ILAB Punks Out

By Tom Congalton

Ever wonder what rare booksellers do after a book fair?

If you guessed “almost anything” you’d probably be correct. But one particular past-time that rare booksellers pursue is music. Many ILAB members are musicians, both professional and otherwise.

This year, after the doors closed on the Friday of the New York Antiquarian Book Fair, several dozen rare booksellers reconvened in a subterranean cavern at New York City’s Lit Lounge to take in a performance by Dear Althea, a nearly all-girl punk band, featuring lead singer and guitarist Ashley Wildes, whose daytime alter-ego is that of a mild-mannered cataloguer at Between the Covers Rare Books. Just in case the bibliophilic connection isn’t clear enough for you, accompanying her on bass was Lisa Gaub, whose husband Andrew many know for his work at Bruce McKittrick Rare Books.

Along with drummer Kait Pawko and lead guitarist Dean DeCampli, the band played to an enthusiastic international audience of booksellers, librarians, punks, and hipsters, in what promises (or perhaps threatens) to become an annual tradition.

Here the band performs “Whirlwind”.

More Dear Althea videos are available

>>> on YouTube

More about the New York Antiquarian Book Fair

>>> on ILAB.org