Night Club 101

The Pyramid Club, a Drag and Punk Rock Landmark, Closes After 41 Years | Eater NY

"A decades-old East Village institution known at its heights for drag performances and its punk rock scene, the Pyramid Club will not be reopening after 41 years: managers Maria Narciso and Quirino Perez confirm the owners decided to permanently close, citing the pandemic's economic downturn and a lack of guidance about nightclubs reopening. The small Avenue A dive bar temporarily shut in early March 2020 ahead of the indoor dining shutdown and never reopened — Narciso says "No one expected this pause to last more than a year," and although she and Perez developed plans to reopen with a food menu and a socially distanced dance floor, they were never able to present them to the very private owners. When Perez texted more than a year later, the owners reportedly responded that "due to COVID-19, The Pyramid Club will not reopen." Opened in 1979, it evolved from a morning haunt for older Polish men grabbing 50-cent shots into a crucial 1980s gathering place for musicians, artists, actors, and drag queens, "a safe haven for freaks, geeks, weirdos, queers, and dreamers" that claims to have hosted the first New York performances of the Red Hot Chili Peppers and Nirvana and RuPaul’s first NYC show in 1982. Perez has tried to keep the spirit alive online, posting that "the Pyramid Spirit... lives inside all of us," even as the building will remain closed." - Luke Fortney