A mural dedicated to Coventry on the exterior wall of Sanger Hall. Photo: Shane O’Brien
Oct. 31, 2024 By Shane O’Brien
A new mural dedicated to an iconic Queens music venue at the forefront of the New York punk and glam rock revolution was officially unveiled at Sanger Hall in Sunnyside Wednesday evening.
The mural pays tribute to Coventry, a legendary rock club that opened at 47-03 Queens Blvd. in 1972 and helped launch the careers of iconic bands such as the Ramones, the New York Dolls and Kiss, who played their first-ever gig at the venue in 1973.
The new mural, painted by artists Dylon Thomas Burns and Dylan Bauver, is on the exterior wall of Sanger Hall, a cocktail bar located at 48-20 Skillman Ave.
Charlie Sub, the son of Coventry founder Paul Sub, said he chose Sanger Hall for the mural because the original Coventry location on Queens Boulevard has since been torn down, while Sanger Hall is one of the closest venues to the original location that offers live music.
As part of the evening’s celebrations, Charlie and Paul Sub were presented with the prestigious Queensmark Award by the Queens Historical Society in honor of Coventry’s impact on music history. The Queensmark Award will now be fixed to a building standing at Coventry’s original location on Queens Boulevard.
The evening also featured a musical performance from Charlie Sub & Sound Dogs to mark the occasion.
Paul Sub, who is now 94, founded Coventry in 1972 after moving to the US as a Holocaust survivor from Austria. He had previously opened a coffee shop in Manhattan called Zodiac that became a popular hang-out spot for celebrated artists of the era such as Bob Dylan, which inspired him to open a music venue in Queens.
His son Charlie, who remembers scooping gum of Coventry’s floor as a teenager while acts such as the Ramones drank in the bar, said his father encouraged all musicians to audition to play at Coventry, providing an opportunity for fledgling glam and punk rock bands.
Artist Dylan Bauver (center, white jacket) with his arms around Charlie and Paul Sub. Photo: Shane O’Brien
“Anyone who wanted to play could play,” Charlie Sub said. “He had to hear them, but as long as they weren’t completely horrible, he would let them play.”
When it opened in 1972, the venue featured five different stages. Due to financial constraints, it was reduced to three stages and then finally to two stages before closing at the end of the 1970s.
“It’s great to have a venue that caters to a certain genre of music, but if not a lot of people are coming to see it, you can’t pay the rent.”
Charlie said he remembers Kiss’s first-ever performance at Coventry in 1973 but said the glam rock band, which became renowned for their full-face make-up, smoking guitars and pyrotechnics, was not even close to being the most outrageous act to perform at the venue.
“We had fire eaters. We had a guy called Satan,” Charlie recalled.
Charlie said the mural has been a long time coming, adding that it tells the visual story of Coventry while also providing a QR code connecting passers-by to a textual history of the venue.
“We didn’t want it to just be a mural. We wanted it to be a story,” Charlie Sub said. “It’s an immigrant story, and it just happens to be a rock and roll immigrant story. We definitely wanted to pursue what we thought was important.”
Charlie and Paul Sub worked closely with Burns and Bauver to create the mural that now lines the side of Sanger Hall.
Burns said the group spent weeks developing the concept for the mural, stating that the piece celebrates the history of Coventry while also bringing color to the local area.
“One of the greatest aspects of it is the joy it brings to the community,” Burns said. “I like how there’s that historical element to it, but it’s just about bringing color to an area that seems to really be receptive to it, and we couldn’t be happier.”
Bauver, meanwhile, said he has been painting murals around New York City for years but said the Coventry mural is special because it memorializes family.
He added that murals have the power to transform entire streets, stating that the Coventry mural will bring additional color to the neighborhood.
“It changes everything,” Bauver said. “It brings a conversation, brings color, brings life.”
Both Bauver and Burns hope that the mural will attract music fans and passers-by alike, drawing more people to the local area.
“I think it’s great that people get to come and enjoy a new piece of art that can change up the whole scenery of a neighborhood,” Bauver said.
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