New York Magazine, November 1999

Nightlife '99: Nightclub Limbo

These days, nightclub owners have to jump some serious hurdles to get the music pumping. But a new network of fixers-for-hire can help get a club past the hard spots -- if their clients don't go bankrupt first.

By Alec Foege

An Excerpt:

Noise complaints your problem? Give a holler to Al Fierstein, a professional acoustic consultant who makes the bulk of his living telling clubs like the Tunnel and the Roxy how to keep quiet. "Some of the measures I use -- and this varies in every case -- include putting up extra Sheetrock, lead lining for the walls, baffling on air-conditioning systems, concrete-block walls and sand-filled walls and ceilings, sound locks so noise doesn't travel around doors into the street," he says. The savviest owners, however, also take their own precautions. The proprietors

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