Indie Sleaze Had Its Revival. Billy Jones Was There All Along.
The owner of Baby’s All Right has seen it all, and then some. What comes next?
By Annie Armstrong
Photography by Robert Blair
Published
The state of Williamsburg, Brooklyn, has been something of a litmus test for the life and exploits of Billy Jones. At 43 years old, the sage owner of the seminal Brooklyn music venue Baby’s All Right can look back at 23 years of life in the hipster capital of the world, and can look back in earnest.
“I remember arriving in Williamsburg in 2002 and standing at North 6th and Bedford,” Jones, who is willowy in denim bell bottoms with the messy haircut of a 20-something, said over iced coffees just a few blocks away from his latest venture, a record store called Billy’s Record Salon. “There was a feeling of calm before the storm.”
Today, that street corner is spitting distance from the dreaded harbingers of the supposed “death” of the neighborhood: an Apple store, a Whole Foods, Sephora, and a handful of seedy vape shops. Back then, though, Jones recalls a Wild West for indie music and the hipster hordes’ eccentric tastes and sensibilities.