Thursday, September 18, 2008

Cake Shop

Anyone who knows me knows that my favorite food is cake. Specifically, white cake with white (or pink) frosting from the now defunct Your Just Desserts in West Hartford, CT. Frosting flowers are also enjoyed (by me). As YJD does not exist in NYC, nay, at all, I am left to find other cake-ing options. Yes, yes, we all know of Magnolia, which is great. And I know I've said this before, but if you either vehemently defend or attack the deliciousness of a cupcake, as people so often do in regards to Magnolia, you need to get your priorities straight. It's a cupcake, get over it, it's going to be amazing anyway you slice it.

Anyway, you can't sit down at Magnolia or it's sister, Billy's Bakery. However, at one shining beacon on the Lower East Side, across the street from my apartment, you can, and it's called, of all things, Cake Shop. I'm going to skip the fact that it's pretentious and hipster and I think it's supposed to be British 'cause they serve tea and Marmite and maybe because of this "cakes" means many more things than just my white on white cake, like, savoury items as well. See, I just wrote the English spelling of savoury.

Despite, or because of all those things, you can take a seat- you always have your own table because it's never crowded-or a couch if you prefer, and just hang. I like to write there. There's always an outlet handy and I eat scones. Yes, scones. You can also have a slice of cake, a cupcake or other delicious baked goods that involve saying the word vegan.

However, what I've been trying to get to and the BEST thing about Cake Shop is that it also doubles as a music venue downstairs. Because of this, the people who work there know their shit about music and EVERY TIME I go there I fall in love with another song that I don't know, I google the lyrics, and BAM I've found my new favorite band/song of the week/month/year. So here are a couple of Cake Shop discovery songs that I listen to on repeat.

"Higher Ground" by The Feelies (This is the song that started my love affair with Cake Shop music)
"Crazy Rhythms" by The Feelies
"Crazy" by Galaxie 500
"Final Day" by Young Marble Giants
"Black Eye" by Uncle Tupelo
"Milky Way" by Syd Barrett

It should be mentioned that The Last Shadow Puppets also performed a secret show there that I saw, and that the first time I heard "The Age of the Understatement" and "In the Heat of the Morning," which lead me to download the original Bowie version which is quite splendid indeed. I also have a creepy high school type crush on Alex Turner, but that's neither here nor there.

1 comment:

Blanket said...

i have gone from astoria to cake shop strictly to buy a cupcake and get back on the train and go back to astoria. that godd. that effing good.