No Sleep: NYC Nightlife Flyers 1988-1999 [Hardcover]

No Sleep is a visual history of the halcyon days of New York City club life as told through flyer art. Spanning the late 80s through the late 90s, when nightlife buzz travelled via flyers and word of mouth, No Sleep features a collection of artwork from the personal archives of NYC DJs, promoters, club kids, nightlife impresarios, and the artists themselves. Club flyers, by design, were ephemeral objects distributed on street corners, outside of nightclubs and concert halls, in barbershops and retail shops, and were not intended to be preserved for posterity. Through the 90s, they became both increasingly prevalent and more sophisticated as printing technology evolved. Overnight, however, with the advent of the internet, the flyer essentially disappeared, despite it being common at one time for promoters to print thousands of flyers for any given event. Recently, these flyers have become sought-after collector's items. What “No Sleep” depicts is a much looser time, after disco and before the gilded age of mega-clubs and luxury bottle service, when the only guiding ethos was that anything was worth a try.
—The New Yorker

...a crucial history of New York's influential club life through the flyers that advertise so many concerts and parties...
—Fact Magazine

A glorious era of hip-hop, house, and avant-garde cardboard artwork reflecting the energy of the downtown music scene.
—MEDIUM Cuepoint

If that nostalgic feeling of golden era hip-hop flyers hits you like it hits me, this would be the book for you.
—Okayplayer

Recently, Armstrong has been looking back at these halcyon days, culminating in the release of No Sleep: NYC Nightlife Flyers 1988-1999, a visual history of flyers from a musical era in New York that might never be matched in terms of scale, independence and sheer creativity. lă*