The Record from Hackensack, New Jersey • 21

TUESDAY. MARCH 8 Bridgt. B-2 Enttrtalnmtnt B-M What's Ahead B-2 TV Listings 0 0 0 By Jerry DeMarco Special to TtM Record doo-wop to rockabilly, new wave, and new music. A word of warning: Parking is a problem in the Washington Street area, although there are parking garages off the main drag. Most times you should plan on walking a few blocks.

The positive side is that these clubs are all within earshot of each other, so the hearty can try a variety in the same evening. Here's a sampling: A circle of musicians, writers, and Sj fefe, few Eto Jsrsey SC8iI The bar scene in Hoboken, from top, Mario Mazzola, an owner of Maxwell's; the outside of Rosebud's; drinks and musk at the Brass Rail; the Brass Rail bar. As condominium conversions and trendy restorations change the face of Hoboken by day, at least a half-dozen clubs along the city's main drag are razing a Hoboken myth after dark. Night life in this old working-class town no longer revolves around a shot, a beer, and a bag of nuts. Before Hoboken's face lift, a club designed for live music was as hard to find as a vacant apartment near the Hudson River waterfront is now.

As recently as four years ago, the only live (and legal) music shows were in piano bars, poolrooms, and a few restaurants that booked Top-40 cover bands. Mention Hoboken, and taverns inevitably came to mind. No wonder. At one time this Hudson County community of 42,000 had more bars per capita than any other city in the nation with one on nearly every corner and, sometimes, a few in between. Hoboken nightspots are no longer a forest of carved mahogany and sawdust Due in part to the influx of young, middle-class professionals (primarily Manhattan expatriates) and the need for an urban alternative to the highly competitive New York City club scene, live music is spreading along Washington Street, and the selection has become as richly diversified as the town's ethnic makeup.

Choices range from Jazz, folk, and 0 I A J. others in the local new-music community has grown at Maxwell's (1039 Washington 656-9632), giving the oldest and best-known of Hoboken's modern nightclubs its identity. "This is a music lover's room as opposed to a poseur's room," says Steve Fallon, who books talent at Maxwell's, summing up the relaxed though involved atmosphere. Maxwell's really has two rooms: a smoky rathskeller of a cafe-restaurant in front, and a toolshed-sized back room that for nearly four years has served a vital role in the Manhattan music scene. In both rooms, music and hobnobbing are the main attractions there are no video games, TV screens, or matchbooks with "Name" and "Number" printed on the inside.

i i 6 mm i i LIVE 4 LIVE MUSIC TT'j 'i ipim'iV'n in I'm Talking Heads, Blondie, and the Ra-mones) and what were then low rents. A watershed in local pop music was reached last week when the Bongos and the dB's were signed to contracts by major record labels. As the Bongos and dB's time their jump to the national stage, a "second wave" of local bands is swelling at Maxwell's. The most prominent so far is Steve Almass's Beat Rodeo, a coun-try-ish outfit that recalls the Everly Brothers. Like their predecessors, the Beat Rodeo is starting to reap the benefits of constant critical feedback from the New York rock press and the camaraderie that has developed among the musicians and friends who frequent Maxwell's.

Like the back room, Maxwell's front-room restaurant is intimate. Several tables are packed together almost right up to the bar so that standing room on weekends is tight As a consequence, service on weekends can be a bit slow. Some who attend the shows arrive around midnight the usual starting time for the opening act Others come around 10:30 p.m., grabbing a table and a bite to eat Jazz acts are booked into the front room most nights (no cover, no minimum). And Maxwell's jukebox, with See HOBOKEN, Page B-3 In 1978, Fallon, along with his brother and two sisters, bought what was then a workingman's bar at 10th and Washington streets, a block from the Maxwell House coffee factory. After opening a restaurant in the front room, Fallon and his siblings later that year built a knee-high stage in the back room and began booking rock-and-roll bands.

Maxwell's back room barely fits more than 100 people. Headliners often begin by 1 a.m., compared with much later starts at warehouse-sized New York City clubs. Admission rarely exceeds $5, less than half what you would pay to see the same performers in Manhattan. The sound, with Fallon at the mixing board, rings clear as a bell. Drinks are served in plastic cups, with prices around $2 each.

Those most responsible for putting Maxwell's (and Hoboken) on the rock-and-roll map are a trio of local bands: the Bongos, the dB's, and the Individuals, each with members who live in Hoboken. Most of the musicians in these bands are in their mid-to-late twenties. Some emigrated to Hoboken in the middle Seventies from, among other places, Winston-Salem, N.C.; Columbus, Ohio; and Haledon, J. All were drawn by the proximity to what was then an exploding Manhattan music scene (popularized by groups like TTh I WIJ Staff photo by ni fuiMM, Pitw MoniMt, tnd Amy Davit or the prize NJ. catch phrase Fishing By Michael Kelly SUff Wrltw "You've got a friend In Pennsylvania." Virginians voice: "Virginia is for lovers." Massachusetts residents mutter (perhaps with tongue In cheek): "Make it In Massachusetts." New Hampshire natives announce: "We're better natured." Texans tease: "Come Live the Legend." Even Bergen County, with the help of Harold Mishkin of Paramus, has a slogan to commemorate Its 300th birthday this month: "I'm Braggtn' "bout Bergen." What kind of slogan Is the state after? "Something that people can get behind," says Richard Stur, the account executive at See SLOGAN, Page B-12 Watson, 32-year-old Cape May bureau chief of The Atlantic City Press, received almost 200 slogan suggestions.

He promptly turned them over to Governor Kean, who, according to Watson, said he "liked" a few of the suggestions, especially one from Mary Boyce of Del Haven: "eNJoy." But Ms. Boyce's offering lost some luster when It was found to be too similar to the slogan of the New Jersey Travel and Resort Association: "NJoy NJ." As the search expanded, another problem emerged: The number of top-notch, original mottoes left to choose from was limited because so many other states, cities, counties, and villages had already officially claimed certain slogans. For Instance, Pennsylvanlans now preach: Victoria Schmidt, director of the state Division of Travel and Tourism: "It Isn't hard to come up with a slogan. It's just hard to come up with the right one." It's not that New Jersey has never had a slogan. It's just that the current catch phrase, "New Jersey's got If was never catchy enough to be printed on T-shirts, bumper stickers, matchbooks, and coffee cups not to mention tour brochures that tout the state.

Instead of pride, the slogan's dual meaning Inspired scores of jokes. For every person who proudly said New Jersey's "got" wide beaches and glitzy casinos, another laughingly added that the state's "got" toxic waste, oil refineries, and mosquitoes. So began ths search for a new state slogan and a spate of problems as frustrating as the northbound lanes of the Garden State Parkway at 6 p.m. on a summer Sunday. For starters, the Union advertising firm of Bozell and Jacobs, hired to manage a $1-million spring and summer promotional campaign for New Jersey, suggested two slogans: "New Jersey and You: Perfect Together," and "New Jersey Will Win Your Heart Away." But when these slogans generated all the excitement of an evening stroll through a meadow lands swamp, they were quickly scrapped.

As the embarrassed promotional team from Bozell and Jacobs returned to the quiet of its offices to ponder more mar ket surveys, a newspaper reporter was Inviting ordinary citizens to submit recommendations. In less than a month, the reporter, BUI The result should be short with a broad meaning. Jokes are out Bragging is In, as long as it's not overdone. It's called slogan writing, and It's supposed to be simple. Not so in New Jersey.

For more than two years, state officials have grappled with ways to find a slogan that would do for the Garden State what "I Love New York" has done for the Empire State: boost tourism and Improve the state's poor Image as the home of trash dumps and mobsters. But the task sometimes has seemed as difficult as picking the winning numbers In the million-dollar lottery. Says.