Black Cracker Presents: Tales of...Season 1
Tales of Times Square: The Tapes
This podcast presents voices of strippers, old fighters, burly-q men, peep show girls, hustlers, cops and the priest who tried to save them.
By Josh Alan Friedman
Season 1: Tales of…Times Square: The Tapes
An audio record of Times Square in the 1970s and '80s, drawn from Josh Alan Friedman's original cassette interviews.
Between 1977 and 1986, Friedman reported from 42nd Street for Screw, The Soho Weekly News, High Times and New York magazine, and the tapes he made became the book Tales of Times Square (Delacorte Press, 1986), still considered the definitive account of the strip before Disney and the Times Square redevelopment cleared it. Nothing in this season is reenacted or narrated from memory. These are the voices themselves, restored from deteriorating cassettes.
Episodes include Pee Wee Marquette, the caustic emcee of the jazz club Birdland through the '40s and '50s; Izzy Grove, one of the last surviving Guys and Dolls characters; and Bob Anthony, Frank Sinatra's boyhood friend and first bodyguard, who ended up running the back office of the Melody Burlesk.
Start anywhere. Each episode stands alone.
THE IRVING BERLIN OF ROCK ‘N’ ROLL. We worked on a book in which he would tell off the world, to be called Kiss My Big Black Ass. It remained unfinished. But Jerry Leiber blew my mind. And he was one bitch of a chef.
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AUSTIN’S GREATEST FALLEN MUSIC HERO In a town known for its fallen musical heroes, Fabulous Thunderbirds bassist Keith Ferguson was a tour de force. He submerged into semi-retirement on his rustic estate, a hangout for wounded animals, reptiles and old pachuchos. The music biz turned ugly, but Austin’s beautiful losers—as well as the heroin—remained pure. And…
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PACHUCO BLUES Ferguson avoids the Vietnam draft, plays Houston lesbian clubs with young Johnny Winter, and joins the Thunderbirds. Like an old wolf, Keith paces his communal porch in Austin. It was his last refuge. Recommended Playlist Girls Go WildT-Bird Rhythm The TailGators Second Winter
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THE BRUTE PIMP OF WHITECHAPEL The 19th century life model for anti-Semitic caricatures was quite a guy. Except I made him up. And he now joins the cast of this season’s Dead Heroes. Episode Playlist The Worst, Bela’s Funeral Dirge heard in this episode.
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A DIVINE MADMAN Tiny Tim lived in his own bubble with angelic girls dancing in the clouds, while 1920’s Broadway lullabies played on harps. He became the biggest fad of 1968. But his lifelong dedication to early 20th-century music was without equal. Episode Playlist Prisoner of Love: A Tribute to Russ Columbo Girl: Tiny Tim…
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