Hilly Kristal, whose rock club CBGB was the birthplace of the U.S. punk rock movement, has died. He was 75.

CBGB rock club owner Hilly Kristal, seen at the New York club in 2006, has died of lung cancer.
(Henny Ray Abrams/Associated Press)

Kristal died Tuesday at Cabrini Hospital in New York City after a battle with lung cancer.

Last year Kristal lost a fight to stop the club, a launching pad for bands such as the Ramones, Blondie and Talking Heads, from being evicted from its home of 33 years.

The club's glory days were long past by the time it shut down, but the CBGB name will be remembered for its influence on a generation of musicians.

"He created a club that started on a small, out-of-the-way skid row, and saw it go around the world," said Lenny Kaye, a longtime member of the Patti Smith Group.

"Everywhere you travelled around the world, you saw somebody wearing a CBGB T-shirt."

Kristal was a singer-songwriter who was raised on a farm but always had an interest in music.

''I think I always felt I was going to do something in music — maybe as a violinist, maybe as a composer," he said in a 1999 interview.

"It was, more or less, classical music for me then. I think I probably started singing as a teenager."

He became interested in pop music and had a singing career that included appearances at Radio City Music Hall. 

Kristal had a deep bass voice and continued to sing whenever he had the opportunity, but he released only one CD, Mad Mordecai, in 1999.

He began managing New York music clubs in the late 1950s, beginning at The Village Vanguard, then with his own club, Hilly's on Ninth Street in the late '60s.

The club he opened in 1973 in the Bowery was initially called Hilly's on the Bowery, later CBGB & OMFUG, which stood for Country, Bluegrass, Blues and Other Music For Uplifting Gourmandisers.

He hoped to create a mecca for country, bluegrass and blues music, but the club instead became an epicentre of the mid-'70s punk movement.

"There was never gourmet food, and there was never country bluegrass," his son Mark Dana Kristal said Wednesday.

CBGB became known for its frenzied crowds, its cockroaches and defiant bands such as the Ramones and the Talking Heads.

Bands credit Kristal

Many bands that went on to become headliners, including Patti Smith, Blondie and
Television, credit Kristal with giving them a start.

Kristal "was our champion and in those days, there were very few," punk poet Smith said at the venue's last show.

Kristal would only book bands playing original material.

"Other clubs were all about models and beautiful people, and he was about letting the musicians in for free to hear music and get cheap beers," said David Byrne, lead singer with Talking Heads.

"It automatically created a scene, and we'd just hang out all night."

Kristal made more money out of CBGB's marketing arm, selling T-shirts and accessories with the club's familiar logo, than out of the club itself.

CBGB rented its space from the building's owner, the Bowery Residents' Committee, an agency that houses homeless people and by 2000, the committee was feuding with the club over back rent.

Final show

After the eviction became inevitable, stars such as Blondie's Deborah Harry and Smith returned for a final show last October.

Kristal was bitter over the loss of CBGBs, but continued to have plans to open a Las Vegas incarnation of the infamous venue as he battled cancer.

His other legacy to the New York music scene was creation, with Ron Delsener, of the popular Rheingold-Schaeffer concert festival in Central Park. His daughter founded the Hilly Kristal Foundation for Musicians and Artists in his name.

Kristal is survived by his daughter, Lisa Kristal Burgman, son, Mark Dana Kristal, son-in-law Ger Burgman, grandchildren Jenny and Adam Burgman and the thousands of artists and musicians who played the club.

A private memorial service is planned and a public memorial will be held at a later date.

With files from the Associated Press