A little chicken before your turkey

On First Avenue in the 20s....this is just goofy.

Noted

"Priced out of Brooklyn? You might want to try Manhattan. Many neighborhoods in Brooklyn are now more expensive to live in than Manhattan neighborhoods (and I'm talking below 90th Street here), according to data compiled by StreetEasy.com for October 2008." (Daily News)

An EV Grieve All-Star (Cover) Salute to the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame Annex!

While the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame Annex in SoHo doesn't officially open until Tuesday, sneak-preview tours are available.

In honor of this grand occasion, here's a cover-band tribute to some bands who have some sort of connection to NYC! (Please save any scorn/ridicule, etc. for the professionals. Like the Counting Crows. This isn't about making fun of kids in their local gymnasiums or bedrooms. Only a little bit.)

Anyway! Enjoy!

Atomic Kitten cover Blondie's "The Tide is High"



Billy Joel tribute band cover "Big Shot"



Counting Crows cover Joni Mitchell's "Big Yellow Taxi"



Lazaras covers four songs by the Ramones



A young woman in her bedroom covers Mariah Carey's "We Belong Together"



High school talent show: The Yeah Yeah Yeahs' "Maps"



A band does Kiss' "Detroit Rock City"



Welsh Valley Middle School 8th Grade Talent Show: Living Colour's "Cult of Personality" (pretty good!)



Turkuaz cover the Talking Heads' "Slippery People"



Devilwearspumas covers the New York Dolls' "Trash" in his bedroom



Aegis Band covers Mariah Carey




And, for no reason, Harvey Keitel does Elvis

Rico gets the hook(ah)?

Well, it looks as if Rico, the hookah joint on Avenue C between Ninth Street and 10th Street has closed. Or else they're "renovating" the space, which is suspiciously empty. IF, in fact, Rico has closed, this would mean there are only 417 hookah bars left in the East Village, aka the "hookah zone."

Joey Fatone talks plush potties, and bloggers everywhere are stumped to write funny, toilet-related headlines

Here's some video of Joey Fatone opening the public restroom thing in Times Square yesterday. (MTV.com)

MTV Shows

A Landmark article

So, what's doing with the New York City Landmarks Preservation Commission? From today's Times:

A six-month examination of the commission’s operations by The New York Times reveals an overtaxed agency that has taken years to act on some proposed designations, even as soaring development pressures put historic buildings at risk. Its decision-making is often opaque, and its record-keeping on landmark-designation requests is so spotty that staff members are uncertain how many it rejects in a given year.

Ugh.

A case of the cutes

Fifty People, One Question: New York from Crush & Lovely on Vimeo.

EV Grieve Etc.: Mourning edition

An infamous walking tour of the East Village (Stupefaction)

Would you like that coffee with a side of guilt? (Esquared)

Gold-painted trash art on 14th Street (Jeremiah's Vanishing NY)

Help prevent an eviction (Save the Lower East Side!)

A little bit of the El Morocco in Brooklyn (Lost City)

Graffitti's comeback? (New York)

Trees are planted alongside an ugly builidng on Ludlow (BoweryBoogie)

Somebody is seeing pink hippos on Wall Street!

And what is "seeing pink hippos" a euphemism for...?

Oh, and this photo was taken before the tree went up in front of the NYSE yesterday. Esquared has a nice shot of that.

Retail space available at Cooper Union (plus: watching the construction from day one)

Despite having been following the new Cooper Union project, I didn't realize there was going to be retail space in the building at Cooper Square between Seventh Street and Sixth Street — 3,000-square feet of it.



"Non cooking food?" Uh, how about FroYo? You don't really have to cook that. Just take it out of the bag and throw it in a machine. Then charge $6 for a three-ounce cup!

By the way, have you been watching the construction at the new Cooper Union building via its LIVE Web cam? You can go all the way back to 2003 and watch it all over again...



How depressing.

"No Reservations" at Sophie's

A tipster tells me that globetrotting chef Anthony Bourdain filmed a segment of his show "No Reservations" at Sophie's this past weekend. He was joined by Nick Tosches to discuss great old haunts of NYC. After Bourdain and the film crew left, Tosches reportedly stuck around for more beers and some pool. The episode filmed at Sophie's will air in February.

Well, this is all good for Sophie's of course, but I keep thinking about what Jeremiah wrote in his post on the closing of the Holland:

This just after Anthony Bourdain, mourning the loss of Siberia, praised the Holland, which he called: "A classic old-man bar." He also hailed the Distinguished Wakamba Lounge, a former after-work haunt of mine, and now I'm worried. What if Bourdain has reaper powers?

Financially strapped automakers cutting corners on design

On Avenue C near 14th Street.

What's new on Lard Street?

Was on Dessert Row the other...er, Seventh Street...the Butter Lane Cupcakes store is now open for business.



Some good news: The historic "Licensed Undertaker" sign is still intact on the building. Of course, the other half of this space is still for rent...



Previously on EV Grieve:
Something else to threaten the very soul of the East Village: Cupcakes

Cinematic facelift

Seeing this gave me pause...then I realized they are just doing some minor renovations. (Or at least that's what I was told by one of the women selling tickets. Though! She acted as if she didn't even notice the building was under scaffolding.) Never can be sure these days, of course. Second Avenue at 12th Street. The Village East Cinemas, home of Intelligent Conversations.