Jimmy Webb died this week. He was 62; the cause was cancer.
His death has been recorded by Gothamist, Rolling Stone, and Consequence of Sound, but not the New York Times, so I feel an obligation to remember him here, even if this blog hasn’t launched yet.
Jimmy was called to New York by a Lou Reed song, and though a bout with addiction sent him home, he returned to the city he loved. He loved New York City passionately, and his presence defined an entire neighborhood.
The beauty of New York is its people. The blood, sweat, tears, and leopard print catsuits are what make its neighborhoods vibrant and unique.
Jimmy is best known as a figure at Trash & Vaudeville, where he demanded his patrons wear tighter, lower-cut pants. When the store moved to East Seventh in 2016, he struggled to enjoy the new location, but gave up and opened his own store, I NEED MORE in 2017 on Orchard Street on the Lower East Side.
Jimmy was one of my customers in the East Village. I worked at the corner of St. Mark’s Place, and was required to wear black, which I happen to own a lot of, so I would often play the Clash station on Pandora during long, hot, miserable shifts. (I swear that I saw Joe Strummer on St. Mark’s when I was in high school.) Jimmy would come in for a small coffee and a brown sugar Pop Tart on the way to work. He loved sugar and he wanted his coffee to be mostly half and half. He laughed easily and often, and he was endlessly kind and gracious. He made you feel special without any effort at all.
He will be missed terribly by everyone who was fortunate to have his light shone on them.
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