The Wild History Of The 1970s Club Scene

We think we know what club life is all about: Dropping beats, overpriced drinks, the politics of the VIP area. But today's nightclubs are the result of decades of corporate takeover — a good time, to be sure, but nothing like the wild, no-holds-barred scene you found in the 1970s, especially in New York City. Spurred on by the nascent LGBTQ+ rights movement, the club scene of 1970s New York had its roots in the 1960s, but the specific economics of the 1970s were the special sauce. Most big cities at the time had affordable downtown areas where artists and musicians could actually find apartments, and they congregated at the seedy bars and clubs that sprang up. The wealthier, straighter, and (let's face it) whiter folks from uptown wanted that energy, and so they would show up for the human scenery.

The end result was the unique chemistry of the classic 1970s club. Inclusion was key. Despite the iconic image of the velvet rope, clubs worked hard to get a diverse group of people inside. Celebrities mingled with the non-famous, and people of all genders, persuasions, and ethnicities danced the night away, usually under the influence of a lot of legal and illegal substances. It was one big party, and some crazy things happened before people began to realize how much money could be made. Here are some of the amazing moments from the wild history of the 1970s club scene.

It's hard to believe the infamous Studio 54 actually existed. Founded by Steve Rubell and Ian Schrager, this cavernous club on 54th Street in Manhattan created the template of the modern club: The illusion of exclusivity, the glamour of celebrity, and an extremely permissive policy toward ... well, everything. Part of the club's success stemmed from luring celebrities there, sometimes with lavish parties thrown in their honor. In 1978, that's how they got country superstar Dolly Parton to show up. As author Anthony Haden-Guest writes in "The Last Party," Schrager got the idea to actually build a farm on the dance floor, complete with live animals.

It worked: Dolly showed up. But she was reportedly freaked out by the size of the crowd and the weirdness of the setup. She sat by herself on one of the balconies and left early, which seems like the right reaction to walking into a club in the middle of Manhattan and finding a farm waiting for you.

A club that defines one extreme of the 1970s New York club scene was CBGB. The club's name stands for "Country, Bluegrass, and Blues," which is very early 1970s. It also turned out to be wildly inaccurate, because CBGB became known as the epicenter of punk rock and new wave music in the 1970s.

CBGB is also known as the birthplace of legendary punk band The Ramones. When the group took the stage on August 16, 1974, CBGB had only existed for a short time and was just another dive bar in a sketchy neighborhood. The bar had established a reputation for letting raw, untested musicians book gigs, and it had a rule against cover songs. While that rule was devised to avoid paying fees to copyright holders, it also meant that a lot of experimental and interesting music graced the stage. Still, no one was expecting music history to be made that night.

Reportedly, the Ramones hit the stage and blasted through their entire set in 12 minutes flat. Most of their songs were less than two minutes long. The band was a hit and played the club 70 more times in 1974 on its way to becoming a legend.

If the names Jayne County (known at the time as "Wayne County") and Handsome Dick Manitoba aren't familiar to you, you need to brush up on your 1970s music history. Manitoba is infamous as the former lead singer of the classic punk band The Dictators, and County was the lead singer of Wayne County & the Electric Chairs, a group known for its wild, glam-punk style and County's crazy stage presence. She later became punk rock's first openly transgender performer.

But back in the 1970s, she was still performing as Wayne County when she took the stage at CBGB with Manitoba in the audience, and things didn't go well. Manitoba heckled County throughout the show, and County gave as good as she got. When (a decidedly not sober) Handsome Dick climbed onstage, County clobbered him with her mic stand — breaking his collarbone and nearly killing him. He threatened to sue.

The underground music scene in New York at the time was dealing with a growing homophobia problem, and the incident brought it out into the open. LGBTQ+ performers like County began to look for safer places to perform, creating a schism in the club scene. The good news? County and Manitoba later buried the hatchet and have become good friends and even recorded music together.

CBGB has become the iconic face of the underground music scene in 1970s New York, but it wasn't the only rock club in the city. In fact, Max's Kansas City was arguably just as important — if a bit less gross. In 1973, Iggy Pop and the Stooges played at the club, which had a very small stage with tables right up against it. The Stooges were a big draw at the time, so the place was packed, and Pop had grown frustrated with the tiny stage. So one night, the unpredictable performer decided to start walking out onto the tables as if they were an extension of the stage. That's a pretty baller move for a singer, and it was going great until one of the tables tipped over, sending Pop crashing down onto another table covered in glasses.

Pop came up bleeding. He had a puncture wound in his chest and discovered that if he pulled his arm a certain way, blood would spurt out — so he started doing it on purpose, spraying his audience with his own blood, which seems like it might have been a health code violation. Pop kept singing through it all. The crew tried unsuccessfully to bandage him up with some gaffer tape, and his blood-soaked performance became the stuff of legend.

Studio 54 is legendary today, a symbol of the excesses of 1970s club life. It has become shorthand for the endless party that supposedly defined the whole decade. The 1970s are often perceived as a wonderful time between the strife-filled 1960s and the stress-filled 1980s, and Studio 54 is the cocaine-fueled, disco-dancing icon representing it.

But the nightclub almost failed completely. After a splashy and well-attended launch, attendance fell off immediately, and the club struggled to get enough people inside to make a profit. It was a huge space and needed about 1,000 people inside every single night — not just on the weekends — if it was going to make a dime. The owners did everything they could think of, but for the first five weeks or so, they barely got by.

Then fashion designer Halston booked the club to throw a birthday party for Bianca Jagger, the wife of Rolling Stones singer Mick Jagger. This included having a naked man covered in gold glitter leading Bianca around on the back of a white horse. Photos of the event were instantly everywhere, and suddenly, it was the place to be, with crowds thronging outside. The moment saved Studio 54, and to this day, Bianca has to explain to people that she didn't ride through the streets of Manhattan on the horse — she and Mick just walked in like regular people. Well, regular mega-wealthy and famous people, but still.

Today, every new club gets compared to Studio 54. It was an everything-goes nightclub where they literally had a giant mechanical moon lifting a spoon filled with cocaine to its nose as part of the decoration. It's hard to understand today just how unique the club was when it opened. While there had been dance clubs in New York and other cities for decades, Studio 54 was the first to truly combine a theatrical sense of "anything goes" with music, substances, and an elaborately designed space.

The official launch of the nightclub on April 26, 1977, was a glitzy affair. Celebrities from all walks of life were invited — including future president Donald Trump, who arrived with his first wife, Ivana. Other icons of the 1970s soon arrived — Cher, Brooke Shields, Margaux Hemingway, and many others. The real party soon erupted outside the club. An anonymous doctor had seen fit to bring a bottle of medical-grade Quaaludes to the opening, and he began handing them out to everyone in the street. Before long, the celebrities dancing inside probably wished they were outside, where a full-on party had broken out, with people disrobing in the street and dancing wildly. Sadly, many of the people in that crowd probably don't remember much about the evening.

The Mudd Club was another iconic New York City nightspot in the 1970s. A small, dingy place, it boasted some of the most diverse crowds ever, with celebrities like David Bowie or Debbie Harry rubbing elbows with less famous folks to take in some legendary rock shows. One of the ways the Mudd Club set itself apart from other places was its willingness to book theme parties. Where other spots like CBGB concentrated on the raw power of new bands on the stage, the Mudd Club brought a bit of panache to its seedy nightlife, which attracted figures like Andy Warhol. Many of the party themes were in alarmingly bad taste, which was part of the fun.

One of the most notorious theme parties thrown at the Mudd Club became an annual tradition: The Joan Crawford Mother's Day costume party. Everyone showed up dressed as either the famous actress — or as her daughter who famously accused her of abuse, complete with bandages and pinafores. That's the sort of wild night that simply wouldn't fly in today's less amused culture, but it was a common occurrence in the place where Fab 5 Freddy and Debbie Harry bonded before she dived into rap for the Blondie song "Rapture."

The Mercer Arts Center is largely forgotten today, but for a few years in the early 1970s, it was one of the most important music venues in New York City. It's most closely associated with the New York Dolls, the incredibly influential proto-punk band (and the starting point for singer David Johansen, aka Buster Poindexter of "Hot Hot Hot" fame).

On the evening of August 3, 1973, the Center was preparing to welcome about 2,000 eager audience members when the building began showing signs of imminent collapse — bricks literally falling and wooden beams groaning under sudden stress. At around 5:00 p.m., just before people were due to arrive, the building collapsed into a heap of rubble, killing four. A fictionalized version of the moment kicked off HBO's short-lived series "Vinyl" and implied it was the sheer rock 'n' roll power of the New York Dolls that brought the walls down, which is just silly. Cool, but silly.

The collapse shouldn't have been a surprise: The building had been showing signs of problems for years, exacerbated by some sketchy and probably illegal renovations done in the 1960s that weakened the structure. Today, you can still see the original roof line of the Center on the brick of the building next door.

If you want to trace the evolution of the 1970s New York club scene, you have to go back to the very beginning of the decade. To February 14, 1970, to be exact. That was the day that a young guy named David Mancuso realized he needed money for the rent on his loft apartment at 647 Broadway. To cover the bills, the record collector and audiophile decided to try an age-old technique: the rent party. He assembled a diverse cross-section of Manhattan natives, provided music and a dance floor, and charged a modest entry fee. Mancuso delved into his huge stack of albums and played DJ, insisting that all records be played in their entirety — no beat-matching or cross-fades as most DJs liked to do.

The LGBTQ+ community at the time had few safe spaces to dance and enjoy themselves, so The Loft, as it became known, was immediately popular. Mancuso's parties were underground but perfectly legal and established the hunger for a nightlife marked by a casual attitude, an inclusive vibe, and plenty of great music. These parties incubated the club culture that erupted into vibrant life later in the decade when splashier, more formal dance clubs opened up.

It's always fun to imagine what it must be like when a bunch of famous, creative people get together, have a few drinks, and hang out. Who wouldn't have wanted to be a fly on the wall when people like David Bowie, Lou Reed, and Iggy Pop hung out at a legendary New York club like Max's Kansas City? The conversation must have been amazing. Except it wasn't.

Pop was introduced to Bowie at Max's in 1971. Bowie had expressed interest in meeting the punk rocker, and Pop had to be woken up and brought to the club. But the meeting of three music icons wasn't the sort of amazing celebrity hangout you might imagine. As Far Out Magazine confirms, in Bowie's own words, the three men experienced the sort of awkward evening we've all suffered through at one time or another: "Me, Iggy and Lou Reed at one table with absolutely nothing to say to each other, just looking at each other's eye makeup."

It's almost comforting to think that super-famous people find themselves at a loss for small talk just like the rest of us. Things got better, though: Bowie became good friends with both Pop and Reed and worked with both of them many times.

Xenon doesn't get as much attention as Studio 54, in part because it was designed to be a near-carbon-copy of the concept. (The owners weren't even trying to hide it: The atomic number of xenon, the chemical element, is 54.) But just because it wasn't terribly original doesn't mean some crazy stuff didn't happen there.

Take the time in 1978 when actress and singer Grace Jones threw herself a 30th birthday party there. Jones rode in on a motorcycle (as one does). Vintage Everyday reports that she posed with the bike on the dance floor and was soon surrounded by half-naked dancers who crowded around her — along with Divine, one of the most famous drag queens of all time.

The birthday cake arrived, and what can only be described as a cake orgy of sorts broke out, with everyone grabbing a piece and feeding each other. Jones and Divine both fed each other a piece, and the most remarkable thing about the whole moment is that it was captured on film. Looking at the photos, it's clear that everyone was having a grand time, but for Jones, there was always an element of performance. American Songwriter quotes her as saying that "it required ... a lot of hard work and good make-up to be accepted as a freak."

One thing that made the 1970s club scene special was the sense of inclusiveness. Despite the velvet ropes and the long lines, the clubs always strove to bring different people together. That was part of the fun: The idea that people from all walks of life would be hanging out, sharing an experience.

Nothing underscored the fun, anything-could-happen vibe of those times like Sally Lippman. Lippman was 77 years old when Studio 54 opened. She was a lawyer by trade but hadn't practiced in decades, and she found a bit of celebrity and whole lot of joy when a young friend brought her to the club. She became a sensation as she danced wildly with men and women decades younger than herself, earning the nickname "Disco Sally."

Sally wasn't just a figure of fun — she was a beloved regular who often invited the staff back to her apartment for dinner. She truly loved the freedom that the 1970s club scene offered. As former Studio 54 manager Scott Bitterman said on his website, "Sally represented the best of the club for me: She was neither rich nor famous. She was a woman who loved to dance and have fun with her friends in the evening."

What sort of party can you really throw for a mega-famous actor on the occasion of their 46th birthday? In the case of Elizabeth Taylor, it had to be a Studio 54 shindig. True to the character of the club, this was no toned-down affair, though it technically took place before her birthday, in February 1978. Taylor entered the club in grand fashion, with scantily clad young men scattering petals before her and the Rockettes kicking ... as beside her husband, Virginia Senator John Warren. In fact, you may get the sense that the saucy party was meant to get under his skin. Warren, a rather straight-laced moderate Republican, wasn't exactly a fixture of the NYC club scene, much less the notoriously hedonistic world of Studio 54.

Maybe he at least perked up at the humongous chocolate cake that bore his wife's image. Only Taylor took it upon herself to begin serving up the cake, starting with a notable part of her torso anatomy and handing it over to her fashion designer, the mononymous Halston. With television cameras focusing in — of course, there were cameras — Warren escorted himself out of frame. It's not clear what he did between then and when he demanded that the couple finally leave, but everyone else was down to party until the wee hours. Warren, however, must have remained unimpressed. The two divorced in 1982.

If you have any doubt that the punk scene of 1970s New York was rough around the edges, consider the story of Johnny Blitz, drummer for the Dead Boys. After Blitz had been stabbed and was facing serious medical bills, the famed — or is that infamous? — rough-around-the-edges rock club CBGB held multiple benefit concerts to help out. At one such gig in 1978, the Dead Boys played, but with a replacement drummer. For the band's signature, "Sonic Reducer," John Belushi stepped in.

Yes, that John Belushi, actor and comedian of "Saturday Night Live" and "The Blues Brothers" fame. Belushi was actually a serious punk fan and wasn't a half-bad drummer himself. Pat Ivers, a filmmaker who was part of the city's punk scene, had met Belushi and Dan Aykroyd at a party, where she and some friends gave them grief about never booking a hometown NYC band on "Saturday Night Live." 

Belushi took up her invitation to visit CBGB, saw the Dead Boys there, and became both a fan and friend of the group. Thus, he ended up drumming on the Dead Boys' "Sonic Reducer" and was ever so briefly captured in the act by Ivers, who was filming that night. Oh, and for some extra punk and New York City flair, legendary drag queen Divine also took to the stage that night, bringing dancers from her stage show, "The Neon Woman," to provide a movement-based accompaniment that evening.

The 1969 Stonewall riots in Greenwich Village took place after a raid on the Stonewall Inn — patrons, sick of routine police harassment and draconian laws on gendered dress, fought back. It's often marked as the beginning of the modern gay rights movement, though 1970s New York showed that things didn't exactly change overnight.

As we mentioned, David Mancuso's Loft arose as an invite-only club that was a queer-friendly place. Mancuso worked particularly hard to create a unique ambience and carefully curated playlist, but was the Loft a legitimate club or merely a regular private party? The NYPD and the city's various licensing authorities certainly thought something was up. Whether their investigations were legitimate or based in lingering anti-LGBTQ+ prejudice is hard to discern, but it's clear that the Loft often faced unwanted attention.

To that end, the Loft didn't necessarily serve for-pay refreshments, as liquor licenses involved city officials, and cigarette machines were typically controlled by the mob. House-made nibbles might be on offer (as well as less-legal substances under the table), but that was about it. Even so, Mancuso was arrested in 1972 for running an unlicensed cabaret, and, though he was cleared of charges, he remained on high alert. He even had a speakeasy-type alarm system installed at the Loft. When the cops came calling, someone up front would flip a switch, alerting Mancuso. He'd turn off the music, patrons would go quiet and sit down, and the entering officer would find nothing of interest.

In the wildest, highest-flying days of Studio 54, it perhaps felt like nothing could touch its founders, Ian Schrager and Steve Rubell. The pair were making quite a bit of money, for one. Rubell publicly bragged about the loads of cash the club was raking in, even telling New York Magazine their take was so staggering, "Only the Mafia does better." 

Yet the IRS couldn't help but notice a disparity between Studio 54's apparent income and how much it paid in taxes. So, in December 1978, agents raided the club. They reportedly found about $600,000 in garbage bags, as well as a large amount of illegal drugs. 

Schrager and Rubell faced federal tax evasion charges, which carried the possibility of hefty fines and up to a decade-long sentence. In response, they threw a party. The night before the pair were to go to prison, Studio 54 lit up with a wild event — sometimes referred to as "The End of Modern-Day Gomorrah" — that included an in-her-cups Diana Ross singing and Rubell almost falling out of the DJ booth during an over-enthusiastic rendition of "I Did It My Way." This party marked the last hurrah of the original club, which was sold, then finally closed in 1986.

For all that, Rubell and Schrager got off pretty easy. Both were sentenced to three and a half years and served only 20 months after cooperating in a larger fraud investigation. In 2017, President Obama fully pardoned Schrager (Rubell had died in 1989). 

Today, Dolly Parton is widely beloved, to the point where she seems like the cool grandma of the music world. But she's hardly prim and proper. As we mentioned, back in the '70s, she even became a regular visitor to Studio 54. (Remember the notorious birthday party that seemed to freak her out? Well, it's at least more fondly remembered by Parton nowadays). And, while there, she formed a friendship with none other than Andy Warhol, another club fixture (who, given his friendship with Jackie Kennedy, enjoyed making surprising connections).

But the two weren't necessarily diving headfirst into the hard-partying aspect of the nightlife that made Studio 54 so notorious. As it turns out, both Parton and Warhol eschewed much of the hedonism, and that's what helped them become buddies. As Parton recalled in her memoir, "Behind the Seams," the two enjoyed a more sober round of people-watching. "Andy and I would mostly just sit on the couch and watch all these crazy people out there doing their thing," she wrote. "We really got to know each other, just sitting on that couch."

To be clear, the two weren't completely above the whole substances thing, as Parton further explained: "Andy and I didn't do too many drugs or drink too much alcohol." It sounds like that was hardly complete abstinence, but nevertheless, Warhol and Parton must have stood out for their relatively buttoned-up natures when everyone else at Studio 54 was getting truly wild.

You may get the sense that, after a while, it could be hard to stand out in the 1970s club scene. Yet, there remains one legend who not only made a mark amongst the teeming club crowds but has also endured as an icon: Rollerena, the roller-skating fairy godmother of NYC. To this day, her identity isn't confirmed, though there are rumors that her professional life involved working with the city or "the Wall Street area," as one friend told the Chicago Tribune (via The Evening Independent). She confirmed in an oral history interview that she was born in Louisville, Kentucky, and served in the U.S. Army in Vietnam before moving to New York City. 

As the story goes, she entered an antique store, bought elegant clothing, and went to a bar in the new duds. When the persona was a hit — Rollerena has never precisely claimed the title of drag queen — she combined the look with a pair of roller skates, influenced by the growing popularity of roller disco. The initial name was "Roller Arena" (and even briefly "Rollin' Skeets"), but "Rollerena" emerged by 1972.

Rollerena soon made quite the impression skating about the city and its nightclubs. At Studio 54, co-owner Steve Rubell loved the persona so much that not only did she get past his infamously strict door policy, but she also became a welcome regular, cheerily sailing past folks waiting in line and giving the doorman a warm kiss on the cheek, as said doorman, Bobby Sheridan, recalled to New York's The Cut.

Exclusive clubs always carry a certain social cachet, but few door policies were as infamously strict and confusing as the one that granted access to Studio 54, moderated by a doorman (who could tell you a thing or two about what it was like working at Studio 54). People were known to wait in line for hours, only to be turned away with little explanation. Some were desperate to get in, with whispered tales of people attempting to rappel down with climbing gear and one tuxedoed man who allegedly died in an air vent as he tried to gain entry. 

Wild legends aside, it's true that club co-founder Steve Rubell himself would sometimes stand at the front door, giving people on the other side of the velvet rope a once-over before proclaiming whether or not they were worthy of entry. But the criteria by which Rubell and Studio 54's doormen operated didn't fall along discriminatory lines, or at least not those you might expect. On the dance floor, you could find people of different genders, sexualities, economic classes, and cultural backgrounds all moving together. Instead, it was more about vibes. 

As co-founder Ian Schrager told the "Hospitality Design: What I've Learned" podcast in 2019, "We wanted to have only party people. It was nothing to do with wealth, race, creed, color, or anything like that. ... We wanted to have people that would be free to party, that women could come there and not be bothered by guys."