Odds and Ends

When I first started this blog I didn't have much material to go on. I used to have to do a lot of scrambling to come up with pictures, etc. for posts. Now that the blog has been going for a full year, I have accumulated quite a lot of odds and ends. This post is an excellent example: found newspaper or magazine clippings that feature pool. To the right is a photo of Aerosmith's Joe Perry playing pool at Playboy Billiards in Coney Island. (FYI, Playboy Billiards no longer goes by that name). It's from a John Varvatos ad, and the photo was taken by Danny Clinch. Clinch, known for his rock and roll photography, is a photographer I respect a great deal. He works with a lot of bands that I like. And photography is not the only thing he's good at. In fact, one of my favorite songs by the Foo Fighters ("Another Round" on 2005's double album "In Your Honor") prominently features Clinch on harmonica. Since Clinch has so much clout with rock musicians, he was the natural choice for the John Varvatos campaign. An interesting story behind the Coney Island shoot can be read here. And while we're at it, click here for more. EDITOR'S NOTE 8-21-07: Brooklyn Billiards, as it's now known, is not in Coney Island. I paid a visit over the weekend. It's in sort of an obscure area deep in Brooklyn that doesn't have a definite name. According to my Streetwise Brooklyn map, it's in between the neighborhoods of Ocean Parkway and Midwood. It's still a good three miles from the Coney Island boardwalk.

On another note, I came across this other clipping around the same time. It's a Lauren Lancaster shot from the inside of Fat Cat Billiards in Greenwich Village, on the cover of amNY. It was a "guide to haunts for the night owl in you." Apparently they think pool is the ideal night activity. There's definitely some truth to that. I have been to Fat Cat twice and the only thing I remember is that, like Broadway Billiards Cafe, there's virtually no cell phone reception because it's underground. Just two random pictures I came across while walking around recently.