The Northside Festival is taking over with a vengeance June 8–14 and occupying every empty stage and open screening room Williamsburg and Greenpoint. Unlike the other festivals on your summer itinerary, Brooklyn’s Northside Showcase is known for its intimate venues and unreal performances from your favorites as well as up-and-coming artists and filmmakers. A special highlight of the week will be Pancakes and Whiskey’s own showcase at Union Pool on June 11th. This spectacular lineup sponsored by Jameson Whiskey, will include (in order of appearance) Leggy, Adam Torres, The Midnight Hollow, and Cultfever.
An explosion of demure candor, Leggy has been gaining notice across the US since the release of their first EP, Cavity Castle, in April 2014. The indie-punk-dream-garage trio played the third annual Indiepop Prom at Baby’s All Right earlier this year and released a second EP, Nice Try, which they plan to promote with a zigzag summer tour across the country.
Adam Torres is an Austin-based singer-songwriter. In 2006, Torres wrote and recorded Nostra Nova, inspired by works by artist Adolf Wolfli and Swiss psychologist Carl Jung. Mirroring the meandering journey of the psyche, Nostra Nova is unconventional in composition, sound, and structure. Torres signed with Misra Records earlier this year with plans to reissue Nostra Nova as well as a new album compiled from the 100+ songs he has written over the past decade.
A Brooklyn-born hypnotic-psych-pop band, the Midnight Hollow emerged in 2012 as an expected balm for the brutal summer heat. The band’s soothing and soaring energy has carried them through the release of Self-Titled in June 2014 and For the People Inside this past March. As far as their shows go, the band likes to keep it unplanned. “The live aspect of music is becoming scripted,” says songwriter and multi-instrumentalist Spencer Draeger. “We center our performances around flirting with the audience’s visceral side.”
Poised at the climax of the showcase, Cultfever is an experimental study of sensuality and sonic fluidity. Tamara Jafar and Joe Durniak first met in 2010 and released their self-titled debut album in 2011. To promote their forthcoming second album, Cultfever released two singles, “Youth” and “Gloria,” on which the duo expertly intertwines intricate and evocative lyrics with edgy tonal plateaus.
Article: Heather McAdams
