The Peppermint Lounge
The Peppermint Lounge
The Peppermint Lounge, or The "Pep," a mid-town biker bar on West 45th Street between Sixth and Seventh Avenues in New York, was the site where rock 'n' roll and youth culture crossed generational and social boundaries. A brief mention by Cholly Knickerbocker (Oleg Cassini) in September of 1961 in the Journal-American made the tiny club a mecca for society types and celebrities. Judy Garland, Noel Coward, Elsa Maxwell, Greta Garbo, and the Duke and Duchess of Bedford mingled with a young crowd, many of them New Jerseyites attracted by New York's 18-year-old drinking age. They twisted to the music of the house band, Joey Dee and the Starliters, who shortly thereafter had a number one record with Peppermint Twist-Part I and starred in a movie, Hey, Let's Twist. Extensive media coverage re-ignited the Twist dance craze and made it an international phenomenon.
—Louis Scheeder
Further Reading:
Carpozi, Geroge, Jr. Let's Twist. New York, Pyramid Books, 1962.
Dawson, Jim. The Twist: The Story of the Song and Dance That Changed the World. Boston and London, Faber & Faber, 1995.
Lucchese, John A. Joey Dee and The Story of the Twist. New York, MacFadden, 1962.