I watched the movie KIDS the other night for the first time since it came out in 1995. There’s that one scene where everyone goes to NASA, the huge party at the club which was a real party at club Shelter in the 1990’s in New York City. And it reminded me of the time I met world famous NYC rave promoter, Scotto in Philly one day, who ran and created NASA. That meeting was over 8 years ago so I wanted to see what he’s been up to, so I hit up Google. And oh shit. My man has been busy in the web game.
Arthur Weinstien (R.I.P.) and Scotto at Limelight 1991 working the lights together in the Dj booth
On his website, Scotto.tv he has uploaded and encoded a ton of Quicktime movies from the early 90’s rave scene from club nights he promoted or ran. These include clips at Limelight, NASA, Ritz, The Building as well as footage taken from mainstream media such as television programs about raves and more. He also has a huge archive of NASA flyers on his site and a collection of MP3 DJ sets available for download/purchase as far back as NASA’s launch nite in 1992.
I was happy to see he took such extraordinary care in preserving and sharing this moment in time. From his website:
SCOTTO IS ONE OF AMERICA’s FOUNDING FATHERS OF THE UNDERGROUND ELECTRONIC DANCE MUSIC and RAVE SCENE, WITH HIS LEGENDARY NYC “NASA” RAVES, AS SEEN IN THE MOVIE “KIDS” AND ALSO FOR HIS RAVESTOCK AT WOODSTOCK ’94. FOR 20 YEARS ALONG THE WAY, HIS UNIQUE PERSPECTIVE AND ACCESS ALLOWED HIM TO FILM HIS LIGHTSHOWS & EVENTS THAT HE PRODUCED AT NYC CLUBS, RAVES, FESTIVALS & WITH BANDS LIKE MOBY and DEE-LITE ON WORLD TOURS — ALL HIS SPARE TIME WAS SPENT CAPTURING AMAZING, SURREAL, COLORFUL ONE-OF-A-KIND and HISTORIC MOMENTS IN THE NYC NIGHTLIFE SCENE AND WITNESSING THE BIRTH OF THE U.S. ELECTRONIC MUSIC MOVEMENT DURING THE 1990’s.
See also: Scotto Myspace
Random trivia: CHLOE SEVINGY was the coatcheck girl at NASA before landing her first major acting role in KIDS 😉 1