photo by Will Deitz
The most surprising thing that happened at this year’s CMJ Music Marathon in New York City had nothing to do with music. On the second day of the October festival, news broke that a lawsuit had been filed against the organization to the tune of $1 million, after a failed merger between CMJ and management/promotion/production company Metropolitan Entertainment. New York Times writer Ben Sisario suggested that the lawsuit could prove a "substantial blow" to the company’s financial stability. But this would only be the latest setback for the 33-year-old festival, whose influence has diminished in recent years. The question isn’t how to save CMJ, but whether any New York festival existent or imminent could take its place.
CMJ was originally founded for industry professionals to discover new bands, and the internet’s since provided a quicker (and more inexpensive) alternative to performing A&R duties. Regardless, two multi-venue fests have attempted to issue correctives, and like much NYC-based cultural phenomena that gets publicity these days, both come from Brooklyn: June's indie-skewing Northside Festival, and Brooklyn Electronic Music Festival, which takes place just a few weeks after the last CMJ banner is taken down.
The six-year-old BEMF offers up what its name suggests: electronic music (predominantly dance-leaning) and considering mainstream American dance culture's recent boom, this has lent the festival added relevance in the last couple of years. With an extensive lineup tailored to appeal to interests both big-room and small-scale, spread across seven Brooklyn-based venues within walking distance of each other, BEMF is a dance festival without the muddy and furry-booted mayhem that often go hand-in-hand with dance festivals. It's Electric Zoo for people who don't like to leave their borough on the weekend.
It was clear that BEMF organizers MeanRed were attempting to promote responsible behavior in the wake of this year's drug-related deaths at Electric Zoo, with flyers reminding festivalgoers about the dangers of substance abuse (not that it stopped the inevitable from happening, of course). For the most part, though, that was the extent of BEMF's branding at the associated venues—even the glowing cube in the shape of the fest's square logo that was on stage during many of last year's sets was conspicuously absent. In a few instances, it was replaced by a glowing cube of a different sort: that of the Red Bull Music Academy, who were one of this year's sponsors. RBMA's presence was a déjà vu of sorts for NYC-residing fest attendees, since the company recently hosted their month-long residency in the city this past summer. With a seemingly endless groundswell of financial resources, RBMA's sprawl was ambitious, impressive, and at times thrilling, with a truly insane lineup and a few outside-the-box ideas that were successful despite the considerable ickiness of an energy drink stamping its brand on artistic culture.
This year's BEMF had the unfortunate position of standing in RBMA's shadow, but its lineup was plenty diverse in its own right, featuring emerging artists alongside considerable legends like John Digweed, MK, and longtime BBC Radio 1 DJ and Essential Mix host Pete Tong. As genres, dance and electronic music have no particular "sound", so the lineup was comprised of showcases that provided something for everyone who preferred to stay in one place during the chilly weekend. Some of these sonic threads carried greater current cultural relevance than others, though.
"Everyone's going to end up there at the end of the night," I heard someone say at Friday evening's makeshift Boiler Room session at the uncomfortably vacant space Villain. He was talking about Montreal producer and TNGHT member Lunice's headlining set at LuckyMe's Music Hall of Williamsburg showcase. Not so, as it turned out. Although Lunice and bill-sharers Evian Christ and S-Type are a few artists carrying the torch for dance music's recent flirtations with hip-hop, the room was never more than ¾-full, standing in stark contrast to TNGHT's packed-house performance in the same venue at the end of 2012.
Blasting recent tracks from Drake, Kanye West (whose Yeezus played a role in nearly every one of the night's sets), and Jay Z among others, Lunice tried his best to whip the room into a frenzy with his notoriously energetic performance, gesticulating and mouthing along to lyrics in a manner that makes you dread the moment someone will coin the term "kabuki-trap". Still, the audience size was in constant flux, and some overheard audience banter suggested why: "I'd like to stick around, but I'm going to head to Output instead."
Many people did just that (the immobile line for Digweed's five-hour set wrapped around the block) and it's easy to understand why. The under-a-year-old club Output brings Manhattan nightlife sensibilities—overpriced drinks, a strict "no photos or videos" policy, a cavernous multi-level floor plan with plenty of curiosities (and couches)—to the decidedly DIY-focused Brooklyn social scene, and most people you talk to will have differing opinions on the place. But people who enjoy it usually cite the same reason: the sound system. "[B]est sound system in the East Coast, bro," minimal techno wünderkind Nicolas Jaar recently told me in an interview, and while I can't vouch for the specificity of his opinion, just listening to music in Output and the adjoining Panther Room, as well as cutting loose on the dance floor, is a supremely enjoyable experience.
The considerable rowdiness of NYC nightlife points to the greatest hurdle that BEMF faces as a viable festival for the committed and the dilettantes alike. Most festivals are less about hearing music and more about the experience, a reflection of one's lifestyle choices; if you're going to go hard on BEMF, you have to like going out late. A lot. Every night begins at 10 p.m., and if you planned to see any of the bigger names that dotted the mostly-underground lineup, a commitment to staying out until 3 a.m. or later is a requirement. For weekend warriors, not an unreasonable request—but what about Sunday, the day before most 9-5'ers with money to blow on a weekend of live music have to go back to work? BEMF's final event, headlined by impromptu headliner and RSS-baiting remix fiend Star Slinger (who served as a replacement for Todd Terje's abrupt cancellation), was scheduled to end around 4 a.m. Monday morning, a not-exactly-ideal timeframe for the hungover-at-work-averse.
So BEMF, like much of dance culture, is not built for the uncommitted. Imaginably, its audience could grow with a few tweaks—more "early" sets, less set-time conflicts (being forced to choose between Actress and Oneohtrix Point Never on Saturday night seemed particularly egregious, especially considering the shared audience the two artists arguably possess), less venues to cut down on the time spent walking between shows at the time of year when temperatures drop sharply. (Output's two-room structure and all-night atmosphere seems especially tailor-made for hosting a slightly pared-down but no less impressive version of this festival.) Dance culture prides itself on exclusivity, though, so it's possible that the interest in audience expansion is minimal; as changes loom over the future of NYC-based festivals, though, it's possible that such presumed attitudes will shift accordingly.