Nightlife and the Nuyorican Cafe

Nightlife is a quintessential part of the NYC identity, especially the clubs -- from the Stork Club and the Copa to Tunnel and Limelight to 1Oak and Butter, this town has always been the defining capital of American nightlife.

It goes without saying that COVID-19 has been a huge hit on the nightlife industry in NYC. The waiters, bartenders, managers, bus boys, hostesses, etc. have seen their jobs vanish, their professions decimated. Bars, clubs, lounges, restaurants, you name it, have been crippled and some may never recover. But some will. Like everything in post-COVID NYC, some things will survive, some won't.

This city has been transformed by the pandemic, and so will the nightlife business. 

One NYC nightlife impressario who won't be part of post-COVID nightlife is Miguel Algarin, founder of the Nuyorican Cafe, who died recently. Unlike many nightlife hotspots that come and go, his place has stayed in business since 1973. And unlike many places that are devoted to drinking, dancing, drugging, debauchery, the Nuyorican Cafe is devoted to poetry. It hosts poets reading their work or "poetry slams" where random people get in front of a mike and read their self-composed poems. The Nuyorican Cafe was and is a vital part of the NYC culture scene, and Miguel Algarin was a great visionary. He will be missed.

I've gone to the Nuyorican Cafe twice in my life. About a week or so after I moved back to NYC from college, a relative took me to my first slam where an excitable guy named Flaco read some wild stuff. Then, a few years later, I went with my then-fiance and her sister, where a friend of ours engaged in a slam and another guy did a very funny poem about Fox News. Both visits were quite memorable.

As soon as this pandemic is over and the Nuyorican Cafe reopens, I'll go again -- in tribute to Miguel and his vision, in tribute to the great culture of NYC, and in tribute to the great nightlife of NYC.