Patti Smith, Flea Bid Farewell to Iconic Punk Club

The determination to renew and rise up was present in nearly every original song she sang, and most of the covers. Smith's band featured lifelong members Kaye and drummer Jay Dee Daugherty, bassist-keyboard player Tony Shanahan and guest bassist for much of the night Flea of the Red Hot Chili Peppers. And they accompanied Smith with warm understatement in the first set, which included Lou Reed's "Pale Blue Eyes" -- a staple of her early shows -- "Ghost Dance" from 1978's Easter and the resurrection story "Birdland" from her 1976 debut album, Horses. She also performed a new, blunt reminder of the crisis raging outside the club's doors. "Without Chains" was a quietly searing indictment of the Bush administration's disregard for human rights at the American military prison in Guantanamo Bay, Cuba -- "our particular shame," she said, introducing the song, "a stain on the United States."

The long electric blowout started with Smith belting the Dead Boys' "Sonic Reducer." She dedicated "Redondo Beach" to her first manager Jane Friedman, "Pissing in a River" to her late brother and original road manager Todd and "Space Monkey" to R.E.M.'s Michael Stipe. Smith put her own spin on the apocalypse in the Rolling Stones' "Gimme Shelter" ("Love, forgiveness, peace -- it's just a breath away!") and included part of Television's "Little Johnny Jewel" in "Rock and Roll Nigger," with Richard Lloyd back on guitar. The boys in the band got a pair of spotlights -- a Ramones medley and the Yardbirds' "For Your Love" -- and Smith's encore was the inevitable, galloping "Land," appended with a blazing "Gloria."

The weight of the occasion finally got to her then -- that this magic would never happen again on this stage. Smith was on the verge of tears, somewhere between sadness and ecstasy, as the crowd shouted "G-L-O-R-I-A" with her. But she quickly recovered for a final benediction. "Jesus died for somebody's sins, but not" -- Smith and the band paused dramatically -- "CBGB's!"

Amen.

For more coverage on the finals days of CBGB, click here.