Goodbye Rebel Rebel

By Robert Heide

It was in the August 2014 issue of Westview News that I first wrote an article entitled Music! Music! Music!—Village Music Stores which focused on my favorite music store Rebel Rebel, so-named after the David Bowie hit record, which sold the 33 1/3 rpm vinyl records that were becoming popular with young hip collectors and hard-to-find American and foreign import CDs. I was particularly grateful when David Shebiro, the amiable proprietor of Rebel Rebel, found an Australian two-CD package entitled Greenwich Village in the 60s: Beginnings and Branches of the New York Folk Festival Revival and a double CD set of early Greenwich Village folk recordings from Czechoslovakia.

Being a Village historian, I was also happy when David came across a CD called Bob Dylan’s Greenwich Village, a three-CD collection of Dave Van Ronk’s Down in Washington Square, and another European three-CD collection entitled The Greenwich Village Folk Scene which included a rare early recording of Bob Dylan singing “The House of the Rising Sun.” With the release of the Coen Brothers’ 2013 movie Inside Llewyn Davis, more of the legendary Van Ronk CDs featuring oddball songs like “Cocaine Blues” from the ‘King of Folk Music’ were back in fashion. In an official New York City celebration, a section of Washington Place from Grove to Van Ronk’s apartment building at #15, where his wife still lives, was named after him.

I go into all of my record-buying history at Rebel Rebel to make the point that anyone looking for any music went to Shebiro’s enclave at 319 Bleecker Street between Christopher and Grove Streets. Now, as of this writing, the store will have sadly shut its doors after 28 years. One more time we can blame it on landlord greed and callous disregard for a cultural Village landmark.

When I first interviewed David in 2014, I asked him about his lease and he said he hoped the landlord would renew. At the time, I knew the stores on Bleecker Street were closing and being taken over by corporate giants like Ralph Lauren or Marc Jacobs, with rents soaring as high as $65,000. Gone already in 2014 were the one-owner boutique shops, newspaper/magazine stores, and antique shops like the charming Michael Malce’s which specialized in vintage hand-sewn Pennsylvania Dutch quilts, 1930s Mickey Mouse dolls, toys, and Big Little Books. I remember fondly Johnny Jupiter who specialized in practical vintage kitchenware, Art Deco Frankart statues of green lady lamps, and enamel-topped kitchen tables from the 1930s and 1940s.

The story of record store closings has also been noted by The New York Times in an article entitled Even Vinyl Mania Can’t Save the Record Stores (June 12, 2016) which featured a color photo of David Shebiro inside his filled-to-the-brim store. The Times article mentioned what must have been the most famous record store haunt in Greenwich Village—Bleecker Bob’s Golden Oldies run by Bob Plotnick for years on 3rd Street between 6th Avenue and MacDougal; it closed in 2013 due to the usual impossible rent hike. When I visited David recently at Rebel Rebel, he told me that his landlord never even offered him the chance to renew and apparently had already set up a deal with Scotch and Soda—a corporate Dutch company offering casual off-the-rack clothing where shirts sell for hundreds of dollars. They had two years ago taken over the space on the corner that housed a great neighborhood coffee shop called Café Angelique which welcomed Villagers and visitors into its quaint old-style cup-of-cappuccino atmosphere. Angelique’s shut down, according to Vanishing New York, an online neighborhood news source, because the same landlord increased the rent from $16,000 to $42,000.

One can ask the question: When will the endless closings and openings of new clothing, cosmetic, and jewelry shops end? It’s anybody’s guess but on and on it goes. Bleecker Street is now primarily name-brand corporate shops. Ralph Lauren and Marc Jacobs can afford to pay high rents and not be too concerned about sales. After all, they sell their expensive wares in Madison Avenue stores and shopping malls all over the world; a high rent in the Village can often be less than a New York Times advertising campaign. Now, unfortunately, the blocks between 7th and 6th Avenues, once home to Greenwich Village’s famous outdoor pushcart vegetable and fruit markets, are going down the same money-mad path selling fancy Korean chocolates, high-priced boxed tea collections, gooey macaroon cookie concoctions, and fancy salads at corporate in-and-out emporiums. Remaining old timers like John’s Pizzeria, Ottomanelli’s Butcher Shoppe, Matt Umanov Guitars, Faicco’s Pork Store, and Murray’s Cheese emporium are the only reminders of better times.

Rebel on Bleecker is just another example of the loss of individuality in a city and world that is running amok. What we in the Village have lost it seems is a sense of community. It’s now just about higher and higher rents in apartments and stores. How about buying one of those $5,000 leather designer handbags? Save your pennies! Just before David Shebiro’s closing I asked him “How are you feeling?” “Terrible!” he said with a weary sad expression on his face. “I’m thinking of leaving the country. I don’t know…” In the store, crowds rifled through the CD racks and LPs for the last time.