considerable coverage at the time. The New York Times ran a story about the concert before the fact, calling attention to Fleischman’s projected concert series as well as Lovich’s “mini-LP” New Toy.
Lovich used two keyboardists for this show. One of them, Thomas Dolby, achieved considerable fame just a year or two later for the hit song “She Blinded Me with Science.” Dolby wrote the title track of the aforementioned New Toy release—she credits him with the song’s authorship when she introduces him late in the concert—and also played keyboards on “Rocky Road,” the last track of Lovich’s 1982 album No Man’s Land. Lovich contributed some vocal tracks for Dolby’s first album The Golden Age of Wireless.
After the show, Stephen Holden wrote in the New York Times that Lovich “put on a fascinating show in which she sang, played the saxophone and danced with a lurching spontaneity that seemed half-demented. Though the songs weren’t intelligible, Miss Lovich’s character had a Chaplinesque appeal in its blending of broad physical comedy with an eccentric kind of pathos.”
Track listing:
Details
Joan
Rocky Road
Too Tender (To Touch)
Say When
Lucky Number
New Toy
Bird Song
Angels
Home
One In A Million
To check out Lovich’s “Chaplinesque appeal” for yourself, you just have to click on the video below.
Previously on Dangerous Minds:
‘Cha Cha’: Nina Hagen and Lene Lovich star in ‘lost’ punk film, 1979