Comments on: Original Offenders: Esther Wong

By: Junko

Junko — Fri, 27 May 2011 18:20:09 +0000

interesting… There’s a movement right now to preserve the Senor Fish building aka the Atomic Cafe where the Go-Go’s and all those punk rock bands played in the day. It is set to be demolished for the new subway station being built underneath. Apparently, the Go-Go’s got their name from the Go-go chicken served at Atomic cafe.

The building will not exist after ~2013/2014, but the history of it is planned to be integrated into the station design or somewhere in that vicinity.

By: Arturo hernandez

Arturo hernandez — Fri, 20 Aug 2010 03:41:38 +0000

Madame Wong’s West. Talk about good times and awesome L.A. History.Philip if u had a hard time sneeking in I was pretty much fortunate. One of my uncles was a bar tender there and every event happening on the weekends I was there for free. Trust me I saw it all good and bad.But like u said Ms Wong had a strong attitude in reallity she was real nice 2 let me hangout at the age of 8 rock on

By: Falling James

Falling James — Mon, 02 Aug 2010 23:30:58 +0000

Hate to crash the party, but the Ramones never played Madame Wong’s. (Complete lists of all of the shows in their long career are fully compiled in two of the Ramones’ biographies.) And, except for a brief experimental tryout of a handful of shows, Madame Wong banned most punk rock bands from playing there. It was the nearby Hong Kong Cafe that booked the punk bands in Chinatown in the late-’70s. Madame Wong’s primarily booked power-pop and new wave bands. She was never the “godmother of punk”; she hated punk rock and even banned women musicians for a long time because she felt that women in bands caused fights (!?). Sometimes the truth is stranger than this rose-colored nostalgia.

By: Threadbared, Outfitted (on this joy + ride) « threadbared

Threadbared, Outfitted (on this joy + ride) « threadbared — Thu, 08 Apr 2010 17:56:55 +0000

[...] a debauched 1979 New Wave party girl waking up on the toilet after a night out at the Mubahay, or Madame Wong’s, getting dressed for her day job reshelving at the public library downtown. I threw together these [...]

By: Lauren

Lauren — Wed, 03 Feb 2010 20:13:23 +0000

Esther Wong was my grandmother. It’s amazing to hear all these stories about Madame Wong’s and the people who were there. I was only 3 years old when Madame Wong’s West closed, so I obviously never got to experience it for myself, and as far as I can remember, she never talked about the restaurants. To everyone who shared their memories, thank you.

By: lynn

lynn — Fri, 04 Dec 2009 01:03:07 +0000

I love all these posts on original offenders.

“Once she made the Ramones clean up the graffiti they painted in her restroom before allowing them to play and they did it without complaining.”
That is SO badass.

Also, what an amazing businesswoman.

By: Howard

Howard — Wed, 02 Dec 2009 22:17:39 +0000

I remember going to the Santa Monica branch to eat once with a guy who introduced me to my lifelong love of Minimalism and his son, who was a budding turntablist….it was probably only a year or two before it closed. There was no band, but it made an impression on me anyway.

Thanks for sharing this, Phil!

By: Michael Sigman

Michael Sigman — Tue, 01 Dec 2009 18:54:53 +0000

In the early ’80s I was publisher of LA Weekly, and she would call and scream at me whenever we screwed up her ad, which happened all too frequently. I’d do my best to apologize, but she kept screaming, so I’d put the receiver down and do other stuff till she was finished.

By: anderson

anderson — Tue, 01 Dec 2009 15:50:38 +0000

Hey Phil,

Did you see the film I WAS BORN, BUT… by Roddy Bogawa. It’s awesome! After the death of Joey Ramone, Bogawa goes on a journey, revisiting the old haunts of his punk rock childhood in the LA scene and Madam Wongs is very prominent.

By: Gary Leonard

Gary Leonard — Tue, 01 Dec 2009 14:54:03 +0000

for the Record: it was Paul Greenstein who 1st brought the idea and booked the 1st bands at Madame wongs in China town. when she saw how much business it brought in she fired him.