Rough Trade July 1998

09 EDITORIAL
AIN'T LIKE IT USED TO BE
10 FICTION
THE INFINITY INCIDENT
14 CARLO ARMANI
BIG VIDEO
24 VINCE ROCKLAND
CENTAUR FILMS
36 SANDOR & ALEXEI
KRISTEN BJORN
46 BRIAN SHEA
BIG VIDEO
54 JACKSON DEDEAUX
FORUM STUDIOS
64 REVIEW
MERCURY RISING
68 FICTION
HEAT WAVE
72 ROD BARRY
FALCON STUDIOS

EDITORIAL NOTE
When you are as close to 50 as I am you can look back at the fifties, sixties, seventies, eighties and nineties and remember what it was like to walk into a bar in the fifties and compare it to today. My first gay bar was in Boston, Massachusetts and it was called the PUNCH BOWL. It was stuffed with men in their late teens to almost dead. Pants were tight and everyone had a basket. If you groped one you got a smile and an erection. The D.A. haircut was everywhere on the young being belittled by the older men near death, still wearing their 3-piece suit and tie, tie-tack, cufflinks and winged-tipped shoes. It was after 5:00pm so offices had closed and the older were having a martini before getting home to the wife and kids but hoping for a blow-job to finish their day before the "white picket fence" evening. Some of them talked about going over to the Lincoln Club for a drink. The Lincoln club was very elegant and catered to the more sophisticated Kennedy aides and State House personnel. The high ranks and titles would astound you.
The more affluent Filene's ribbon clerks and hairdressers from Jordan Marsh were gathered around the jukebox singing along to the latest Broadway Musical...West Side Story. When "I Feel Pretty" began, the boys around the juke box knew every single word. And the show had just opened. If only Carol Lawrence and Chita Rivera knew how famous they were in a little gay bar in Boston. Larry Kurt was a big hero with his songs from the musical until the Johnny Mathis versions hit the jukebox.
The Punch Bowl was a bar where couples stuck together and singles groped each other. No one had a condom in their wallet and if someone walked in wearing a leather cap, they were instantly shunned and soon they left. Couples who were lovers did not use the word, "lover" they used the word "friend" but emphasized the word so you got the picture. The word "gay" still meant "happy" to most of the country and was still used in movie titles, song titles and lyrics. Among the homosexuals the word "gay" was revered and was such a stamp of approval. Most customers had a real name for family and work and a bar name for being out in the world. There were no cell phones or answering machines. Answering services were so outrageously expensive only surgeons and senators belonged. You didn't have or need a car until summer when you went to the Cape. You rode the subway unless you met a 3-piece suit who drove you home after he took you to dinner and then to his abode where he poked your ass with his little dick. He would even have the audacity to ask you if it hurt. But you got a ride home and a promise to be taken to New York to see West Side Story. Only to discover that some other hot little ass was heading for New York with your date. He was considered "ROUGH TRADE" and had a 12 inch cock. My how those older men loved to exaggerate in front of we little puppies huddled around the juke box singing, "/ Want To Be In America."
As you may suspect, there were no Blacks, Hispanics, Orientals, etc. in the bars. Little Rock was just that...a little rock. It was okay to love Harry Belefonte, Johnny Mathis and Nat King Cole on the juke box but it stopped there.
A weekend escape took us to New York where the Anvil and the Mine Shaft were places to see. I will never forget walking into the Anvil and seeing a naked man standing on the bar, smoking a cigarette with his cock. Due to the laws in force I am not permitted to talk about what I saw in the Mine Shaft. One thing for sure, it was filled with "ROUGH TRADE!"
Chuck Edwards