Jessie Love Action at CMJ - Day 4

CMJ Friday Day 4

Day 4 of CMJ promised to be our most hectic, as September Girls were booked to play 3 shows in both Manhattan and Brooklyn over the course of the day. Lucky for us, the first show was near our apartment at the new(ish) Rough Trade NYC branch in Williamsburg, Brooklyn. The shop is massive and wonderfully laid out. A brick warehouse styled up with its warehouse roots, with shipping containers being used as walls and dividers and lots of space to browse and listen to music. 

The shop also features a venue... not a little shop stage mind, but an actual venue with a tall roomy stage, great sound and lighting system, balcony and bar. We enjoyed our set as the sound was good and the Tecate was refreshing.

Up after us were Pinact - a duo from Glasgow... though as we were told, the drummer didn't make it through immigration and the singer/guitarist had a friend filling in on drums. You'd never know anything was amiss however, as they were incredibly fun and brash indie punk. There was a real 90s Alternative sound, with Nirvana as an obvious reference, but it wasn't just simple aping, as they had an incredible energy and were a really enjoyable watch.

Oscar were up next, and were certainly something different, but also enjoyable. Genre defy-ing but a bit indie-alternative with guitars, keys and no drummer. The songs I heard reminded me of The Drums, fun pop, but with a underlying bitter edge.

Unfortunately we weren't able to stick around for the "secret surprise guest" who turned out to be 90s Manchester greats, James. Oh Well.

We headed back over the Williamsburg Bridge to The Delancey, where the Music From Ireland was due to begin. September Girls were up first, and admittedly had a little bit of a struggle with our sound as we were rushed onto the stage as the previous showcase was running around an hour behind schedule. Yikes. Despite this we let loose and just went with it.

After us, Dott, from Galway, popped onto stage and sounded great. They've got a harmonious beachy sound, similar to Best Coast, and they looked like they were truly enjoying the show, smiling and joking about out of tune guitars. They were quite good at recreating their recorded sound, which is certainly worth checking out. We had to head back to Brooklyn for our next gig so I didn't make it through to the end of the set, but I can imagine the rest of it went swimmingly.

Our next stop was Brooklyn Nite Bazaar - an indoor shopping market complete with stalls of homemade trinkets and food stuffs like Korean Tacos and Meat Cones (still not sure what that is). My bandmate Lauren described it as "Hipster Chuck E Cheese" and indeed it had a real cool, grown-up fun fair vibe.

We arrived in time to catch Beverly, another Kanine Records band (it was a Kanine party after all) and they absolutely blew me away. Harmonious indie pop as you'd expect from a band whose original members included Frankie Rose, but Rose was not missed, as the band were dreamy and fun. Really looking forward to having a proper listen to their album.

September Girls turn next, and being our last gig, we let loose, headbanged a bit and screamed for our lives at the end of our last song, Sister. New York had been very good to us and we enjoyed every minute.

After us, once again, were Flowers. Having seen them at least three times in the last few days, they were noticeably also more confident and having fun. The crowd seemed to really get into it and it topped off a great night, and a great festival overall.