November 28, 2016 · Team HG
[BLOG] In the 1970s, Groningen knew Josje, a seemingly insignificant café on Peperstraat. In Jan Eilander's *Rock ’n Roll Junkie* (1994), a biography of Herman Brood, the café keeps popping up. It takes center stage. An intriguing constant. Apparently, this little coffee pub wasn't so insignificant after all. No, notorious turns out to be a description that suited Josje so much better.
In 1980, Johnny Többen took over its operation. Josje became De Ster.
A year or so earlier, coming from the CPN, the Communist Party of the Netherlands, Johnny had taken on the role of strike leader during the prolonged labor unrest at the Okto strawboard factory in Winschoten. Closure loomed. With the naming of his café, he referenced communist-anarchist symbolism: the red, five-pointed star. A clear, unmistakable, and explicit political statement. He managed to secure De Weduwe van den Eelaart, a small gin brand from Schiedam, for his café's neon outdoor signage. The brand featured a star in its logo. A white one, admittedly, but still: a star.
De Ster became a legendary pub, an authentic, dark, somewhat sinister heavy metal institution. It promoted itself with the strong slogan Hart voor Hard.
An area of approximately sixty square meters, excluding the small hallway and toilets. It was no more than that. The beer was served exclusively in bottles. The tap was not connected to anything. And despite the great musical significance the pub played for metalheads, a live performance never took place. The space required for it simply wasn't there.
In mid-2010, the property owner terminated the agreement with Többen. With a different tenant, he could be significantly better off financially. That is how it goes. Capital and Culture. They clash. ‘My life’s work is being kicked out from under me, stated Johnny. A firm observation that made sense.
Hordes of fans of brutal, unadulterated doom, gothic, metal, and thrash knew their way to the café from far and wide every evening, every night, all too well. Johnny was the boss there. He was the defining figure. That is hardly surprising when you are a very big, fat man who only managed to hold up his trousers with powerful suspenders. Johnny was a man who displayed great love for his Mieke, for his wondrous café, and for his growling, noisy, and devilish music.
De Ster was often the final destination of an enjoyable evening.
I shared a school past with Johnny. Least bothered by the constant commotion of clothes around us, we often reminisced about it in De Ster—the sweet ones, but especially the bad ones. Johnny has recently managed to make short work of the latter with unceasing fanaticism.
On August 31, 2010, it was definitively over for the Home of Metal History institution, a title befitting De Ster. A farewell concert, A Farewell to Café De Ster, was held on September 10, 2010, at the acclaimed VERA, the club for the International Underground.
Bands that mattered in the Groningen metal circuit, bands with striking but frightening names like Vortex, God Dethroned, Prostitude Disfugerement, Ministery of Terror, Damnator, Gheestenland, As it Burns, and Department of Correction, paid their musical tribute to the unique café. It was an evening where De Ster, and especially Johnny Többen, was honored for what he has meant to Groningen's music culture. Johnny concluded that evening with the sober observation: Everything comes to an end.
And then. Moving on without.
Mieke and Johnny were very good at that. They enjoyed life. They enjoyed each other. During a casual visit to beautiful Dordrecht on June 10, 2015, I unexpectedly bumped into Johnny on the Voorstraat. That is how it goes when you meet him. A postman on duty was kind enough to take a picture of the four of us.
Even then, Johnny knew of his miserable, irreversible illness. Despite this fatal prospect, he faced life resignedly until the very end, but with a brave optimism.
In the somewhat morbid poster A Farewell to Café De Ster, I see his miserable death depicted.
Johnny, an amiable and striking Marxist.
Until the grave.
Author: Coen van Uhm ©
See also article: Johnny Többen from Cafe De Ster has passed away.
