After a full eight hours at the L.A. Airport, sleeping in between a bench and a wall, getting stepped on by babies, then finally getting on a flight that consisted of much snoring and drooling, I made my descent into JFK. I was greeted by the sparkly New York rain that I know so well. Upon landing I called Jonathan while I waited for the cab. He was in Brooklyn at his good friend Herb’s place. He had gotten in two days prior and was just beginning to sort out 5 years of abandoned crap that he had stashed all around New York. Aaron, the Director hadn’t arrived yet to continue filming the documentary, so JS was taking it easy and hiding out over there in Red Hook before breaking his half-decade abstinence from between the legs of our city.

45 dollars and a few cigarettes later, I made it to my usual haunt on 7th street and A, changed my clothes and was out the door again to meet JS and Howie Pyro at Niagra on the corner. We leaned against a car in front of the Joe Strummer mural and it felt good to be home. It was the first time I’d ever interacted with Jonathan in NYC and it felt kind of like a dream that I’d had many many times before. Something I’ve experienced in a past life, or something I was meant to experience, but when I was living in New York our paths had, oddly enough, never crossed. I sat there with Howie who is one both my and Jonathan’s closest friends in or out of New York, watching the two of them interact. Mutually hating the amateur night frat boy party that the Lower east Side has become. But it was FUN.

I could already see the force that JS was and still had in the city, even after years of absence in Rio de Janeiro and the connection he seemed to feel to that street in particular. It was like he was home again, and I could see the look of relief on his face that being back wasn’t as hard as we all expected it to be.

I was nervous initially, wondering if seeing a Whole Foods on the Bowery would trigger a full on meltdown. It didn’t, and I knew then that this trip was going to be a really successful one for all involved.

-Alessandra

Timeout New York

VICE

NY PRESS

First of all thank you everyone who came out to support all our efforts this week in New York. Narcisa is pretty much gone so if you didn’t get a copy I do have a few left. Here are some pics for now, bloggage to come later.

Kembra Pfaler and Clayton Patterson at Santo's Party House

Boyd Rice and Billy Leroy at Santo's Party House

JS Reading at Santo's Party House

Genesis Breyer P-Orridge at Santo's Party House

JS reading at Santo's Party House

JS reading at Santo's Party House

JS and Billy Leroy at Santo's Party House

The crew outside Santo's Party House

Wes Eisold outside the reading at Hospital Productions

JS after the Hospital Productions reading

JS and Max Morton at Hospital

Signing books at Hospital Productions

JS talking to the ladies at Hospital Productions

JS and tattooed fan at Hospital Productions

JS and Gerry Visco (thanks for the photos) after Hospital reading

Gibby Haynes, Miz Metro and Crosby outside the Hospital reading

Stoop party with Gibby and Kembra. And me! Don't forget me!

NYC WE LOVE YOU!!!!

So, after a month in Los Angeles cleaning up the wreckage of the recent and distant past, I finally bid farewell to the City of the Angels and got on a plane to New York for a long week of readings, book signings, Spoken Word shows, reunions, movie shoots, wheels, deals and general mayhem before going home to the dubious safety and comfort of my comparitively simple life in Brazil.

Being back in the city after moving away 5 years ago and turning the page on that long, colorful chapter of my life is a strange experience. Colored by the odd culture shock of seeing it through the eyes of a semi foreigner now, coming from that odd Brazilian immigrant’s perspective of years past makes it even odder still.

Not an entirely unpleasant feeling. And as glad as I am to have left this daily reality behind and turned the page on it years ago, there’s still a big part of me that belongs to this place and always will.

As if to confirm that, all day long people have been asking me directions. Its as if they sense me to be a local, someone with a deep and intimate working knowlege of the mysterious inner workings of this strange and baffling town. And I suppose I am. I feel that way today as I sit here at an open air table at the pizzaria at the corner of Macdougal st and w 3rd.

And as I sit here contemplating the character of this odd city of my birth, feeling my DNA reconnecting to it and watching the people passing by, I feel myself surrender to that feeling of impending familiarity, as if at any moment an old and well known aquaintence will walk up and sit across the table from me with a smile and a familiar, “JS! How ya doin’?”

Memories of days and nights and months and years spent traversing the lights and shadows of this space emerge in a mental tapestry of images, recollections and adventures, people, places, things and events. Details which spring to life from the inner workings of the machinery of my experience.

And suddenly I realize that this is my life today as the parade of souls dribbles by and I feel very very jaded by it all.

Jonathan and Alessandra outside of The Strand

Street vendor reading Narcisa

Howie Pyro and Alessandra

Houston Santa Claus- Billy's Antiques

On Friday night Jonathan made his first “official” public literary foray, signing books and reading from Narcisa to a good sized gathering of friends, well-wishers and fans at Billy Shire’s La Luz de Jesus Gallery in Hollywood.

After reading the first hilarious and horrifying piece involving projectile vomiting and the supernatural for a good ten-minutes – after which Jonathan was about ready to call it a night, the audience was clamoring for more. Jonathan, cornered now with nowhere to run, continued to spew the demented poetic prose of Narcisa from his signature Blackberry/novel writing device.

The event was deemed by one and all a big success, thanks largely to the kind and respectful attention of everyone who came out for it. According to Billy the gallery owner, more people turned out to see JS read than the audience for a recent appearance by Irvine Welsh (Trainspotting) — maybe the Trainspotting fans were too busy shoving methadone enemas up their rectums to make it out that night, who knows?

Among Friday’s diverse audience were a few notable creative pundits and forward-thinkers, among their venerable ranks the notoriously sardonic comedic genius, author Jerry Stahl and one of the original Kings of the Lowbrow art movement, Robert Williams.   Also present was Jonathan’s favorite Ex, designer and writer, Amy Fields with her current husband, Noah Levine, author of Against The Stream and Dharma Punx.

Jonathan’s reading was captured visually by Steven Perilloux of the Terry Richardson clan and photographer John Maldonado, along with the camera crew of a documentary-in-progress about Jonathan whose working title is “Hooray For Me and Fuck You”.
Stay tuned for clips of the reading and for now enjoy the photos.

I’d choose this kind of evening over a motel full of crack whores and jelly donuts any day. Thanks everyone for making it possible. We will see you for Jonathan’s next reading in NYC on the 40th Anniversary of the Tate/La Bianca murders.

John Maldonado 2009

John Maldonado 2009

Steven Perrilloux 2009

John Maldonado 2009

John Maldonado 2009

John Maldonado 2009

Steven Perrilloux 2009

Steven Perriloux 2009

John Maldonado 2009