None of the Personal Effects material has ever been available on cd so we revisited the six releases and picked twenty songs to put on a compilation cd that we hope to have available at the show next Friday. One of the songs that made the cut was “Lucia’s Supper Club.”
I remember finding a pack of matches on Culver Road (I think) from Lucia’s Supper Club in Olean, NY. There was a gondola on the front and we were intrigued by the “Supper Club” name. We wrote a song about the place and put it on “It’s Different Out There” LP. The illustration I did for the cover sort of pictures Lucia’s the way we imagined.
Years later we found Olean on the map and drove down there for dinner at Lucia’s. We ordered Chicken Picatta and it was delicious. We brought an album with us and left it with the chef. I detailed our trip there on this Refrigerator entry. A few months later we received this letter in the mail.
Hi, I just had to write to you…
I was browsing the Internet this week and came across your info on the web. What prompted me to write to you is that I am Lucia Bardenett’s great-granddaughter. She was the “Lucia” of Lucia’s Supper Club in Olean. Oddly, this weekend we are celebrating my grandfather’s (Lucia’a son) 87th birthday. Nonna (as we called her) died in 1986, so my grandfather is really the last of the restaurant’s founding immediate family. My grandfather was her only child. He had 6 children who gave him 15 grandchildren and 2 of those have given him 3 great-grandchildren. I am the oldest of the 15.
So there’s a little info for you. I didn’t want to go on and on, but anyone who would be so intrigued by a pack of matches to write a song, design an album cover, and make a trip to Olean would probably be interested.
I am forwarding the link to your website to all of my family members (as you can tell from the above is quite a few). Could you tell me how to get a copy of that song? The mp3 version on your site won’t work for me. If you have a chance, could you even send me a copy of the lyrics. We’d be interested to see what you imagined about our family’s old restaurant.
By the way, I can guarantee Nonna would have gotten a kick out of your album cover; she was such a character! Marie Rakus Olean, NY
Here’s the cd version of Lucia’s Supper Club.
[audio:http://www.popwars.com/downloads/personal_effects_lucias.mp3]
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When I put this video together, I labeled it “Scorgies 1986”. Just the other night, I insisted that it was Scorgies. And while the lights above the back row seem to be in the same positions, I am now thinking that it’s probably Backstreets or Jim’s (as Peggi and Paul suggested at rehearsal on Thursday night). If it were Scorgies, the stage would be higher in relation to the cameraman.
This is the same show that I used to put the Darlin’ video together, and in that video, you can see the sides of the stage which put the idea that this is Scorgies even more in question.
Anyone remember a backdrop like this at Scorgies?
Bob
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Bob. I’m pretty sure it was at Idols (?) upstairs when it was changing over from a transvestite club. Remember the big beaded necklaces and other stuff in the dressing room? And there was a walkway off the stage sort of like they use for fashion shows. That glitsy backdrop says it all.
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I think you are right. I forgot about Idols upstairs. I remember it became Mirage up there, with Idols downstairs. But I think Idols may have begun upstairs. I also thought for a moment that it may have been Garibaldi Gardens, but looking that the backdrop and the twinkling lights, and knowing that Garibaldi’s color scheme was gold brocade and velvet, there would have been a different vibe.
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