New Moon was a Parisian nightclub, located at 66 Rue Pigalle (now Rue Jean-Baptiste Pigalle) in the Place Pigalle, that started in the late 19th-century as a headquarters for Impressionist artists. In the 20th century, it became a jazz club and then a lesbian cabaret, before converting to a well-known alternative rock club in the 1980s. It closed in 1995.[1][2]
In the 1860s, the building where the New Moon was later located was a cafe frequented by French Impressionist painters called La Nouvelle Athènes. In the early 20th century, the cafe added a cabaret to become first Monico, then the New Monico.
Between World War I and World War II, it became Ada "Bricktop" Smith's Chez Bricktop,[3][4] famous for its jazz and frequented by luminaries like Pablo Picasso, John Steinbeck, Ernest Hemingway.[3] Performers included Marlene Dietrich, Ethel Waters, Duke Ellington and Louis Armstrong. In the 1950s, the club became a striptease cabaret called The Sphinx, then the Narcisse.
By the 1960s, it had become the New Moon, and was a lesbian cabaret through the 1960s and 1970s. It closed in the early 1980s, and reopened again in 1987 as an alternative and punk rock club.[5]
From 1987 to 1995 the club was known as one of the most important venues in Paris for punk and alternative rock.[6][7][8] Noir Désir, the French Lovers, Mano Negra, the Naked Apes of Reason were a few of the many groups who performed. French photographer Raphaël Rinaldi published the book Paris New Moon, Paris (2016) focused on photography of the venue in the 1980s and 1990s.[7]
After briefly operating as a nightclub called Le Temple, the building was torn down to create office buildings in 2004.[2][9]