CMJ Music Marathon begins in New York, will feature local bands, Ghostface Killah, GZA, and 500 other acts
The relentless music marathon known as CMJ kicks off today in New York City, and six local bands will perform.
CMJ is a non-stop, five-day multimedia extravaganza that features some 500 different bands - many of them unknown - playing at 75 different venues, all but assuring that at some point of the day you might bump into a band that's never even trended playing at some dank, cramped club.
No, Willow Smith will not be performing, but that doesn't mean you shouldn't pay attention.
In the past, CMJ has served as the Schwabb's drugstore of music, the site where previously unknown bands like Clap Your Hands Say Yeah!, Black Kids, and Wye Oak were discovered by the industry.
But the important thing here is the local connection. Six local bands are playing, including Lower Dens, Cotton Jones, Deakin, Clutch, Zo!, and a DJ set by Avey Tare.
Lower Dens, actually, performs tonight at the Ottobar before heading to New York Wednesday for the first of a mind-boggling 11 CMJ shows.
The marathon anticipates there will be be some 1,200 performances over all, as well as a series of movie screenings, some only tangentially related to music, like the new Anne Hathaway and Jake Gyllenhaal romantic comedy, "Love and Other Drugs," where Gyllenhall plays a scruffy if attractive pill pusher.
In addition to little-known bands, indie headliners like Phoenix, Surfer Blood, and Ghostface Killah and GZA will also play some shows this week.
Watch out later this week for Midnight Sun's preview of the festival, including interviews with Lower Dens' Jana Hunter, Deakin, and Cotton Jones.
Erik Maza is a features reporter at the Baltimore Sun. He writes for several sections of the Sun paper and contributes weekly columns on music and nightlife. He also writes and edits the Midnight Sun blog. He often covers entertainment, business, and the business of entertainment. Occasionally, he writes about Four Loko, The Block, the liquor board, and those who practice "
Comments
Maza is streching for material. This is relevent to Baltimore's Nightlife scene, how? Because a few "Local" bands are going to NYC? Okee.
Clutch is from Germantown...It is Maryland yes, but a DC suburb. And I dont think they are craving for attention, they have been around a LONG time, hardly still "discoverable".
Posted by: lopsided head | October 19, 2010 10:14 AM
The Sun is stooping to a new low- I know this sh** is intentional now. The first rule of journalism is localize, localize, localize. Don't fire Maza axe his editor ASAP. No one post any comments -that's what they want- sorry but I had to.
Posted by: Tif | October 19, 2010 10:18 AM
OK Im out, last comment. See you at D@L.
Posted by: lopsided head | October 19, 2010 10:24 AM
Wouldn't exactly call Cotton Jones a local band. Yes they got their start in Cumberland but they've moved in and out of Maryland over the past couple of years and you can probably count the number of times they've played Baltimore on one hand (and that's including their Page France days).
Posted by: Zach | October 19, 2010 1:08 PM
With the exception of Lower Dens no one you list is really a Baltimore band. Deakin and Avey Tare have both been in NYC for years, Clutch and Zo! are D.C.-ers, and you you could probably count the number of times Cotton Jones has played Baltimore on one hand (and that's including their Page France days).
Posted by: Zach | October 19, 2010 1:19 PM
I was reading and I thought that people were giving you a hard time Maza, but after reading this they were right to do so.
With all that is going on in Baltimore (based on all the facebook invites I get alone) and we have to talk about NYC? They have their own publications dealing with their nightlife, and I doubt they give a rat's a** about what we are doing down here.
To give credit where credit is due, you do write about Baltimore events; we just don't read this blog to read about other cities' events. If you bring your focus back to Baltimore and what this great city has to offer you will find that people may be less hostile towards this blog.
Good luck man....
Posted by: Calvin | October 19, 2010 9:22 PM