New Delhi Cabaret, Vancouver

[mbarrick]

I was on a mission tonight to find old photos of a friend from the ancient days before digital cameras and was therefore rooting through ye olde banker's box of photos. In the course of doing this I found the above cabaret ticket with the photos I inherited from my father. The ticket has to date from the early 1960's. My dad drove a taxi for Black Top Cabs in the early 1960's. I posted one of his old fare-receipts last July. I did a little research on the New Delhi Cabaret. It was a live music venue that focused mostly on R&B and was in operation from 1956 to 1973, run by a guy named Leo Bagry. They had a house band and also had feature bands and novelty acts. Durius Maxwell played there as a novelty act as a teenager. Tommy Chong's (as in "Cheech and Chong") band "The Shades" played there frequently in 1959-1960. They had burlesque dancers. Choo Choo Williams started her 12-year dancing career at the New Delhi Cabaret. Miss Lovie danced there in there starting in 1964 and here is her own description of her act: "I made things happen with my body. I'd sit on the floor, I'd stick my legs up high, up above my head, and I'd make my butt pop. I made my buttocks work like drums through muscle control. I could move around the floor like a clock, in a circle. I did the splits. I used to do a lot of black light dancing, and I used to wear a lot of glitter all over my body. That use to be my thing: I glittered." It's also my understanding that these cabarets weren't licenced, but nonetheless people brought their own liquor in brown paper bags that they would hold under the tables. Elaine tells me that her dad, my father in law, used to go to these places and verifies the booze-in-a-bag-under-the-table thing. This wasn't officially sanctioned, but nothing was done about it. Note the 4 a..m. closing time on the ticket, too. The New Delhi wasn't the only cabaret like this in the East End. In 1967, an article in the Vancouver Province noted: "As a tourist attraction, Chinatown probably ranks second only to Stanley Park, and so contributes greatly to Vancouver's fame abroad. With its restaurants, stores and nightclubs, it adds entertainment spice for resident and visitor alike." Vancouver wasn't alway "No Fun City." Below is 544 Main Street as of last spring (from Google.)

Sources:
"Tripping with Chong" http://www.canada.com/story_print.html?id=c55e75c8-90cb-46c5-89cb-73fc6bf1f6d2&sponsor=
"Pacific Northwest Bands" http://www.pnwbands.com/newdelhicabaret.html
"The Drum Network" http://thedrumnetwork.ning.com/profile/DurisMaxwell
"Spectacular Striptease, Performing the Sexual and Racial Other in Vancouver, B.C., 1945-1975", Becki Ross, Kim Greenwell, Journal of Women's History 17.1 (2005) 137-164

Comments

[annamaryse.livejournal.com]

OK - there used to be an old club on Homer or Hamilton near where a post office once was (I want to say around Smythe, but it's been a really really long time) and I can't remember the name of it but it was an upstairs bar with these crazy lucite tables that had tubes in them - coloured tubes full of water through which a constant stream of bubbles were propelled. The place had been a strip club in the fifties, and a famous one. Later on it was a punk club at one point and a gay afterhours joint at another, and for a time both simultaneously... and I really need to get my hands on the name...

If you can figure out the name of this place from my description, and can tell me I will be forever in your debt, sir.

[mbarrick.livejournal.com]

There was the Playpen (formerly Thunderbird) at 856 Seymour that was upstairs. I have no idea if the tables were like you describe, though. Everything else I know about or have read about in Yaletown was street-level.

[annamaryse.livejournal.com]

Hrmmm... I do remember the playpen (not until you mentioned it) and this place was definitely not on Seymour. I'm gonna try to email Joey Shithead, he's the only person I can think of who might still be alive and has a web presence who might remember the place and if I get a hit I'll let you know. Thanks Michael!

[cheekydevil.livejournal.com]

That is AWESOME.

Here's another gem, though not from quite so far back. Gary Smith from Images In Vogue posted this on Facebook, it's video footage from 1982 from them performing at Pharoah's Nightclub in Gastown.

http://www.facebook.com/video/video.php?v=10150158626520052&oid=2314438448