Did we meet Michael Alig clubbing at Tunnel?

Friday. Our road trip to NYC continued. This was the night that Mel, Steve and I tripped down to the gala opening of Puzzled, a new weekly event at a nightclub called the Tunnel. Located on the corner of West 27th Street and 12th Avenue, on Manhattan's extreme west side, overlooking the West Side Highway. As we pulled onto the block of 27th between 11th and 12th avenues, hookers scattered in all directions. Various unsavory characters who resembled pimps lurked in doorways, keeping watch over a steady flow of club kids who were teeming everywhere.


The crowd flow seemed to be headed away from the club, which immediately made me fear that we might have a hard time getting in. It was precisely two a.m. when we finally walked up to the main entrance. Five or six doormen were keeping things in line. It took us a half hour to get in, and we still had to pay $20 apiece, but it was worth it.



The shit had three levels, inside it stretched for like half a city block, and there were a good 2000-2500 people there. At least. Every second person was wearing some elaborate, fucked up costume, people in cages were dressed as animals, mirrored lounges lined with silver-upholstered couches everywhere, with holes in the middle, filled with little yellow plastic balls. One big room where all the balls came from, just like at Chuck-E-Cheese.


Nude dancers downstairs in the basement, upstairs a whole network of different rooms, each with their own DJ, each hosting a separate private party for all the New York club cliques. Huge silver tendrils hanging from the ceiling, only slightly lighter than punching bags, swinging back and forth amidst the crowds. The former lead singer from Devo (Mark Mothersbaugh) had some paintings on display in an art exhibit in one section of the club. Right near the coatroom was some guy wearing a business suit, chilling behind a desk in a picture perfect office space, behind a plexiglass window, who was being paid to sit pretending to do type, and file stuff, and do office work all night long, just to fuck with people, because it was the last thing you would expect to see at a place like the Tunnel!


The whole scene was like a rave, only for the older, New York club set glitterati.

- Letter to Jared, 11/7/93

(Note from 2009 – we met a lot of crazed club kids that night in the VIP areas. I wouldn't be surprised if one of them was the infamous Michael Alig (Party Monster), who had to have been there hyping up the next Puzzled. On the puzzle-shaped, die-cut flyers from this night, plus the ones we took home for the next Friday's party, Alig was listed as a co-promoter.)