NYC Goth Kids Say Goodbye to Legendary Club

A club that defined the Goth scene in the New York City in the '90s paid homage to its roots on Sunday night before the Lower East Side venue, The Element, shut its doors for good.

“People would put on fangs and walk around and pretend that they were vampires in a role play kind of a thing,” promoter Joe Cyn, who said that the club -- formerly known as The Bank -- once hosted a vampire wedding, told Niteside last night.

Cyn and his partner Hal Gould returned to the stucco manor after nearly a decade to host “The Bank Farewell”  in its last night as a club Sunday evening. While The Element’s future is unknown, the promoters were told it would retire from nightlife thus ending the historic venue where bands like the Nine Inch Nails got their start and Madonna once visited.

Nostalgic party-goers decked out in their best black lace (some even sporting fangs) and swaying to their own beat came to recreate the “Albion Saturdays” and “The Realm Fridays” from the '90s as a final farewell. Some hadn’t been to the place in 10 years when it was an alternative music scene venue.

If the dark eyeliner and fangs don’t create a spooky aura, the Goth club’s own urban legend certainly does: Cyn, a native New Yorker, and Gould, who hails from England, spoke of “a ghost wearing glasses” who lives amongst its walls.

 “There were very large security guards running out of the basement and never coming back to pick up their pay,” said Gould, who doesn’t believe in ghosts but admitted that he avoids being in the basement alone.

“Literally -- people you wouldn’t expect to be afraid would be very, very afraid. Everyone talks about the same thing. It’s a ghost wearing glasses.”

It was a long night for Gould, who is also the manager of Terminal Five and was set to greet Bob Dylan the Monday morning as legendary folk singer begins his concert series at the venue. But for both promoters, it was a bittersweet ending.

For Cyn, it was a recreation of the night when they last said goodbye in 1999, although this time it was truly the end.

“There were people on the street with their ears pressed to the doors, listening to the music,” said Cyn of one of his and Gould’s most memorable -- and packed -- nights at the club. “People were dancing on the corner because they couldn’t get in.”

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