Photo by Gerry Visco
Every Monday, I show up and sing my songs. We laugh. We cry. We get very, very drunk. That’s how Breedlove, the singer, songwriter and performance artist, describes his weekly show at St. Jerome’s every Monday at midnight.
Walking into St. Jerome’s on Rivington Street last week, I felt like I’d stepped back in time to some scruffy dive bar in the early 1980s. The room was tightly packed with a crowd wearing punkish outfits and glam rock rags, beaming friendly vibes to everyone who walked through the door as they bopped in time to the music. Breedlove stood perched on the small stage in the back of the dark narrow room, wearing a tacky powder blue shirt festooned with glittery hearts, plaid boxer shorts, retro aviator glasses and sporting a shaggy unkempt hairdo and beard combo.
“Looking your best doesn’t always mean looking your most attractive,” he told me.
Well, I certainly agree he has his own style. An Elton John for the grittier rockers out there, his backup dancers held aloft lip-shaped telephones while he crooned “Love On The Telephone” sitting atop the bar. St. Jerome’s, in the space that formerly housed the Asian-themed bar Belly, just celebrated a fourth anniversary, and is beloved as the down-and-dirtiest rock ‘n’ roll bar on the Lower East Side, though it has a cozy charm with tin ceilings and dark burgundy walls. And already the place has history: Lady Gaga used to go-go dance there in 2006, when she met her ex (and rumored-to-be-current) flame, Luc Carl, the bartender and manager.
Ironically, Breedlove dons for his party the persona of a dweeb and a loser but comes out a winner. “He came on over to me and said hi before the show, no pretentious attitude,” my friend said, surprised. Breedlove is opening for Lady Starlight and Semi Precious Weapons on their North American headlining tour later this month, so he must be doing something right. The crowd agreed. Breedlove’s there every week and so are the kids. Like Gabe Fuller, a green-eyed dreamboat with dyed magenta hair newly arrived from Kalamazoo to study acting at NYU, and platinum-blond blogger Darian Darling. “We all love Breedlove,” opined BadLeigh Lilicita DesiLou, one of his smoldering dancers, who also studies Latin at Columbia. Let’s face it, we can all use a feel-good night these days to laugh, cry and get very, very drunk.
Walking into St. Jerome’s on Rivington Street last week, I felt like I’d stepped back in time to some scruffy dive bar in the early 1980s. The room was tightly packed with a crowd wearing punkish outfits and glam rock rags, beaming friendly vibes to everyone who walked through the door as they bopped in time to the music. Breedlove stood perched on the small stage in the back of the dark narrow room, wearing a tacky powder blue shirt festooned with glittery hearts, plaid boxer shorts, retro aviator glasses and sporting a shaggy unkempt hairdo and beard combo.
“Looking your best doesn’t always mean looking your most attractive,” he told me.
Well, I certainly agree he has his own style. An Elton John for the grittier rockers out there, his backup dancers held aloft lip-shaped telephones while he crooned “Love On The Telephone” sitting atop the bar. St. Jerome’s, in the space that formerly housed the Asian-themed bar Belly, just celebrated a fourth anniversary, and is beloved as the down-and-dirtiest rock ‘n’ roll bar on the Lower East Side, though it has a cozy charm with tin ceilings and dark burgundy walls. And already the place has history: Lady Gaga used to go-go dance there in 2006, when she met her ex (and rumored-to-be-current) flame, Luc Carl, the bartender and manager.
Ironically, Breedlove dons for his party the persona of a dweeb and a loser but comes out a winner. “He came on over to me and said hi before the show, no pretentious attitude,” my friend said, surprised. Breedlove is opening for Lady Starlight and Semi Precious Weapons on their North American headlining tour later this month, so he must be doing something right. The crowd agreed. Breedlove’s there every week and so are the kids. Like Gabe Fuller, a green-eyed dreamboat with dyed magenta hair newly arrived from Kalamazoo to study acting at NYU, and platinum-blond blogger Darian Darling. “We all love Breedlove,” opined BadLeigh Lilicita DesiLou, one of his smoldering dancers, who also studies Latin at Columbia. Let’s face it, we can all use a feel-good night these days to laugh, cry and get very, very drunk.
