The Pyramid Club is a

nightclub A nightclub (music club, discothèque, disco club, or simply club) is an entertainment venue during nighttime comprising a dance floor, lightshow, and a stage for live music or a disc jockey (DJ) who plays recorded music. Nightclubs gener ...

in the East Village of

Manhattan Manhattan (), known regionally as the City, is the most densely populated and geographically smallest of the five boroughs of New York City. The borough is also coextensive with New York County, one of the original counties of the U.S. state ...

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...

. After opening in 1979, the Pyramid helped define the East Village drag, gay, punk and art scenes of the 1980s. The club is located at 101 Avenue A in Manhattan.

History

In the '70s and '80s the club became a hangout for "a new breed of politicized drag performers" like Lypsinka,

Lady Bunny Lady Bunny, originally known as "Bunny Hickory Dickory Dock" (born Jon Ingle, August 13, 1962), is an American drag queen, nightclub DJ, actor, comedian, and event organizer. She is the founder of the annual Wigstock event, as well as an occasion ...

, and

RuPaul RuPaul Andre Charles (born November 17, 1960; stylized as RuPaul) is an American drag queen, television personality, actor, musician, and model. Best known for producing, hosting, and judging the reality competition series ''RuPaul's Drag Race'' ...

, whose first New York City show was at the Pyramid Club in 1982 . On Labor Day 1985, Pyramid performer

hosted the

Wigstock Wigstock was an annual outdoor drag festival that began in 1984 in Manhattan's East Village that took place on Labor Day. Continuing, with a few gaps, until 2005, the festival would traditionally act as the unofficial end to the summer for the ...

Festival in

Tompkins Square Park Tompkins Square Park is a public park in the Alphabet City, Manhattan, Alphabet City portion of East Village, Manhattan, East Village, Manhattan, New York City. The square-shaped park, bounded on the north by 10th Street (Manhattan), East 10th ...

Andy Warhol Andy Warhol (; born Andrew Warhola Jr.; August 6, 1928 – February 22, 1987) was an American visual artist, film director, and producer who was a leading figure in the visual art movement known as pop art. His works explore the relationsh ...

and

Debbie Harry Deborah Ann Harry (born Angela Trimble; July 1, 1945) is an American singer, songwriter and actress, best known as the lead vocalist of the band Blondie. Four of her songs with the band reached on the US charts between 1979 and 1981. Born in ...

dropped in the Pyramid to do a feature on the club for

MTV MTV (Originally an initialism of Music Television) is an American cable channel that launched on August 1, 1981. Based in New York City, it serves as the flagship property of the MTV Entertainment Group, part of Paramount Media Networks, a di ...

, and

Madonna Madonna Louise Ciccone (; ; born August 16, 1958) is an American singer-songwriter and actress. Widely dubbed the " Queen of Pop", Madonna has been noted for her continual reinvention and versatility in music production, songwriting, a ...

appeared at her first

AIDS Human immunodeficiency virus infection and acquired immunodeficiency syndrome (HIV/AIDS) is a spectrum of conditions caused by infection with the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV), a retrovirus. Following initial infection an individual m ...

benefit at the club. Both

Nirvana ( , , ; sa, निर्वाण} ''nirvāṇa'' ; Pali: ''nibbāna''; Prakrit: ''ṇivvāṇa''; literally, "blown out", as in an oil lampRichard Gombrich, ''Theravada Buddhism: A Social History from Ancient Benāres to Modern Colombo.' ...

and

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played their first New York City concerts there. From 1992–95,

Blacklips The Blacklips Performance Cult was an avant-garde drag performance group based in New York City's Lower East Side, at the Pyramid Club. The collective was active from summer 1992 to spring 1995. Blacklips was founded in the summer of 1992 by ...

Performance Cult, a collective founded by Antony Hegarty, presented plays at Pyramid every Monday at midnight.

Keith Haring Keith Allen Haring (May 4, 1958 – February 16, 1990) was an American artist whose pop art emerged from the New York City graffiti subculture of the 1980s. His animated imagery has "become a widely recognized visual language". Much of his wor ...

was also a frequent patron. In 2007, it was proposed that 101 Avenue A, the Pyramid Club's building, be landmarked. The proposal, described as the first "drag landmark", was not adopted by the

New York City Landmarks Preservation Commission The New York City Landmarks Preservation Commission (LPC) is the New York City agency charged with administering the city's Landmarks Preservation Law. The LPC is responsible for protecting New York City's architecturally, historically, and cu ...

(LPC). However, in the spring of 2011 the LPC proposed a new historic district in the East Village focused around lower Second Avenue and encompassing 15 blocks and 330 buildings. The original proposal excluded buildings such as the Pyramid Club, but because of efforts made by local community groups, the proposed district was expanded to 101 Avenue A as well as other similar buildings. The LPC designated the club as part of the

East Village/Lower East Side Historic District __NOTOC__ The East Village/Lower East Side Historic District in Lower Manhattan, New York City was created by the New York City Landmarks Preservation Commission on October 9, 2012.Brazee, Christopher D., et al"East Village/Lower East Side Hist ...

on October 9, 2012.

Notable performers

* Babes in Toyland * Book of Love *

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Chris & Cosey Chris & Cosey, sometimes known as Carter Tutti, are a musical duo formed in 1981, consisting of couple Chris Carter (electronics) and Cosey Fanni Tutti (electronics, guitar, cornet), both previously (and currently the sole surviving) members o ...

* Country Joe & the Fish *

Jayne County Wayne Rogers (born July 13, 1947), better known by her stage name Jayne County is an American singer, songwriter, actress and record producer whose career has spanned six decades. Under the name Wayne County (inspired by Wayne County, Michigan), ...

Johanna Went Johanna Went is an American performance artist who primarily works in the Los Angeles area. She started her career in the late 1970s as musician in the punk scene. Music is still an important element of her shows. She has often worked with musici ...

Deee-Lite Deee-Lite was an American house and dance music group formed in New York City. The group's best-known single is "Groove Is in the Heart", which was released in 1990 from their debut studio album ''World Clique'' (1990), and was a top-ten hit in ...

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The Frogs ''The Frogs'' ( grc-gre, Βάτραχοι, Bátrakhoi, Frogs; la, Ranae, often abbreviated ''Ran.'' or ''Ra.'') is a comedy written by the Ancient Greek playwright Aristophanes. It was performed at the Lenaia, one of the Festivals of Dionysus in ...

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Richard Hell Richard Lester Meyers (born October 2, 1949), better known by his stage name Richard Hell, is an American singer, songwriter, bass guitarist and writer. Hell was in several important early punk rock bands, including Neon Boys, Television and T ...

* The Hillbilly Peckers * International Chrysis * Dean Johnson *

* Liberty Belle and the Union Boys *

Rhys Chatham Rhys Chatham (born September 19, 1952) is an American composer, guitarist, trumpet player, multi-instrumentalist (flutes in C, alto and bass, keyboard), primarily active in avant-garde and minimalism, minimalist music. He is best known for his "g ...

* Lypsinka *

Taylor Mead Taylor Mead (December 31, 1924 – May 8, 2013) was an American writer, actor and performer. Mead appeared in several of Andy Warhol's underground films filmed at Warhol's The Factory, Factory, including ''Tarzan and Jane Regained... Sort of ...

* Miss Understood *

Mudhoney Mudhoney is an American rock band formed in Seattle, Washington, in 1988, following the demise of Green River. Its members are singer and rhythm guitarist Mark Arm, lead guitarist Steve Turner, bassist Guy Maddison and drummer Dan Peters. Orig ...

Nico Naftiran Intertrade Company Société à responsabilité limitée#In Switzerland, limited (NICO) is a Switzerland, Swiss-based subsidiary of the National Iranian Oil Company (NIOC). NICO is a general contractor for the oil and gas industry. NIOC bu ...

* Psychic TV *

Q Lazzarus Diane Luckey (December 12, 1960 – July 19, 2022), known professionally as Q Lazzarus, was an American singer. She is best known for her 1988 song " Goodbye Horses", which became a cult classic after being prominently featured in a scene from ...

John Sex John McLoughlin (April 8, 1956 – October 24, 1990), better known by the stage name John Sex, was an American cabaret singer and performance artist in New York City from the late 1970s until his death in late 1990. Early life Sex was born on ...

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Tabboo Stephen Tashjian (born 1959) is an American artist. His drag queen character Tabboo! became known in the East Village underground scene of New York City in the 1980s. He is also a puppeteer, painter, and singer. Biography Stephen Tashjian was ...

The Voluptuous Horror of Karen Black Kembra Pfahler (born August 4, 1961 in Hermosa Beach, California, United States) is an American filmmaker, performance artist, visual artist, adjunct professor, rock musician, and film actress. Her film work is associated with the movement known ...

They Might Be Giants They Might Be Giants (often abbreviated as TMBG) is an American alternative rock band formed in 1982 by John Flansburgh and John Linnell. During TMBG's early years, Flansburgh and Linnell frequently performed as a duo, often accompanied by a d ...

Warrior Soul Warrior Soul is an American rock band, formed by lead singer and producer Kory Clarke. Clarke started the band on a bet from a promoter at New York City's Pyramid Club, after a solo performance art show called "Kory Clarke/Warrior Soul". Clark ...

* White Zombie *

Wendy Wild Wendy Wild (born Wendy Andreiev, August 31, 1956 – October 26, 1996) was an American singer, musician, and artist who in the 1980s was a well-known presence in New York's downtown music and performance scenes. Career Growing up in Northp ...

Meat Beat Manifesto Meat Beat Manifesto, often shortened as Meat Beat, Manifesto or MBM, is an electronic music group originally consisting of Jack Dangers and Jonny Stephens that was formed in 1987 in Swindon, United Kingdom. The band, fronted by Dangers (the only ...

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References

External links

History of the Pyramid Club
{{East Village, Manhattan Nightclubs in Manhattan East Village, Manhattan 1979 establishments in New York City