While it's easy to get caught up in all of the excitement of CMJ, there are also some pretty great shows happening this week that have no tie to the monstrous music marathon. We've included a lot of these shows in our special CMJ calendar, as we wanted to make sure you knew they were happening. Now we'll take this opportunity to further highlight a few non-CMJ events that particularly strike our fancy.
Wednesday through Sunday - Songs of Ascension at Brooklyn Academy - Renowned vocal innovator and experimental artist Meredith Monk teams up with video artist Ann Hamilton to create "a sanctuary of music, movement, and video rooted in her evocative vocal style."
Thursday - Gary War, Eric Copeland, Expo '70, Fluffy Lumbers (WNYU non-CMJ show) at Market Hotel - NYU's student radio station puts on this show with the spacy experimental sounds of Gary War, Eric Copeland of Black Dice, the abstract psych atmospheres of Kansas City's Expo '70 and the fun Jersey rock of Fluffy Lumbers.
Friday - Sam Mickens' Ecstatic Showband & Revue, CSC Funk Band and Jimmy Cousins at Monster Island Basement - We're seen both Mickens' Ecstatic Showband and the CSC Funk Band a few times, and both groups are not to miss. Mickens, who also plays with The Dead Science, always rounds up an outstanding group of musicians to present his soulful tunes, including killer drummer Mike Pride. CSC features former-USAISAMONSTER guitarist Colin Langenus as well as members who have played with Talabam!, Gwar and more. They play stellar funk jams, including covers of Sun Ra and the Grateful Dead.
Saturday - Double Dagger, Future Islands and Smarts - The first time we saw Baltimore's Double Dagger was a quite a while back in a small basement club in Virginia. The group hauled a massive stack of amplifiers onto the stage and proceeded to blow us away, both literally (with those amps) and figuratively (with their outstanding jams). We picked up a button and a seven-inch and have been fans since. Double Dagger's songs are wound tight with energy, and it's infectious. Seeing them live, it's hard not want to flail about, to kick and scream. You can hear the sweat in their music. Future Islands, also from Baltimore, will open with some solid new wave-esque synth-pop.
So, don't forget that there's more than CMJ going on this week. Take a look at all of the great options that you've got and then head to see some live music!
Songs of Ascension preview video:
Gary War's ""Highspeed Drift":
Double Dagger's "Vivre Sans Temps Mort":
