Marianne Faithful- Posh People Crueler than Junkies

60s sex symbol chanteuse Marianne Faithful, who despite becoming a pop star and dating Mick Jagger ended up homeless in the early 70s, has revealed she was happier being destitute than living with her controlling Baroness Mother.

Ending up living on the streets of London's Soho for two years after her heroin addiction spiraled out of control, Faithful (who’s full title is Baroness von Sacher-Masoch) told the Guardian she was nevertheless lucky.

“People looked after me, the meths drinkers, junkies. I learned that human beings are really all right,” she told Dave Simpson.

“I didn't know that from my posh life in the 60s. It was very bitchy and people were cruel to each other,” she added. (http://bit.ly/VnfSeZ )

Her positive assessment of London’s street people struck a chord with the memories of seminal New York superclub promoter Rudolf Piper who, speaking to Time Out New York this week, fondly remembered the mid 80s era of Danceteria as ‘still the good old days of sex and drugs and rock & roll’.

"The five floors of this supermarket of style were where gays, straights, artists, junkies, goths, skinheads, lost uptowners, sexy Jersey chicks, pinheads, Studio 54 leftovers, B&Ts (Bridge and Tunnels), weirdos from outer space, drag queens, S&M freaks, hookers, performers of all sorts, East Villagers galore, not to mention musicians of all kinds, got together,” he recalled.

“We lived over there! Seven nights a week, week after week…it was so good, and we all thought it would never end.” (Time Out: http://bit.ly/11pHcwr _

Danceteria resident DJ Johnny Dynell similarly cited nightlife’s broke but stylish outsiders and misfits as the driving force behind the New York’s creative culture of the era in an interview with Skrufff last year.

“In the late seventies and early eighties the yuppies were total losers in New York club-land. By the nineties they had taken it over. I never saw that one coming,” he admitted.

“New York just got too rich. Kids can't afford to come here anymore. The only people who can afford New York rents are lawyers and investment bankers,” he pointed out.

Johnny, who remains one of New York’s most respected alternative/ underground DJs, also blamed AIDS for destroying Piper’s ‘good old days of sex and drugs and rock & roll’.

 “Kids today have no idea what it was like back then. To lose so many people. If you ran into a friend after not seeing that person for a couple of weeks you would both breathe a sigh of relief to see that you were both still alive. There was this constant darkness (especially in clubs) that is thankfully a lot brighter today,” said Johnny.

“AIDS robbed the world of at least two or three generations of creative people. It took the best. When I look at the music that I get sent every day now I am astounded by the lack of creativity. Almost every song is either a remix or a remake of another song. To just blatantly steal parts from other records is considered song-writing. This is the least creative generation that I have ever seen and I can't help thinking that losing so many real artists to AIDS is one of the reasons,” he suggested.