Way Back When
November 1969.
I was working at Carl Ally advertising on Madison Ave. in NYC. It was a creative agency that
occupied two of 39 floors in a high-end office building at 437 Madison Avenue.
It was built in 1967 by the William Kaufman Organization, and designed
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in the Modernist style by the renowned architectural firm Emery Roth & Sons. For a young and
aspiring copywriter, I couldn’t have dreamed of a better environment
to stimulate my creativity.
New York in the late 1960’s and 70’s was an amazing place; Broadway shows,
Greenwich Village nightlife, Concerts at Lincoln Center,
parties in the lofts of coworkers; we lived every minute of every day to the max.
I saw Janis Joplin onAugust 26, 1970 at an outdoor concert at the Garden State Arts Center on
New Jersey’s Garden StateParkway; for her it was an upscale venue,
5300 seats and lawn seating for another 5000 or so.
Her backup band was Full Tilt Boogie. Joplin wasn’t known for her beauty;
but when she sang, her pockmarked face disappeared, and a goddess
took control of every nerve in your body. Sadly, she died six weeks later on October 4, 1970.
I saw Blood Sweat and Tears and Jethro Tull at the old Fillmore East in April of 1969. In those
days rock stars knocked themselves out onstage to try and give you the best that they could,
and they even thanked you for your applause at the end of the performance.
Those were indeed wonderful days.
Bill Tremper
