Cairo Knife Fight
As the weather starts to cool and the days grow shorter, musicians from all over the world are making their instinctual yearly migration to the industry hotbed of New York City for the annual CMJ Music Marathon & Film Festival. Along with Austin’s South by Southwest, CMJ is possibly the nation’s premiere showcase of established, up-and-coming and hopefully soon to be up-and-coming musicians alike. Past performers of note include Arcade Fire, Foo Fighters, Nirvana and The White Stripes among many others.
If you’re interested in finding out about these bands before your friends do, Livestream.com is streaming select live performances from the festival through Saturday, October 22. Go out and get those bragging rights!
Here are some of the highlights from Livestream.com‘s coverage of the festival (all times listed in Central Standard Time):
Tuesday, Oct. 18: Cairo Knife Fight at 8 p.m.
Two-piece rock bands are always a trip to watch, especially when they can utilize multiple instruments simultaneously and loop tracks successfully to create a very non-two-piece sound. New Zealand’s own Cairo Knife Fight has already taken these talents to the stage performing with Foo Fighters, Them Crooked Vultures and Queens of the Stone Age.
Wednesday, Oct. 19: Lisa Hannigan at 3 p.m.
Kicked out of fellow countryman Damien Rice’s band after seven years together, Irish pop songstress Lisa Hannigan has set out on her own, building quite the budding career for herself. Breathy, haunting and soulful, Hannigan will be performing this special acoustic set and chat in addition to a CMJ showcase.
Also: Zola Jesus at 6 p.m.
With a background as an opera singer and a penchant for dramatic industrial music, Zola Jesus creates an enigmatic mystique that is almost as captivating as her dark, new wave songs.
If you just want to hear the tunes, you can download a sampler put together by CMJ or use Spotify to access a playlist of 101 tracks from CMJ artists put together by music website Spinner, including Milwaukee’s own The Wildbirds..
Photo courtesy of cairoknifefight.com.
