club kids

a group of eccentric, wildly flamboyant young clubgoers who more or less defined new york city nightlife in the late 1980s and early 1990s. led my michael alig, who formed a coterie of young misfits (with aliases such as james st. james, richie rich, leigh bowery, kenny kenny, walt paper and amanda lepore) and promoted the notorious disco 2000 party which took place every wednesday night at the limelight. the limelight (now the avalon, at 6th and 21st) was homebase for the club kids. other venues included tunnel, palldium and club usa. all of these clubs were owned by peter gatien. house was the favored musical genre, ecstacy the favored drug (along with ketamine and, later on, heroin). the club kids dressed in outrageous, over the top, often risque outfits and costumes. though not exclusively gay, the rave scene they started in new york had a definite homosexual bent and was hugely popular among drag queens and transgendered individuals. escalating drug use and overdoses and more and more cases of aids among the club kids, along with then-mayor rudy giuliani's crackdown on nightlife in manhattan led to the demise of the club kids. michael alig murdered his drug dealer in 1996 and is currently still in prison.