Hilly Kristal, founder of iconic New York rock club CBGB, dies at age of 75

NEW YORK – Hilly Kristal had no idea what he was unleashing when he welcomed a rash of unknown bands onstage in his dank Bowery dive: Television, the Ramones, Blondie, Talking Heads, the Patti Smith Group.\nKristal, a New Jersey farm boy whose musical tastes ran to tamer fare, opened CBGB as a haven for country, blues and bluegrass music. Instead, his cramped club became the epicenter of the punk rock movement, setting off a three-chord musical revolution that spread around the world.\nKristal, 75, died of complications from lung cancer at a Manhattan hospice after a long fight with the disease, his family announced Wednesday. CBGB closed last October with a blowout concert by Smith and her band, ending a 33-year run for the dingy space where Kristal operated from a small desk just inside the entrance with its familiar white awning.\n“He created a club that started on a small, out-of-the-way skid row, and saw it go around the world,” said Lenny Kaye, a longtime member of the Patti Smith Group. “Everywhere you travel around the world, you saw somebody wearing a CBGB T-shirt. It was a real rallying point for musicians trying something different.”\nAt the club’s boarded-up storefront Wednesday morning, a spray-painted message read, “RIP Hilly, we’ll miss you, thank you.” There were also a dozen candles, two bunches of flowers and a foam rubber baseball bat – an apparent tribute to the Ramones’ classic “Beat on the Brat.”\nDavid Byrne, lead singer of Talking Heads, remembered Kristal’s low-key demeanor and generosity.\n“Other clubs were all about models and beautiful people, and he was about letting the musicians in for free, to hear music and get cheap beers,” Byrne said. “It automatically created a scene, and we’d just hang out all night.”\nKristal was an unlikely avatar of punk music, opening his own club in 1973 after booking acts such as Miles Davis at the Village Vanguard. “At first, they didn’t play so well,” he once said of the seminal punk bands that came to CBGB.\nBut he became a beloved figure to the performers who used his small venue as a launching pad to stardom, including several who reached the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. He also served as manager for the Dead Boys, whose appeal was summed up by their album title “Young Loud & Snotty.”\n“In an era when disco was the mainstream, Hilly took a chance and gambled,” said drummer Marky Ramone. “The gamble paid off for him and for us. We are all grateful to him.”\nThe influence of Kristal’s club was pervasive, extending to generations of bands around the country and the globe. Even the landlord who finally evicted Kristal from CBGB first kissed his wife inside its walls, which were plastered with mementoes from bands across the decades.\nKristal’s plans for a club attuned to his tastes disappeared when Television, led by Tom Verlaine, began playing Sunday nights in the mid-1970s. Other bands were soon joining them, and CBGB became the place for punk fans to mingle with performers like Joey Ramone, Debbie Harry or the doomed Sid Vicious.