A Taste of Tomorrow's Grandmothers
by Amanda DeLuise
New York City is home to one of the most historical music scenes on the planet. It is the birthplace of American punk and independent music, houses some of the world's most famous venues (i.e., CBGB's, Cafe Wha?), and produced some of the world's most famous musicians (i.e., The Ramones, Bob Dylan). For one week every year, the Big Apple is overrun with the newest bevy of upcoming performers from all over the nation and the world.
The annual CMJ Music Marathon and Film Festival arrived in New York on October 21st and provided the city with a constant flow of music and entertainment for the next five days.
College Music Journal (CMJ) is one of the world's most popular sources of music news, album reviews, and new music downloads for the newest "up and coming" young acts. Both a print magazine and online publication, CMJ offers daily downloads and reports for music fans, musicians and industry buffs.
Anchored this year in the East Village, CMJ brought all of its participants to the Judson Memorial Church on Washington Square Park to pick up registration badges and gift bags. Meanwhile, next door at New York University's Kimmel Center, badge holders were welcomed to attend a series of daily panels discussions with topics ranging from music publishing to the use of music in video games. Panelists included George Clinton and Duncan Sheik, whose Tony award-winning musical Spring Awakening was the subject of a two-hour panel.
Though five-day passes ranged from $280 for students to nearly $500 for non-students, badge holders had the possibility of seeing sets from one thousand different artists on any given night of the festival. The only problem was deciding what to go to and getting there early enough to make the badge cut-off. Most shows were not CMJ exclusive, meaning the general public was also allowed to purchase tickets. This lead to many venues having strict cut-offs for CMJ passes. For example, Saturday night's sold-out Hip Hop Live tour featuring David Banner and Talib Kweli only left room for twenty lucky badge holders. For shows that were not sold out, the allotted badge spots ranged between 75 and 100, or continued on until the club was at maximum capacity.
While CMJ caters to under-the-radar acts, this year's festival featured some big name bands like Broken Social Scene, Minus the Bear, and Coheed and Cambria.
While music remained the focal point of the Marathon, there were also dozens of films being premiered. Kevin Smith's newest movie Zack and Miri Make a Porno premiered at the Regal Cinema on Union Square Thursday night. A question-and-answer session with Smith followed the premiere.
It was a five-day whirlwind of music and mayhem that ended in a lot of people losing sleep in hopes to catch that band they'd been hearing about, or that band they've always loved. New York City was crawling CMJ-goers slinking out of clubs like Drone on Avenue A, where the Global Hip Hop Showdown began at 3am. But regardless of the lack of sleep, CMJ seemed to accomplish its main goal: to showcase what will sure be some of the biggest underground acts of 2009.
