photo of Nick Corasaniti by Danny Clinch
Nick Corasaniti's I Don't Want to Go Home: The Oral History of the Stone Pony was just published by Harper Books. It is a fascinating look at both the history of the Stone Pony and the rise, fall, and rebirth of Asbury Park itself. The book includes interviews with a staggering number of people including musicians, DJs, reporters, Stone Pony employees, music industry professionals, people involved with Asbury Park, and even a few governors. It also features some exclusive, never-before-seen photos from Danny Clinch.
Musicians interviewed include legendary Asbury Park artists like Bruce Springsteen, Steve Van Zandt, and Southside Johnny, but the book goes on to include artists from throughout the Pony's history. There are interviews with national artists like Dave Davies of the Kinks, Jesse Malin, Jack Johnson, Jorma Kaukonen, Graham Parker, and Huey Lewis to name a few; plus Jersey artists like The Bouncing Souls, Gaslight Anthem, Jack Antonoff, the Jonas Brothers. The "cast of character" runs four pages and is followed by a foreword by Bruce Springsteen himself.
The book does a wonderful job of giving readers an idea of how intrinsic music is to Asbury Park and how the town's history and its musical history are woven together. The book begins with artists talking about clubs like the Orchid Lounge and Upstage Club and how the riots in 1970 changed the town. It's got stories about the Fast Lane; the famous softball games between Pony staff and teams with members of the E Street Band and Asbury Jukes; and how the Pony began booking national acts. It dives into how the change in the drinking age affected the club industry and how bad politics and crooked politicians kept the town down.
Most of all, it shows the bond between artists, music fans, and the club - and how that bond has kept the Stone Pony going throughout all of the changes in the town over the last five decades.
Nick Corasaniti was born and raised in the Garden State and works as a domestic correspondent covering national politics for the New York Times. He splits his time between Brooklyn and Asbury Park. New Jersey Stage reached out to Nick to learn more about the book and why he thinks pork roll is actually "Taylor Ham."
I liked how you set the book up in a way that to fully understand the story of the Stone Pony, you really need to know about the way Asbury Park was in the years before and throughout its run. Do you think that was instinctual for you because you started going to Asbury in the '90s when the town was at its worst and the way it is today is drastically different?
I don’t think I had that’s connection in my mind. I really wanted to start with the riots for two main reasons: I wanted the reader to get a sense of the town, community and history of Asbury Park so they could get a greater understanding of the world that the Stone Pony would soon inhabit, and how that influenced all of the local artists. And while the book is an oral history of The Stone Pony, I also wanted it to be a history of Asbury Park, and the riots were such a major inflection point in the history of the town.
The book is designed as if you have people all together in one room just sharing their memories. It’s a great format, but must have been both a joy and pure hell to organize. Was this always how you planned to present it?
It was truly a labor of love, but I always knew I wanted to do an oral history. When you’ve got 50 years of a place, with so many characters and eras to go through, it’s so much more fulfilling to hear the stories unfiltered from those who experienced it. I also like going into an interview armed with anecdotes and memories from other artists to free the memories of the people I’m interviewing. The reader really gets the vibe that they’re just a fly on the wall of a great conversation. And I think the book does a great job of letting you be a fly on the wall backstage at the Pony, with all the greats coming through.
I love the way the artists who were all part of the early years at the Pony remember those times well and you truly get the feeling they all wanted each other to succeed. That’s one thing I’ve always seen in Asbury. Do you think that’s the same vibe in other music cities? That everyone relishes in the success of others? Or is that something born out of being in a town that is very much an underdog?
I think there are a ton of similarities between Asbury Park and New Orleans. Two music cities that have often been on the wrong end of good luck, yet the collaborative spirit between musicians there is what gives the place its soul. Just like Bruce could randomly jump up unannounced at the Pony, so too could any of the Neville Brothers or Trombone Shorty or Kermit Ruffins or any legend of the area hop on any stage unannounced on any night. That spontaneity is infectious, it is addictive for the audience, and keeps everyone coming back, even when other parts of the town around the venues is falling apart.
It’s wild that you have Governor Christie talking about going to the Pony at 16 with a fake ID! What’s the craziest thing someone told you (or admitted to) while making this book?
I still can’t get over that bouncers, bartenders and regulars at the Pony would eat glass as a show of toughness. Boggles my mind. As someone said in the book, that might have been the memory Bruce was channeling when he wrote the lyrics “And the boys try to look so hard.”
Was there any one event that inspired this book? Were you at the club one night and the idea just came to you?
It was more my first return to Asbury Park back in early 2017. I had been gone for a long time due to work (at one point I was living in Washington, D.C.) so I had no idea of the renaissance Asbury was experiencing while I was away. When I first set foot in town, and didn’t see the rotting C-8 structure and instead saw glimmering condos and all these bustling restaurants on Cookman Avenue, I was like “What happened here?!” So I wanted to tell that story, and the Pony is one of the lone constant threads stretching back 50 years that’s still going strong.
You spoke with an amazing number of people for this book. How long were you working on it?
It was an off again, on again project from about 2019 to 2022, as I juggled my day job as a political reporter for The New York Times in two critical elections and a pandemic that made doing in-person interviews quite difficult. But I really turned to the book full time as soon as the 2022 election ended.
For a project like this one, I think most people would generally have had someone who served as a lynchpin to help get things going. Was Danny Clinch was that guy for you? If so, when and where did you and Danny first meet?
The book would not be possible without Tim Donnelly and Danny Clinch. I had met Danny at an iStar event sometime in early 2017, and I met Tim when I was covering SeaHearNow in 2019. They both became fast friends of mine. I like to say Tim was both the shaman and sherpa of the book, my constant gut check who made countless connections for me, and Danny was instrumental in connecting with some of the most critical artists (and providing lots of photos for the book, including six never-before-seen shots from his personal archive.) They both are always thinking of Asbury first, and are some of the fiercest advocates for live music. The success of SeaHearNow is a testament to that. Every town would be better off if it had a Tim and Danny.
The book would also never have been successful if not for Merissa Fleischhauer, who I call my Asbury guardian angel. She gave me in-demand rooms and personal run of the gorgeous lounge at The St. Laurent to conduct more than 50 interviews in the book (often over the knockout burger at lunch) with artists who needed a bit of privacy.
Were there people who were hard for you to track down? Or was this one of those things where artists started sending other artists your way?
The most challenging part was simply working around artists who were on tour with a busy schedule. Tours can be grueling. Even for the biggest artists, they’re still sleeping overnight on a bus going from one city to the next. So finding a time when they could both be thoughtful about their memories and also not overburden them on an already exhausting touring schedule was always a challenge, but I’m so grateful so many made it work.
There are obviously many prominent musicians from the area who are no longer with us. Who is someone you wish you could have spoken with?
Clarence Clemons, without a doubt. There are probably more than a dozen Clarence stories (at least half from Sam Moore, they were apparently quite the duo) that didn’t end up in the book just because I didn’t have his voice around to balance them out. He was a larger than life figure in the truest sense, and we miss him every day.
When some think about the history of the Stone Pony they tend to think about the first decade when Bruce Springsteen had just put out Born to Run, artists like Southside Johnny were signed, and industry reps were checking out bands like The Shakes, Cahoots, and The Shots. But you also dive into the Pony's second half with a look at how the club rebounded from closing in 1991, the Warped Tours, emergence of the Summer Stage and the Sea. Hear. Now festival, plus bands that you fell in love with. How important was it for you to include acts that were more from your time period? Did it give you a sense of pride to spotlight these artists?
I am so proud of the music scene I came up in. Aside from my parents, I really think I was raised by punk music and Bruce Springsteen, and what we had in basements and legion halls in New Jersey was truly special. Jack Antonoff, who knows a thing or two about the music business, affirmed my senses when he said just how unique and important the New Jersey scene was in that late 90s era. There are so many bands that wrote some of the catchiest melodic punk that either were from NJ or made their name in New Jersey, from local legends like Lanemeyer, LWL, Centsless and The Youth Ahead to ones that gained national acclaim like My Chemical Romance, Midtown, Bigwig, Armor for Sleep and Catch 22/Streetlight Manifesto.
And two of the biggest to ever come out of New Jersey also put down roots in Asbury Park: The Bouncing Souls and The Gaslight Anthem. These are two foundational bands to me, to New Jersey and to American music in general, and it gave me such joy to be able to talk to them for the book.
Tell me about one or two of your favorite shows you saw at the Pony.
Oh man, there’s dozens. But if I had to pick a single one, it is the 2019 Southside Johnny show where Bruce did indeed show up and play for 45 minutes. We took my dad as an early birthday present, and man, did Bruce and Southside and the Jukes deliver.
What's a Pony show you WISH you had been able to see?
The 1984 Born in the USA tour kickoff. To have someone that galactic, on the precipice of true superstardom, take the stage with the full band unannounced and play what would become one of the biggest records in the world would have been an out of body experience.
Finally, tell me a little about yourself. Where did you grow up? How long have you been working at the New York Times? What in the world makes a guy who splits his time in Asbury Park call it Taylor Ham ? LOL
I grew up in North Jersey in Morris County, which is why it is Taylor Ham (and it is! As I’ve always said, we don’t call Jet Skis “water recreational devices,” we call them JetSkis. Sometimes the lexicon latches on to the brand name). And I’ve been at The New York Times for about 16 years, and have been covering politics for the Times for 13 years.
Any promotional events planned for the book?
OH YES!
We are throwing a blowout concert at The Pony on Saturday, June 8, and its going to be in the style of the Pony’s “golden era.” We’re going to have a house band led by Marc Ribler, and have more than a dozen special guests to take the stage, from Asbury legends like Bobby Bandiera, Lance Larson and Vini “Maddog” Lopez to members of Skid Row, The Gaslight Anthem, The Bouncing Souls, The Smithereens and TT Quick, plus tons of other special guests! You don’t want to miss. Doors at 7pm, show starts at 8. Books will be for sale and I’ll sign them all. Tickets here.
For my hometown people, I’ll be doing a Q and A at the Library of the Chathams with my high school film crit teacher (and guitar club supervisor) Terrance “Ferg” Ferguson on Tuesday June 11.
The next night, June 12 from 7-10 pm, we’ll be doing selected readings from the book, along with a special musical guest, at The St. Laurent lounge in Asbury Park. Come for some fun stories, music, and (I’m not exaggerating one bit here) the absolute best cocktails in New Jersey! RSVP for free here.
