These days, the customers of the newsstand in the Metropolitan stop aren’t waiting in line to buy the Post, Times, or those stale House of Bazzini nuts that you can’t actually find above ground. Instead, they’re asking for change to buy zines out of a vending machine and snatching up vinyl records curated by Greenpoint shop Co-Op-87.
More →
Artist-Musicians (and a Former Pro Runningback) Open AP Coffee
Yesterday, Wes Mapes and his business partners opened AP Coffee on a once desolate block that, until recently, had been known more for its murals. He thinks it was a good call. “This street is going to be the street off [the Jefferson] stop, for sure,” he told Bedford + Bowery. “It may even be the premiere street in all of Bushwick, even above a lot of places off the Morgan stop.” (He may be on to something: the sister bar of Welcome to the Johnsons is set to open just a block away.)
More →
Lil’ Nugs: Ethiopian Speakeasies and NYU Hamptons
Scott Lynch
Every day at 4:20 p.m. we stuff your pipe with Lil’ Nugs, our late afternoon link dump.
Yesterday morning, the Bedford Avenue L train platform looked like McCarren Park during Northside: crowded with sweaty people. That’s because the L trains weren’t going into Manhattan, due to, apparently, electrical malfunctions that messed up the signals. The good news (for cabbies, anyway)? It might keep happening! [WNYC]
Citi-Bikes could make their debut in Brooklyn neighborhoods facing extensive subway outages. [New York Daily News] More →
Step Right Up! Coney Island’s Sealo the Sealboy Will Be Reborn in Bushwick Tonight
Scary Ben and Darlinda Just Darlinda (Photo courtesy of Bushwick Burlesque)
Tassel-twirling burlesque veteran Darlinda Just Darlinda and her partner-in-circus Scary Ben have a love affair with Coney Island. Tonight, their Bushwick Burlesque series will feature 10 spectacular Coney-born acts to raise funds for Coney Island USA, a non-profit whose facilities for sideshow and burlesque were damaged by Hurricane Sandy.
Even as the cabaret and underground circus scenes thrive at venues like House of Yes, Coney still carries cultural cachet with the young and hip of North Brooklyn as a locus of performance. It’s still relatively rare to find sideshow acts such as fire-eaters, snake-charmers and sword-swallowers north of Coney Island.
More →
Check Out This Blood-Spattered ‘Game of Thrones’ Birthday Cake
Photo: Sweet and Shiny Cafe
Elaine Li of Bushwick’s Sweet & Shiny Cafe made an awesome “Game of Thrones”-themed “nameday” cake last week for one lucky Northman. What better way to cope with (read: eat) your feelings now that the season is over and we are all in Westeros withdrawal?
More →
Welcome to Bushwick, Welcome to the Johnsons!
(Photo: Brando Skyhorse)
Max Fish isn’t the only Lower East Side bar that’s Brooklyn bound. Welcome to the Johnsons is opening a sister spot in Bushwick. Unlike the Rivington Street den of depravity, it’ll be called simply The Johnsons. But don’t worry – it’ll still be welcoming. More so than the scruffy original, it could be argued, since it’s about four times the size.
The offshoot, at 369 Troutman Street, will feature an open-air patio that’ll be in full swing till closing time, said owner Lisa Gartner, who also co-owns Sweet Paradise on the Lower East Side.
More →
The Village Voice Is Leaving the Village… and Occupying Wall Street
Will 80 Maiden Lane soon look like this? (Photo: Phillip Pantuso)
In a move fittingly symbolic for a paper whose corporate overlords flew in to lay off some of its most venerated, tenured writers, the Village Voice is moving out of the Village — where it’s been, of course, since 1955 — to an office tower in the Financial District. The move is scheduled for sometime in August.
The new offices are located on the twenty-first floor of an office building at 80 Maiden Lane. Also in the building are the International Gay and Lesbian Human Rights Commission, Catholic Charities of the Archdiocese of New York, the New York offices of the National Gay and Lesbian Task Force, and the Department of Investigation for the City of New York. According to a realtor at Winick Realty Group, the sandwich chain Jersey Mike’s will be opening its first Manhattan location in the building’s ground-floor retail space over the summer.
More →
Lil’ Nugs: Dressler Closes, Ludlow Lot Sells For $5.7M
Photo by: Congo Rodes
Every day at 4:20 p.m. we stuff your pipe with Lil’ Nugs, our late afternoon link dump. Sorry we’re late today — launch and all!
A Williamsburg/East Village writer-producer team uses the Bedford + Bowery tipline to tell us about their new web series, “Brunch on Sundays.” Filmed in both neighborhoods, it explores the real brunch-time topics of 20-somethings, like pooping in front of boyfriends. [Brunch on Sundays]
South Williamsburg’s Dressler, serving fancy food since 2006, closed its doors for good today. The restaurant’s website cited a regrettable failure to reach a lease-renewal agreement with the landlord. [Free Williamsburg]
A vacant lot at 145 Ludlow Street has been sold by Lower East Side developer Sion Misrahi for $5.7 million. A six-story apartment complex and 1,900 sq. ft. of retail space are set to take its place. [The Lo-Down] More →
Reel Psyched: Our Northside and L.E.S* Film Festival Picks
Introducing “Reel Psyched,” wherein we tell you what we’re really excited to see in the theaters this week.
With the Lower East Side Film Festival in full swing in Manhattan and the Northside Festival’s film program popping off tonight in Brooklyn, it’s a good time to be a film buff.
At the L.E.S* Film Festival, which kicked off Thursday and continues through the weekend, offerings from up-and-coming directors are judged by a panel of guests including celebrities like Judah Friedlander (“30 Rock”) and Dan Janvey (“Beasts of the Southern Wild”). The audience favorite gets a $2,000 check from Vimeo (ahem, Bedford + Bowery’s video player of choice).
More →
Tags: 30 rock, anthology film archives, atom tan, bad motherfucker, beasts of the southern wild, bewilderbeast, bikini kill, biting elbows, byzantium, casa mezcal, crosby street hotel, cult movies, damon cardasis, dan janvey, das racist, documentaries, dosa hunt, East Village, fear of flying, film, go down death, having you, ian svenonius, ilya naishuller, indian food, jackson heights, judah friedlander, kathleen hanna, le tigre, lower east side film festival, make-up, midnight movies, movie trailers, movies, nation of ulysses, neon indian, northside festival, rainbow music, riot grrls, roxy hunt, shannon walker, spectacle, super mario brothers, the birdman, tony castle, vampire weekend, videology, who took the bomp: le tigre on tour, williamsburg cinemas, yeasayer
Help This Man Realize His Trippy Dream Of Staging ‘Wizard Of Oz’ in Bushwick
Somewhere over in Bushwick the L train rides; artists and Hasids, poets and dreamers, ride their bikes.
So goes a dreamy, surreal version of “Somewhere Over the Rainbow” that may some day appear in “Bushwick the Musical the Movie,” an in-the-works film set in the neighborhood and modeled almost entirely on “The Wizard of Oz.” John Martino, a 55 year-old former IT specialist, is trying to raise a staggering $2.5 million to get the movie made.
More →