Target Video Cleanup

Jeanine, Jackie & Jill hitting the Target bar, Feb. 1980.

  Photo: Linda Vestal Ratto.

On May 13, 1980 Joe left Target HQ for 3 weeks in NYC. He was off to see Jill who’d set up some shoots and probably a show. I’ll post more on that at a later date. The warehouse got a breather after weeks of activity and mayhem.

Cleaning the checkered, tiled floor always went faster with the great sounds blaring from our jukebox full of classics old and new. We always worked with music whether live, from the jukebox or projected video. It gave life to the cavernous brick studio. The jukebox was our own gem in the pre-streaming, pre-pandora days but like them, it was free. It was stocked with the greatest singles, and they were vinyl. Eddie Cochran, the Shirelles, the Specials, Black Flag, Gang of Four, the Sex Pistols, the Ramones, the Avengers, the Dils, James Chance, Martha and the Vandellas, the Cramps, the Clash, James Brown, Gene Vincent, Flipper, Tuxedomoon, the Mutants and Linton Kwesi Johnson were only a few in the collection. Bands usually came by with their new single and it got added to the collection at one point or another. Let me know if you had your single in the box. I’ve bugged Joe for years look for the box of singles that got packed up after the SF earthquake.

So, back to cleaning the floor. It was usually caked with a brew of cigarettes, beer, gum and sweat. It was easy to sweep up the beer cans and bottles (at least those we didn’t break for recreation), but the coating of goo was a much tougher task. I remember the smell of the process as being a mixture of hexol and nicotine. God awful. Like being in that can of beer you just drank with the butt in it.

Hours after the task was accomplished, we’d cop some cheap Andre champagne and tuna sandwiches at the Asian liquor store on the corner of 18^th & South Van Ness. Or maybe we'd hit Whiz Burger. We’d settle in at the Target bar (situated at the entrance to the studio) before heading out into the city.