Bob Minkin’s Best Photos of New York Music in the Seventies and Eighties — SkimNews
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- Bob Minkin documented NYC's 1970s-80s concert scene on a running tally that began with Eric Clapton at Roosevelt Stadium in 1974 and reached show #73 with Frank Zappa at the Palladium, a list he relies on because he has no memory of many of the shows
- Warren Haynes made what Minkin recalls as the Allman Brothers Band's first Beacon Theatre appearance; Minkin says he thought at the time that the new guitarist had "some big shoes to fill," which Haynes subsequently proved he could
- Bruce Springsteen at the Palladium on Sept. 17, 1978 is what Minkin calls "one of the best shows I ever saw out of any band," saying Springsteen played "like his life depended on it" and "like his foot was on the pedal to the floor"
- Buddy Guy at the Lone Star Cafe on Nov. 14, 1984 was captured with a flash because the venue's lighting was inadequate; Minkin notes he had to be "judicious" about shooting to avoid being thrown out
- Albert Collins at the Lone Star Cafe on Dec. 5, 1982 was photographed mid-stunt, walking out the front door of the packed venue playing guitar while a crew member trailed his cord
- Minkin photographed a multi-segment "Guitar Greats" bill featuring David Gilmour, Johnny Winter, Dickey Betts, Steve Cropper, Neil Schon, Link Wray, Dave Edmunds, and Brian Setzer sharing a house band, which he calls "the least superlative way you can call this thing"
- Jerry Garcia Band at the Palladium on Nov. 27, 1977 was shot by Minkin when he was 18 using a cheap Konica Rangefinder camera on nearly empty film, leaving him with only a handful of negatives from the show
- Minkin captured an experimental zoom-blur portrait of Jorma Kaukonen and Jaco Pastorius at My Father's Place in Old Roslyn on Jan. 4, 1985 by firing flash at a slow shutter speed and zooming the lens during exposure
Why it matters: Minkin's numbered concert list — from Eric Clapton at Roosevelt Stadium in 1974 to show #73 with Frank Zappa at the Palladium — anchors his eyewitness accounts of canonical NYC music moments, including Warren Haynes's Allman Brothers debut and Springsteen's Sept. 17, 1978 Palladium show. Because he admits having "no recollection" of many of the shows, the list itself functions as the primary historical record, making the archive valuable to anyone trying to reconstruct the era's gig-by-gig chronology.
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