Jenn Hampton’s groundbreaking work as GM of the original Asbury Lanes, which was created during the height of ruin, served as an indispensable stalwart in the history of Asbury Park. During her tenure, she created a cult of cool clubhouse that perfectly captured the potently raw meeting of music and art. In the eleven years at Asbury Lanes, Jenn helped to create a national and international fan base of performers, bands and burlesque acts, in addition to creating an innovative gallery program that focused on young art collectors. The success of Asbury Lanes helped to create a destination in Asbury Park for music lovers, artists and performers from all over the country. She and her partner, artist Jill Ricci, opened Parlor Gallery in 2009 featuring innovative work by some of the best emerging and established artists. Over the past five years, Hampton has been entrusted by national real estate developer Madison Marquette, one of the lead developers in Asbury Park, to create and curate the Wooden Walls Project, a public arts program that showcases murals and public art on the Asbury Park Boardwalk. Wooden Walls has been the recipient of international acclaim and is Asbury Park’s greatest social media calling card. Boy Scout talked to Hampton about psychological puzzles, basement shows and social media soul.
Boy Scout: If you arrived in Abury Park in 2019 filled with great ambition, how might you ascend to your artistic summit?
Jenn Hampton: Asbury Park. I like “How would I ascend to my artistic summit?” Does anyone ever have a summit? I feel like that's the beauty of being a creative. You don't know where you ever get to? So, I guess if I came to Asbury Park in 2019, I would look at the history of the culture, and all the wonderful things that have happened musically, and I would jar to try to put Asbury Park on the map or other creative endeavors. So, I would focus on art, I would focus on performance art, and theater, and try to elevate what people think of New Jersey… and I know that that's a huge, daunting task… but I think that if I got here today, that that would be the first thing I would do is try to show people that there's a whole bunch of creative endeavors that have been overshadowed by that history and people are like “Where’s Asbury Park? What's that? Is that where Bruce Springsteen's from?” that should not be the only thing that lies in the history of Asbury Park.
Boy Scout: In a time of faltering news platforms, transient facts and generations who opt for digital currency over great literature, how will the stories of those that came before us survive?
Jenn Hampton: I have say about “fake news” and “false narratives,” and sadly Asbury Park suffers from all of those things… I think that it's a small microcosm of a national sort of crisis that I think that we have. What's interesting, that not to diverge to go forward, there's a woman in town who started a temporary museum, and when you walk through as a creative you see that you're long and a line of lineage of people that you've never heard of because there was no technology then. There was a written record but only so many people have had it and a lot of people have died off. So, I think that the only thing that we have in this sort of platform today is what we do to inspire others to create.
Boy Scout: With the eradication of many of Asbury Park’s cultural landmarks through hyper-gentrification, an act that seems to be eroding the soul of many cultural capitals, will our artistic heritages henceforth be confined to yellowing newsprint and the libraries of the past?
For instance, I worked on a project called Asbury Lanes with my friends and we had a decade of creative endeavors. And then, when it closed, I realized that without that platform how will the true story go on? Of course, there are the myths -- and we all love myths -- and so the myths turn into this other narrative (that may or may not happen) so that's also the flip side. It can go both ways. It can be this grand thing that happened, and people remember it better than it was (or tried to knock off and knock out that history). But the only thing you really have, are the people that take that experience with it.
I think that the challenge with hyper gentrification is that “false narrative” that people have to spin to create the hyper gentrification for the energy of money. Basically, being a creative that's in it and seeing other creatives go through it in other places like Detroit, and downtown Los Angeles, and obviously New York, you do feel hopeless to some degree because you don't know how you can combat big business. I think the best way that any creative can stop it, is to continue doing what they do. Follow their own path, and their own trajectory, and everything comes around because everything's a cycle. So, for instance in Asbury Park, where many feel like this is the Renaissance, I feel like it's the Dark Ages. Everything is the same. If you look at the hashtags of Asbury Park it could be anywhere in the country. Asbury Park will find its way back to that sort of fun status quo, so to speak, and I think that I just might take a while because it was the un-status quo for so long, that the status quo now seems unfamiliar to many. For the creative, it's really important to stay the path, and trust in the path, and trust in the cycle, and know that you just do your part to be honest to yourself in your craft, and it will others will catch up.
Boy Scout: As a seminal figure in Asbury Park, where do you find your motivating heartbeat? Is there still a living, breathing musical and artistic culture?
Jenn Hampton: “Seminal figure” is a funny word, a funny phrase. I think that what happens, as I kind of reference to creatives, because I think they all kind of are fed by the beat of their own drum...
The sad part, for me currently, is that for a very long time (and note I've only been here for 14 years… It's not a very long time but it feels like a very long time in Asbury Park) The challenges were always, we have the land, we have the enthusiasm, there's people here that want to make stuff happen. In Asbury, It would just take one person to inspire two people, to get five people interested and say “Hey, my uncle has this building...” and I feel like that could happen at any time. You see little things that pop up and do that could be something…
The challenge is, you're facing so many things that sort of contradict, you have to focus on the ones that you have. You have to look at your own environment, and your own tribe, and your own community, and say “Okay, where can I go to get the support that I need to do these things because I see what we need?” Sadly, or not sadly, I've hit the point in the road where I need somebody that knows how to be creative in business, and go to toe with development and make the understand that the artistic passions and endeavors of a town being sold-on needs to happen and needs to be present. I do believe that person exists but where there used to be large peaks of inspiration and doers, there are now just consumers. As a doer that is dependent on consumers, it's a challenge for me currently in the status quo of Asbury Park. I need to surround myself by doers because those are the people who inspire you. I always say, it's like you're at a party and there's nobody in the room that does something better than you… you're at the wrong party.
If I was in development, I would be surrounded by my peers, and this would probably be a really lovely time to be here. But as a creative, there's not anyone, sadly right now, that’s inspiring me… except kids who throw basement shows… and when I say kids, I mean anybody under 50… Or, people that do art in the dead of night. Or, people that are like “Hey, let's go into this abandoned place and throw an art show…” and that does still happen from time-to-time …so, I think the trick is always aligning yourself with people that push you to do the things that you never thought you could do.
I used to be inspired by the people of Asbury Park, because those were the people that lived here 15 years ago, because they didn't want the same thing that others sort of wanted. A safe town by the shore. They liked the decay. They liked the empty canvas or blank canvas, so to speak. Obviously, the creative I find inspiration in is the ocean, and that's the mother of all….
Boy Scout: The late Harry Dean Stanton believed “Everything is predestined. Nothing is important. Life is an illusion. It’s all a movie. Nobody’s in charge” which is lovingly referred to as his Appreciation of Nothing. Do you have a guiding life philosophy that keeps you on the path?
Jenn Hampton: I find it very necessary to my experience on this planet to surround myself with the creative forces that make paintings and sculptures. You know, do graffiti and put up a wheatpaste, but at the end of the day, if you want to get, like, deep into the spirituals…. “What do we need? What is real? Is any of it real?” It's really interesting to the psychology -- and this is a sort of off the point-- but the psychology of art watching people pick art. Learning that these are just things that we surround ourselves, feed our narrative of the story that we give ourselves for this lifetime. What's challenging to me about that is like “Everything is nothing.” I used to think “Well, destiny is preordained… and if I sit in a room… I mean by this theory, I could just sit in a room and the universe will find me.” I realize, getting older, is that's not necessarily true. There are things that I believe are pre-ordained. I do think that everything seems to be like a puzzle. I used to be very challenged by doing puzzles. Growing up in western Pennsylvania when it would snow, a lot of people would sit around and do puzzles, which is terrifying to me.
I would watch how people would sit there and stare at this puzzle. They'd stare at these little pieces “No, it’s this one!” and then someone would interject and say “No, it's not. That's the wrong piece!” “No! This is the piece!” and then an hour later they would find the right piece, which was not the first or second, and then they'd be on their way. They would finish like a whole section of the puzzle. So, I'm realizing that if you pay attention, you see how people, and places, and things, and experiences are these pieces of puzzle. You might meet somebody that you think is life-changing, and yeah, they might be life-changing, but not in the experience that you want them to be. Whether it's a love interest, or a business interest, and you see how people come in and out of your life to advance you, or you to advance them.
I think the hardest thing for me is being passive in that experience and trusting that everything has its past, and it's time, and its purpose. Because the timing is everything. To reference back to the Asbury Lanes, would that experience and the way that we ran a performance space, work in a world where we are now surrounded by corporate music? The answer is “No!” Unless, we had somebody that would back us financially because we couldn't compete with the guarantees... Unless made a relationship with the band that they loved us so much, and I do believe that could be true. But, timing is everything. We were just around at a time where no agents were paying attention. Bands were paying attention. Now, agents pay attention. They realize there's money to be made here. And so, the music changes…
My mom and dad were Buddhist so they tried to instill two things in me. I love them dearly, but it doesn't help you learn to live in this world. The two things that they instilled in me were “you should always follow your bliss” and “the only thing that's worth for any currency in the world is love.” Giving to people and receiving, and treating people how you want to be treated, and making sure love goes around and around. So, those are the things that I try to remember when doing anything any endeavors that I do.
Boy Scout: Was there a moment in your artistic life where you took an out-of-character risk and it transformed you?
Jenn Hampton: Forever, and ever, and ever, I just assumed, and was pursuing, and was trying to manifest being an actress. So, many times I would find myself in situations where I was trying to, sort of, fake my way into workshops. For me, that was out-of-character to not tell the truth. You know, “I'm going to do it my way! I'm going to work with David Lynch! And I'm not going to quit until I work with David Lynch!” You think that by making that act of defiance, thinking that you're going to do it some way different than anybody else did. I say that because there's no way the person Jen was 14 years ago would have said “yes” ... “Hey, do you want to run a bowling alley that we turned into a performance venue?” There was something inside of me that was like “Well, you've been trying to get yourself connected to David Lynch for seven years now… This kind of sounds like it could be the plot of a David Lynch film. A person who stumbles across an empty bowling alley that has magical sort of transformative qualities…” Using the bowling alley referencing as if it's a character in a movie and for those who have ever seen the Asbury Lanes, it was a character in a movie. It was its own character, the structure.
And so, at the time when I was offered this opportunity, to do what you want and see where it leads (without any thought of failure, or success, for that matter) was probably the most transformative thing because you are so focused on making it become successful in your mind (whatever successful means), not for yourself, but for a whole community of people. Because you want to see a place where performance art can happen. You want to see a place where there isn't structure in terms of “Here's the security guy at the door who's going to be all gruff and make you feel uncomfortable.” I wanted a place where there's an all-female staff that accepts candy is currency. You want a place where it's so ridiculous that you can't believe it exists.
I think for me, it was a decade of not listening to the inner part of your brain, for better for worse. “This is a bad idea, this is a great idea, this is a bad idea this is a great idea.” I sort of made peace with that inner struggle and just started saying “Yes, sure yeah let's do that. Yeah! Let's do that. Yeah, I can run this place. Yeah, I know how to do an LLC! Yeah, I can do that!” With having no clue… The girl that walked in those doors was not necessarily somebody that would like get down on the bathroom floor and scrub it because she wants Kathleen Hanna to be happy. Taking on new risks: i.e. paying bands really high guarantees, going to the town to fight about why we need to do “Sex, Toy, Bingo,” or why burlesque needs to happen in a town that has a history of burlesque. It's an out-of-body experience. Because you become this person, that when you step back and you look at that person, you're like “Who is that?”
If anybody has an opportunity in their life to do something that seems absolutely ridiculous, you should say “yes” for as long as you can.
Boy Scout: The last couple of years has seen a country divided. Has the current political climate inhibited or infused your work?
Jenn Hampton: As an observer, I mean it's hard in this day and age not to engage in political feelings one way or the other. I can just share an experience that was super moving to me. When Donald Trump got elected, Asbury Park was one of the few communities that all voted Democrat. Very many tears that day. I remember I was like “I should just open up the gallery because I want to be around art. I want to be around things that make me feel good.” So many people, as a community, stopped by, and just silently walked through the gallery, like “Thank God you're open.” And they would just cry, and I realized at that time that art, and music, and things that make you feel good, are going to be a really important part of this presidency, and the world that we live in going forward. Because, I do think it's like the Dark Ages. I hope that what's going to come out of it is like the Renaissance. Whether that be intellectually, spiritually, artistically, creatively for good or bad. These things happen. And when you get comfortable, as a creative, it's a very scary place, and sometimes uncomfortable feelings, and thoughts, help to really spark.
In some creatives it's a thing that can become a catalyst for new bodies of work and new ways of thinking. I feel like that the world we live in it can be a very scary place but you have to trust that this is part of the process to get us to a better place.
Boy Scout: Does a world of hyper social media intrude on your ability to be your artistic self?
Jenn Hampton: What I see being around younger people whether it's at an Art Fair, or at a show, there isn't that being in the moment. There are many times in my life that I probably wish that I had social media, or technology, to help me remember something. Sadly, our society will be over documented to this point of like “false narratives” and “fake realities.” What I see from young people is this lack of curiosity. People will only go to a show if they know they could buy a ticket pre-sale at the door. Like buying a ticket at the door, and interacting with people, is a foreign notion at this point. Then getting into a show, seeing your friends, taking selfies, and you watch the show and you're videotaping the whole show, and you're watching the show through your phone.
Now that the iPhone gives you your screen time, it's terrifying. Because for me, it used to be a source of inspiration. Because I can't get to LA to see an art show. I can't get to Berlin to see the opening of this collective. I can't see the new mural in Brazil by one of my favorite artists. But now, from the business side of what I do, I see how it could take away from the experience. I feel like aging is going to be terrible for a whole subset of people. There are these things in the world that maybe shouldn't be documented. They should be secret. Think about indigenous cultures that think that the camera takes away your soul. Now we're living in this generation where nobody isn't doing anything that isn't on camera. So, what does that mean about us as a spiritual universe? I don't know.
Jenn Hampton: I'm growing backwards, I think. Maybe not physically, but mentally. I feel like I was way more fearful as a kid. I'm not as fearful of the things I was, like “Oh, I don't know if I should do that. That seems crazy. What will people think?”
I realized that you are your own worst critic. You might be a topic of conversation for fifteen seconds but then after that… That would be the best thing I would tell young people. Don't care what others think because it's never going to help you get to where you need to go. Caring what people think, for many years, I would say “no” often because I didn't want to let people down. I realized that was just my own fear. I feel as I've gotten older I just say “yes” to everything. I feel like if you say “yes” it creates an energy that others around you will say “yes” you will become a positive fearless person that will be able to accomplish things that seem crazy to others because you don't see it as crazy.
Boy Scout: Has your bravery grown through the ages?
Jenn Hampton: Yes, I would say that I am getting braver as I get older. I just missed a physical and mental would match. That’s gotta be the shitty part about life. You get all this knowledge aging, but then you have to deal with like looking at your facing and being like “Who is that?”
Boy Scout: In a media mad world, can sincerity still be a virtue?
Jenn Hampton: I'm like the biggest sap in terms of human nature... I find myself very emotional about the human spirit. It creates this reaction for me that results in tears in the most uncomfortable of spaces. It could be when I'm hearing a song, or when I see a kid screaming in the middle of the pit at a singer. It happens many times and I realized that there's others like me that still feel that energy of sincerity, and truthfulness, and passion.
You can find people to align yourself with who are more sincere, and don't necessarily care about the narrative. I feel like that happens through daily interactions with people, we just don't notice it anymore, and when we do notice that, it's so overwhelming. I do believe that if you pay attention you can see sincerity in lots of forms. There are people that want nothing from you except to be kind and it's always really heartwarming to find them. It just seems it's harder to find them in this day and age for some reason.
I am in a constant state of questioning. I try very hard to only do things that make me feel good, and make others feel good. However, that can go awry. I try very hard to be as authentic as I can be, and to be as open as I can be. I mean I love people. I love their stories. I love, you know, the weirdo that comes in off the street to the gallery that wants to just talk at me for two hours.
Boy Scout: Abraham Lincoln said: “To summon up our better angels.” What are the words you live by?
Jenn Hampton: There are energies hidden in people that make you see yourself. I don't know if there are words that I live by, but there are activities that I live by. I try to give everybody the same respect as I would give to a peer, or a teacher, or a mentor, if I can. There is a soul in there that is trying to tell you something that you might need to know. I want to go away from this existence knowing that I made a mark, and that mark inspired other people, and then that inspiration inspired more people, and then they made their mark. That sort of energy just grows, and grows, and grows.
Boy Scout: Your groundbreaking work as GM of the original Asbury Lanes serves as an indispensable stalwart in the history of Asbury Park which was created during the height of ruin. During your tenure, you created a cult of cool clubhouse that perfectly captured the potently raw meeting of music and art. As an early Asbury cultural revolutionary, are you ever wistful for an older, grittier Asbury Park?
Jenn Hampton: I'm trying very hard to still make peace with how our experience with Asbury Lanes has ended. And through that mourning I've learned a lot of things. One of the things that I realized the other day, and it was like the first time in a couple years that I felt… like, hopeful, or at least proud. When people talk about the Asbury lanes is almost like they're talking about this sort of dreamy place that looks a certain way. It felt a certain way. It operated a certain way. When I read my notes, I get very proud of the work that we did there. “Revolutionary?” I think in terms of what we were trying to do, in a time, in a place that seemed surreal. There was nobody here which made it really easy to not fail. There was no one to please except for ourselves. It's hard to think of myself as the conductor of that. There was a point where I looked and I was like “I don't know what I'm doing” but then what happens is something really magical. You say this is bigger than me and it feels great to know that I'm doing something that is influencing, and changing my environment, and other people's environment.
When people say I moved to Asbury Park because of Asbury Lanes, it's not necessarily for the building. I think that people believe that if this could happen here, anything can happen here. To give people hope is such a cool sort of gift that I was given from the universe. I was just the vessel. Through my energies, and my sort of guilty pleasures, I could inspire other people to do the same. It’s infectious. Art is infectious. When you see people making art, you want to make art. Even if you don't make art. When you see people making music… like, we would have people get up to do their first show at the Lanes and nobody laughed, or booed…. I get choked up thinking about the community of Asbury Lanes. People that supported us whether they came to shows, or came to eat tater tots, or bought a piece of art… they were buying into a different way of life. They were buying into “I want to be part of this. Whatever this is, this feels good.” We were the place that if you were a singer girl, you felt safe going there. We had lots of divorced dads that just felt really lost. They would go there and be like “I feel part of something.”
And to make people who don't feel comfortable in the world, feel part of something, it's such a gift. Now what I'm mourn is not being able to give that gift to people. I see so many people displaced. Everyone says to me “Jenn, there's nowhere to go. I don't know anybody anymore. This towns full of people that just want to get drunk.” The fact that you the new Asbury Lanes has televisions says it all. One of our rules was there are no TVs. We don’t want you to experience what you do at home, we want you to step outside of your comfort zone and experience something different. Whether that'd be fearful to walk in a door of an old, falling down bowling alley in Asbury Park on 4th Avenue when people would get shot … you get inside and you're like “Oh, okay. I can do this.” Success was when I would look over the audience at a burlesque show and there'd be an 18 year old with a mohawk and then, a 70 year old woman that used to see burlesque shows when she was that 18 year old. We were a space for people to come to experience in Asbury Park. I don't know if it's because it looks gritty that people were more open to experience. Sadly, it's becoming like anywhere else in the country. Gentrified. You know, it looks like an Instagram filter everywhere.
The challenge for me is find those energies in a town that wants to look like everywhere else when it's not like everywhere else. There are still characters here. There's still people that believed in this idea that there is something different here. What I realized as I've been mourning the opening of the new Asbury Lanes… it's not just a club that someone took, it was a community. I think that the karma of a company that takes a business (I say that in “quotes”) and uses that history to fortify them to sell luxury condos… is like the most shameful thing that you could do. Because, I think that there is nothing sacred anymore. I can mourn that experience but be very proud that like no songs will be written about the new Asbury Lanes.
We had people that wanted to celebrate there not because it was a nice space but because the energy inside felt good. So, it's a very good cautionary tale. What I can only hope for Asbury Park is that there's enough of us that will continue making it feel a certain way. You know, that whole energy “What is never created, is destroyed” is a true statement. For me that came in the form of the Wooden Walls. The Baronet Theater was a beautiful vaudevillian theater that was once a sex theater, and then a Disney theater, and had this beautiful history. It was falling down. The same development company that acquired the Asbury Lanes also acquired it and ripped it down.
Before they ripped it down, we would have craft night where we would write signs as if we were speaking for the Baronet, so they would be akin to something like “Please don't hurt me, I'm a pretty lady.” and we would put those all over town. People wouldn't get them. “Those are the weirdos over it at the Asbury Lanes they had craft night…” I feel like art has always been a component for the Lanes and that's over the thing that I missed the most was how can I affect as many people's lives as I can, being one person.
Boy Scout: Your artistic urges continue at Parlor Gallery, the Wooden Walls project on the Asbury Park Boardwalk and in expanding city murals. Given the intersection of art and commerce today, are you still hungry to explore the bleakly beautiful?
When I would walk the boardwalk after Hurricane Sandy I saw all these boards up. It sort of reminded me of when you see process from artists and you see a work in progress. So, I took that concept of how I feel when I view people making art and said “We should do this up and down the boardwalk.” You know, music has a home everywhere here, why doesn’t art? I went to every developer starting in 2010 till I got a green light from Madison Marquette to fund a mural program that would encompass all of Asbury Park. “How can I affect the most people?” Well, the boardwalk gets the most amount of traffic in this town.
I want people to see the beauty of the architecture so I thought if I go to different blighted areas on the boardwalk that have these wooded walls on them, and I put art on them, maybe people will start to pay attention to the building. We're in our fourth year, and now I realize, again, I had no clue. I assumed that there would be a certain percentage of people that visited the boardwalk that would appreciate it. I didn't realize that, like Asbury Lanes, if you give people inspiration it changes them and they take that home with them. Even as simple as public art can be to all of us that sort of engaged in the arts, too many it's like the coolest thing they've ever seen (for lack of better words) because they don't see art. And when I say they don't see art, they're not the type of people that will walk into a gallery, or go to a museum. They have an experience that I might have going to the Whitney. Their Whitney is public art. Makes you feel familiar, and akin to this energy, and Asbury Park, and then you want to come back, and then you want to --- I don't know, maybe you want to invest in Asbury Park in a creative way--- or maybe, you want to get married here, or whatever the case may be. I realized that it's that same energy of inspiring people, through art and performance, that changes your life experience. it elevates you, even just for a moment, taking a selfie. I wanted people to have a free experience that made them feel good.
Parlor is an untraditional gallery in a traditional gallery set up: White walls, openings, every four to five weeks. Parlor is a platform to try to bring artists into Asbury Park because they will, eventually, just like music musicians, change our landscape.
Boy Scout: What is your greatest regret?
Jenn Hampton: I guess my greatest regret would have been… I let it on some level get taken away from us. I felt helpless in not knowing how to fight a billion-dollar corporation. I'm this one little person how could I fight lawyers. I think my biggest regret is not figuring out how to parlay that energy into another building.
Boy Scout: What is your greatest fear?
Jenn Hampton: My biggest fear is because I come in a certain package, that people won't take me seriously, and understand the gospel that I'm preaching is true. And they'll look back and say “Dammit! I wish… we should have had a place. Jenn said this was going to happen.” Yeah, you can you can exploit the arts, but guess what You have to do? You have to give back.
Boy Scout: How would you like to be remembered?
Jenn Hampton: People have such short memories, I just want to be remembered. I've been trying to find a location and developer that would help me create an Arts Club, where you could go and buy art, make art, eat art, feel art, listen to art, drink art and therefore we would be surrounded by like-minded people that would want the same experience. Like Asbury Lanes but grown up on some level. A little bit more grown-up.
To learn more about Jenn Hampton, visit her here
Jenn Hampton: Asbury Park. I like “How would I ascend to my artistic summit?” Does anyone ever have a summit? I feel like that's the beauty of being a creative. You don't know where you ever get to? So, I guess if I came to Asbury Park in 2019, I would look at the history of the culture, and all the wonderful things that have happened musically, and I would jar to try to put Asbury Park on the map or other creative endeavors. So, I would focus on art, I would focus on performance art, and theater, and try to elevate what people think of New Jersey… and I know that that's a huge, daunting task… but I think that if I got here today, that that would be the first thing I would do is try to show people that there's a whole bunch of creative endeavors that have been overshadowed by that history and people are like “Where’s Asbury Park? What's that? Is that where Bruce Springsteen's from?” that should not be the only thing that lies in the history of Asbury Park.
Boy Scout: In a time of faltering news platforms, transient facts and generations who opt for digital currency over great literature, how will the stories of those that came before us survive?
Jenn Hampton: I have say about “fake news” and “false narratives,” and sadly Asbury Park suffers from all of those things… I think that it's a small microcosm of a national sort of crisis that I think that we have. What's interesting, that not to diverge to go forward, there's a woman in town who started a temporary museum, and when you walk through as a creative you see that you're long and a line of lineage of people that you've never heard of because there was no technology then. There was a written record but only so many people have had it and a lot of people have died off. So, I think that the only thing that we have in this sort of platform today is what we do to inspire others to create.
Boy Scout: With the eradication of many of Asbury Park’s cultural landmarks through hyper-gentrification, an act that seems to be eroding the soul of many cultural capitals, will our artistic heritages henceforth be confined to yellowing newsprint and the libraries of the past?
For instance, I worked on a project called Asbury Lanes with my friends and we had a decade of creative endeavors. And then, when it closed, I realized that without that platform how will the true story go on? Of course, there are the myths -- and we all love myths -- and so the myths turn into this other narrative (that may or may not happen) so that's also the flip side. It can go both ways. It can be this grand thing that happened, and people remember it better than it was (or tried to knock off and knock out that history). But the only thing you really have, are the people that take that experience with it.
I think that the challenge with hyper gentrification is that “false narrative” that people have to spin to create the hyper gentrification for the energy of money. Basically, being a creative that's in it and seeing other creatives go through it in other places like Detroit, and downtown Los Angeles, and obviously New York, you do feel hopeless to some degree because you don't know how you can combat big business. I think the best way that any creative can stop it, is to continue doing what they do. Follow their own path, and their own trajectory, and everything comes around because everything's a cycle. So, for instance in Asbury Park, where many feel like this is the Renaissance, I feel like it's the Dark Ages. Everything is the same. If you look at the hashtags of Asbury Park it could be anywhere in the country. Asbury Park will find its way back to that sort of fun status quo, so to speak, and I think that I just might take a while because it was the un-status quo for so long, that the status quo now seems unfamiliar to many. For the creative, it's really important to stay the path, and trust in the path, and trust in the cycle, and know that you just do your part to be honest to yourself in your craft, and it will others will catch up.
Boy Scout: As a seminal figure in Asbury Park, where do you find your motivating heartbeat? Is there still a living, breathing musical and artistic culture?
Jenn Hampton: “Seminal figure” is a funny word, a funny phrase. I think that what happens, as I kind of reference to creatives, because I think they all kind of are fed by the beat of their own drum...
The sad part, for me currently, is that for a very long time (and note I've only been here for 14 years… It's not a very long time but it feels like a very long time in Asbury Park) The challenges were always, we have the land, we have the enthusiasm, there's people here that want to make stuff happen. In Asbury, It would just take one person to inspire two people, to get five people interested and say “Hey, my uncle has this building...” and I feel like that could happen at any time. You see little things that pop up and do that could be something…
The challenge is, you're facing so many things that sort of contradict, you have to focus on the ones that you have. You have to look at your own environment, and your own tribe, and your own community, and say “Okay, where can I go to get the support that I need to do these things because I see what we need?” Sadly, or not sadly, I've hit the point in the road where I need somebody that knows how to be creative in business, and go to toe with development and make the understand that the artistic passions and endeavors of a town being sold-on needs to happen and needs to be present. I do believe that person exists but where there used to be large peaks of inspiration and doers, there are now just consumers. As a doer that is dependent on consumers, it's a challenge for me currently in the status quo of Asbury Park. I need to surround myself by doers because those are the people who inspire you. I always say, it's like you're at a party and there's nobody in the room that does something better than you… you're at the wrong party.
If I was in development, I would be surrounded by my peers, and this would probably be a really lovely time to be here. But as a creative, there's not anyone, sadly right now, that’s inspiring me… except kids who throw basement shows… and when I say kids, I mean anybody under 50… Or, people that do art in the dead of night. Or, people that are like “Hey, let's go into this abandoned place and throw an art show…” and that does still happen from time-to-time …so, I think the trick is always aligning yourself with people that push you to do the things that you never thought you could do.
I used to be inspired by the people of Asbury Park, because those were the people that lived here 15 years ago, because they didn't want the same thing that others sort of wanted. A safe town by the shore. They liked the decay. They liked the empty canvas or blank canvas, so to speak. Obviously, the creative I find inspiration in is the ocean, and that's the mother of all….
Boy Scout: The late Harry Dean Stanton believed “Everything is predestined. Nothing is important. Life is an illusion. It’s all a movie. Nobody’s in charge” which is lovingly referred to as his Appreciation of Nothing. Do you have a guiding life philosophy that keeps you on the path?
Jenn Hampton: I find it very necessary to my experience on this planet to surround myself with the creative forces that make paintings and sculptures. You know, do graffiti and put up a wheatpaste, but at the end of the day, if you want to get, like, deep into the spirituals…. “What do we need? What is real? Is any of it real?” It's really interesting to the psychology -- and this is a sort of off the point-- but the psychology of art watching people pick art. Learning that these are just things that we surround ourselves, feed our narrative of the story that we give ourselves for this lifetime. What's challenging to me about that is like “Everything is nothing.” I used to think “Well, destiny is preordained… and if I sit in a room… I mean by this theory, I could just sit in a room and the universe will find me.” I realize, getting older, is that's not necessarily true. There are things that I believe are pre-ordained. I do think that everything seems to be like a puzzle. I used to be very challenged by doing puzzles. Growing up in western Pennsylvania when it would snow, a lot of people would sit around and do puzzles, which is terrifying to me.
I would watch how people would sit there and stare at this puzzle. They'd stare at these little pieces “No, it’s this one!” and then someone would interject and say “No, it's not. That's the wrong piece!” “No! This is the piece!” and then an hour later they would find the right piece, which was not the first or second, and then they'd be on their way. They would finish like a whole section of the puzzle. So, I'm realizing that if you pay attention, you see how people, and places, and things, and experiences are these pieces of puzzle. You might meet somebody that you think is life-changing, and yeah, they might be life-changing, but not in the experience that you want them to be. Whether it's a love interest, or a business interest, and you see how people come in and out of your life to advance you, or you to advance them.
I think the hardest thing for me is being passive in that experience and trusting that everything has its past, and it's time, and its purpose. Because the timing is everything. To reference back to the Asbury Lanes, would that experience and the way that we ran a performance space, work in a world where we are now surrounded by corporate music? The answer is “No!” Unless, we had somebody that would back us financially because we couldn't compete with the guarantees... Unless made a relationship with the band that they loved us so much, and I do believe that could be true. But, timing is everything. We were just around at a time where no agents were paying attention. Bands were paying attention. Now, agents pay attention. They realize there's money to be made here. And so, the music changes…
My mom and dad were Buddhist so they tried to instill two things in me. I love them dearly, but it doesn't help you learn to live in this world. The two things that they instilled in me were “you should always follow your bliss” and “the only thing that's worth for any currency in the world is love.” Giving to people and receiving, and treating people how you want to be treated, and making sure love goes around and around. So, those are the things that I try to remember when doing anything any endeavors that I do.
Boy Scout: Was there a moment in your artistic life where you took an out-of-character risk and it transformed you?
Jenn Hampton: Forever, and ever, and ever, I just assumed, and was pursuing, and was trying to manifest being an actress. So, many times I would find myself in situations where I was trying to, sort of, fake my way into workshops. For me, that was out-of-character to not tell the truth. You know, “I'm going to do it my way! I'm going to work with David Lynch! And I'm not going to quit until I work with David Lynch!” You think that by making that act of defiance, thinking that you're going to do it some way different than anybody else did. I say that because there's no way the person Jen was 14 years ago would have said “yes” ... “Hey, do you want to run a bowling alley that we turned into a performance venue?” There was something inside of me that was like “Well, you've been trying to get yourself connected to David Lynch for seven years now… This kind of sounds like it could be the plot of a David Lynch film. A person who stumbles across an empty bowling alley that has magical sort of transformative qualities…” Using the bowling alley referencing as if it's a character in a movie and for those who have ever seen the Asbury Lanes, it was a character in a movie. It was its own character, the structure.
And so, at the time when I was offered this opportunity, to do what you want and see where it leads (without any thought of failure, or success, for that matter) was probably the most transformative thing because you are so focused on making it become successful in your mind (whatever successful means), not for yourself, but for a whole community of people. Because you want to see a place where performance art can happen. You want to see a place where there isn't structure in terms of “Here's the security guy at the door who's going to be all gruff and make you feel uncomfortable.” I wanted a place where there's an all-female staff that accepts candy is currency. You want a place where it's so ridiculous that you can't believe it exists.
I think for me, it was a decade of not listening to the inner part of your brain, for better for worse. “This is a bad idea, this is a great idea, this is a bad idea this is a great idea.” I sort of made peace with that inner struggle and just started saying “Yes, sure yeah let's do that. Yeah! Let's do that. Yeah, I can run this place. Yeah, I know how to do an LLC! Yeah, I can do that!” With having no clue… The girl that walked in those doors was not necessarily somebody that would like get down on the bathroom floor and scrub it because she wants Kathleen Hanna to be happy. Taking on new risks: i.e. paying bands really high guarantees, going to the town to fight about why we need to do “Sex, Toy, Bingo,” or why burlesque needs to happen in a town that has a history of burlesque. It's an out-of-body experience. Because you become this person, that when you step back and you look at that person, you're like “Who is that?”
If anybody has an opportunity in their life to do something that seems absolutely ridiculous, you should say “yes” for as long as you can.
Boy Scout: The last couple of years has seen a country divided. Has the current political climate inhibited or infused your work?
Jenn Hampton: As an observer, I mean it's hard in this day and age not to engage in political feelings one way or the other. I can just share an experience that was super moving to me. When Donald Trump got elected, Asbury Park was one of the few communities that all voted Democrat. Very many tears that day. I remember I was like “I should just open up the gallery because I want to be around art. I want to be around things that make me feel good.” So many people, as a community, stopped by, and just silently walked through the gallery, like “Thank God you're open.” And they would just cry, and I realized at that time that art, and music, and things that make you feel good, are going to be a really important part of this presidency, and the world that we live in going forward. Because, I do think it's like the Dark Ages. I hope that what's going to come out of it is like the Renaissance. Whether that be intellectually, spiritually, artistically, creatively for good or bad. These things happen. And when you get comfortable, as a creative, it's a very scary place, and sometimes uncomfortable feelings, and thoughts, help to really spark.
In some creatives it's a thing that can become a catalyst for new bodies of work and new ways of thinking. I feel like that the world we live in it can be a very scary place but you have to trust that this is part of the process to get us to a better place.
Boy Scout: Does a world of hyper social media intrude on your ability to be your artistic self?
Jenn Hampton: What I see being around younger people whether it's at an Art Fair, or at a show, there isn't that being in the moment. There are many times in my life that I probably wish that I had social media, or technology, to help me remember something. Sadly, our society will be over documented to this point of like “false narratives” and “fake realities.” What I see from young people is this lack of curiosity. People will only go to a show if they know they could buy a ticket pre-sale at the door. Like buying a ticket at the door, and interacting with people, is a foreign notion at this point. Then getting into a show, seeing your friends, taking selfies, and you watch the show and you're videotaping the whole show, and you're watching the show through your phone.
Now that the iPhone gives you your screen time, it's terrifying. Because for me, it used to be a source of inspiration. Because I can't get to LA to see an art show. I can't get to Berlin to see the opening of this collective. I can't see the new mural in Brazil by one of my favorite artists. But now, from the business side of what I do, I see how it could take away from the experience. I feel like aging is going to be terrible for a whole subset of people. There are these things in the world that maybe shouldn't be documented. They should be secret. Think about indigenous cultures that think that the camera takes away your soul. Now we're living in this generation where nobody isn't doing anything that isn't on camera. So, what does that mean about us as a spiritual universe? I don't know.
Jenn Hampton: I'm growing backwards, I think. Maybe not physically, but mentally. I feel like I was way more fearful as a kid. I'm not as fearful of the things I was, like “Oh, I don't know if I should do that. That seems crazy. What will people think?”
I realized that you are your own worst critic. You might be a topic of conversation for fifteen seconds but then after that… That would be the best thing I would tell young people. Don't care what others think because it's never going to help you get to where you need to go. Caring what people think, for many years, I would say “no” often because I didn't want to let people down. I realized that was just my own fear. I feel as I've gotten older I just say “yes” to everything. I feel like if you say “yes” it creates an energy that others around you will say “yes” you will become a positive fearless person that will be able to accomplish things that seem crazy to others because you don't see it as crazy.
Boy Scout: Has your bravery grown through the ages?
Jenn Hampton: Yes, I would say that I am getting braver as I get older. I just missed a physical and mental would match. That’s gotta be the shitty part about life. You get all this knowledge aging, but then you have to deal with like looking at your facing and being like “Who is that?”
Boy Scout: In a media mad world, can sincerity still be a virtue?
Jenn Hampton: I'm like the biggest sap in terms of human nature... I find myself very emotional about the human spirit. It creates this reaction for me that results in tears in the most uncomfortable of spaces. It could be when I'm hearing a song, or when I see a kid screaming in the middle of the pit at a singer. It happens many times and I realized that there's others like me that still feel that energy of sincerity, and truthfulness, and passion.
You can find people to align yourself with who are more sincere, and don't necessarily care about the narrative. I feel like that happens through daily interactions with people, we just don't notice it anymore, and when we do notice that, it's so overwhelming. I do believe that if you pay attention you can see sincerity in lots of forms. There are people that want nothing from you except to be kind and it's always really heartwarming to find them. It just seems it's harder to find them in this day and age for some reason.
I am in a constant state of questioning. I try very hard to only do things that make me feel good, and make others feel good. However, that can go awry. I try very hard to be as authentic as I can be, and to be as open as I can be. I mean I love people. I love their stories. I love, you know, the weirdo that comes in off the street to the gallery that wants to just talk at me for two hours.
Boy Scout: Abraham Lincoln said: “To summon up our better angels.” What are the words you live by?
Jenn Hampton: There are energies hidden in people that make you see yourself. I don't know if there are words that I live by, but there are activities that I live by. I try to give everybody the same respect as I would give to a peer, or a teacher, or a mentor, if I can. There is a soul in there that is trying to tell you something that you might need to know. I want to go away from this existence knowing that I made a mark, and that mark inspired other people, and then that inspiration inspired more people, and then they made their mark. That sort of energy just grows, and grows, and grows.
Boy Scout: Your groundbreaking work as GM of the original Asbury Lanes serves as an indispensable stalwart in the history of Asbury Park which was created during the height of ruin. During your tenure, you created a cult of cool clubhouse that perfectly captured the potently raw meeting of music and art. As an early Asbury cultural revolutionary, are you ever wistful for an older, grittier Asbury Park?
Jenn Hampton: I'm trying very hard to still make peace with how our experience with Asbury Lanes has ended. And through that mourning I've learned a lot of things. One of the things that I realized the other day, and it was like the first time in a couple years that I felt… like, hopeful, or at least proud. When people talk about the Asbury lanes is almost like they're talking about this sort of dreamy place that looks a certain way. It felt a certain way. It operated a certain way. When I read my notes, I get very proud of the work that we did there. “Revolutionary?” I think in terms of what we were trying to do, in a time, in a place that seemed surreal. There was nobody here which made it really easy to not fail. There was no one to please except for ourselves. It's hard to think of myself as the conductor of that. There was a point where I looked and I was like “I don't know what I'm doing” but then what happens is something really magical. You say this is bigger than me and it feels great to know that I'm doing something that is influencing, and changing my environment, and other people's environment.
When people say I moved to Asbury Park because of Asbury Lanes, it's not necessarily for the building. I think that people believe that if this could happen here, anything can happen here. To give people hope is such a cool sort of gift that I was given from the universe. I was just the vessel. Through my energies, and my sort of guilty pleasures, I could inspire other people to do the same. It’s infectious. Art is infectious. When you see people making art, you want to make art. Even if you don't make art. When you see people making music… like, we would have people get up to do their first show at the Lanes and nobody laughed, or booed…. I get choked up thinking about the community of Asbury Lanes. People that supported us whether they came to shows, or came to eat tater tots, or bought a piece of art… they were buying into a different way of life. They were buying into “I want to be part of this. Whatever this is, this feels good.” We were the place that if you were a singer girl, you felt safe going there. We had lots of divorced dads that just felt really lost. They would go there and be like “I feel part of something.”
And to make people who don't feel comfortable in the world, feel part of something, it's such a gift. Now what I'm mourn is not being able to give that gift to people. I see so many people displaced. Everyone says to me “Jenn, there's nowhere to go. I don't know anybody anymore. This towns full of people that just want to get drunk.” The fact that you the new Asbury Lanes has televisions says it all. One of our rules was there are no TVs. We don’t want you to experience what you do at home, we want you to step outside of your comfort zone and experience something different. Whether that'd be fearful to walk in a door of an old, falling down bowling alley in Asbury Park on 4th Avenue when people would get shot … you get inside and you're like “Oh, okay. I can do this.” Success was when I would look over the audience at a burlesque show and there'd be an 18 year old with a mohawk and then, a 70 year old woman that used to see burlesque shows when she was that 18 year old. We were a space for people to come to experience in Asbury Park. I don't know if it's because it looks gritty that people were more open to experience. Sadly, it's becoming like anywhere else in the country. Gentrified. You know, it looks like an Instagram filter everywhere.
The challenge for me is find those energies in a town that wants to look like everywhere else when it's not like everywhere else. There are still characters here. There's still people that believed in this idea that there is something different here. What I realized as I've been mourning the opening of the new Asbury Lanes… it's not just a club that someone took, it was a community. I think that the karma of a company that takes a business (I say that in “quotes”) and uses that history to fortify them to sell luxury condos… is like the most shameful thing that you could do. Because, I think that there is nothing sacred anymore. I can mourn that experience but be very proud that like no songs will be written about the new Asbury Lanes.
We had people that wanted to celebrate there not because it was a nice space but because the energy inside felt good. So, it's a very good cautionary tale. What I can only hope for Asbury Park is that there's enough of us that will continue making it feel a certain way. You know, that whole energy “What is never created, is destroyed” is a true statement. For me that came in the form of the Wooden Walls. The Baronet Theater was a beautiful vaudevillian theater that was once a sex theater, and then a Disney theater, and had this beautiful history. It was falling down. The same development company that acquired the Asbury Lanes also acquired it and ripped it down.
Before they ripped it down, we would have craft night where we would write signs as if we were speaking for the Baronet, so they would be akin to something like “Please don't hurt me, I'm a pretty lady.” and we would put those all over town. People wouldn't get them. “Those are the weirdos over it at the Asbury Lanes they had craft night…” I feel like art has always been a component for the Lanes and that's over the thing that I missed the most was how can I affect as many people's lives as I can, being one person.
Boy Scout: Your artistic urges continue at Parlor Gallery, the Wooden Walls project on the Asbury Park Boardwalk and in expanding city murals. Given the intersection of art and commerce today, are you still hungry to explore the bleakly beautiful?
When I would walk the boardwalk after Hurricane Sandy I saw all these boards up. It sort of reminded me of when you see process from artists and you see a work in progress. So, I took that concept of how I feel when I view people making art and said “We should do this up and down the boardwalk.” You know, music has a home everywhere here, why doesn’t art? I went to every developer starting in 2010 till I got a green light from Madison Marquette to fund a mural program that would encompass all of Asbury Park. “How can I affect the most people?” Well, the boardwalk gets the most amount of traffic in this town.
I want people to see the beauty of the architecture so I thought if I go to different blighted areas on the boardwalk that have these wooded walls on them, and I put art on them, maybe people will start to pay attention to the building. We're in our fourth year, and now I realize, again, I had no clue. I assumed that there would be a certain percentage of people that visited the boardwalk that would appreciate it. I didn't realize that, like Asbury Lanes, if you give people inspiration it changes them and they take that home with them. Even as simple as public art can be to all of us that sort of engaged in the arts, too many it's like the coolest thing they've ever seen (for lack of better words) because they don't see art. And when I say they don't see art, they're not the type of people that will walk into a gallery, or go to a museum. They have an experience that I might have going to the Whitney. Their Whitney is public art. Makes you feel familiar, and akin to this energy, and Asbury Park, and then you want to come back, and then you want to --- I don't know, maybe you want to invest in Asbury Park in a creative way--- or maybe, you want to get married here, or whatever the case may be. I realized that it's that same energy of inspiring people, through art and performance, that changes your life experience. it elevates you, even just for a moment, taking a selfie. I wanted people to have a free experience that made them feel good.
Parlor is an untraditional gallery in a traditional gallery set up: White walls, openings, every four to five weeks. Parlor is a platform to try to bring artists into Asbury Park because they will, eventually, just like music musicians, change our landscape.
Boy Scout: What is your greatest regret?
Jenn Hampton: I guess my greatest regret would have been… I let it on some level get taken away from us. I felt helpless in not knowing how to fight a billion-dollar corporation. I'm this one little person how could I fight lawyers. I think my biggest regret is not figuring out how to parlay that energy into another building.
Boy Scout: What is your greatest fear?
Jenn Hampton: My biggest fear is because I come in a certain package, that people won't take me seriously, and understand the gospel that I'm preaching is true. And they'll look back and say “Dammit! I wish… we should have had a place. Jenn said this was going to happen.” Yeah, you can you can exploit the arts, but guess what You have to do? You have to give back.
Boy Scout: How would you like to be remembered?
Jenn Hampton: People have such short memories, I just want to be remembered. I've been trying to find a location and developer that would help me create an Arts Club, where you could go and buy art, make art, eat art, feel art, listen to art, drink art and therefore we would be surrounded by like-minded people that would want the same experience. Like Asbury Lanes but grown up on some level. A little bit more grown-up.
To learn more about Jenn Hampton, visit her here
