WORDS FROM THE FRONT

Brian Bumbery

is a well-known figure in the music industry, an ex-VP of Publicity for London/Sire and presently head of his own Score Press PR firm, which represents Jay Faires’ JCOR label, among others. He recently moved back to his native New York, where he took an apartment on Maiden Lane, a mere block and a half from the World Trade Center. He e-mailed this report to several friends:

Dear HITS,
I sit and type to you as 7 World Trade Center is collapsing. I wrote this earlier today. I was feeling a bit better earlier, but as the day goes on, I honestly don't know what the hell is going on here. I feel that the universe/God is on my side, and there is no way I will be able to get to my apartment. Intuitively speaking, I feel like my apartment is OK because the way the streets are in downtown N.Y. is completely different than the rest of the city. It is very much like London... short streets that dead end; however, if you stepped out of my front door and looked west you have a clear view of what is going on.
PS. My trip to LA this Thursday is canceled.

As most of you know, today the World Trade Center was hit today by two hijacked airplanes. I live 1.5 blocks from the Twin Towers. I was midway into my morning coffee with friends, Kent Belden and Marcella Farman, who is in town and staying with me. It has become tradition on Maiden Lane that every morning we gather for coffee to discuss the day, current events and just about everything in between. Today, while we were sitting there, we heard a sound that sounded like a plane crashing, but we couldn't be sure. Soot and papers began flying past my window and when we tuned into NY1 News and what we thought had indeed been confirmed. It was reflex for feelings of compassion to be sent out to anyone that had been involved in the plane crash and in the Twin Towers, and at the same time we felt like we were able to relax because we had an answer. Little did we know that minutes later another plane would crash into the other tower.

At that moment people were screaming, sirens were going off and smoke was everywhere. Our first reaction was to stay in the apartment because it was chaos in the streets. We went out to look at the WTC and it was honestly like being in a horror film. A police officer told us to vacate downtown because if something else (like the building collapsing) were to happen we would be, for lack of a better word, FUCKED. I grabbed the dogs and the three of us ran for the JCOR office on Lafayette Street, about 15 minutes (by foot) north of our building.

As we crossed Canal Street there was another rolling thunderous sound and when we walked into the office building we were told that one of the buildings collapsed. We were 15 minutes ahead of disaster.

As we sit in the JCOR office, we are hearing reports that our street is still there and areas within a one to two block radius of the Twin Towers are being used to line up the injured and casualties. There was 40 inches of soot and body parts in the streets, but obviously we will not know the truth until the dust settles... LITERALLY. It's hit or miss as far as phones go, and we're off to give blood for those that have been injured. Will write more when I get the chance.