After spending much of the day worrying that Downtown Music Festival goers (myself included) would have to spend their Saturday night venue-hopping in gross, stormy weather, the rain finally went away and left a nice chill in the air––near-perfect conditions for an evening of bouncing around the Lower East Side. At first, it didn’t really seem like there was much of a “festival” vibe considering everything was so spaced out at multiple spots; it kind of seemed like the night was just a series of dissimilar performances at a bunch of popular venues, as opposed to one larger event. But as the night went on, and more and more people started appearing on the streets with their brightly colored wristbands, a more communal atmosphere was established.
At Tammany Hall, I unintentionally caught a short set by Cali-turned-Brooklyn rapper Hefna Gwap, in which his energy and many lyrics about weed were played up by a group of his super enthusiastic friends/entourage who all joined him on stage several times. Soon after, Queens-native Awkwafina took the stage and the stoner verses were replaced with fairly comedic lines about Mayor Bloomberg and private parts. For a small-ish girl, she definitely has a big (and awesome) mouth. In between her raps about how great it is to be from NYC and why her “vag” is better than yours (FYI if you haven’t heard her song “My Vag” I highly suggest you check it), she talked about watching Sarah Lawrence students aggressively twerk at her show the previous night, and how much she loves to make her dates take her to Dallas BBQ restaurants for their massive margaritas. That may or may not be true, but I’m choosing to believe she was being honest because that’s kind of amazing. Anyway, the margarita talk was related to her feelings about Bloomberg’s soda ban, and she then went into a song about oversized margaritas that included a sample of El Bloombito’s hilarious attempts at authentic Spanish. All in all, her performance was highly entertaining.
At Rockwood Music Hall (Stage 2), I caught the tail end of The Chevin. Their energy was totally infectious, and the place was literally so packed that I was unable to move from the entranceway until their set finished, and people started filing out. By the time Teen came on, the place had mellowed out a bit, which seemed appropriate for their dreamy, psychedelic sounds. Lead singer/instrumentalist Teeny Lieberson’s voice was actually quite striking despite the hazy vibe of their music, and it was pretty awesome to hear her impressive vocal ability while she played not one, but two instruments. Having attended mainly electronic shows in recent months, Teen was pretty refreshing to see live. And I still think it’s totally badass to see an all-girl group rock the stage.
Despite the awesomeness of some of the smaller performances throughout the night, Purity Ring put on, at least in my opinion, the best set hands down. I’ve been a big fan of the Canadian electronic duo for a while but hadn’t heard much about their live performances, so I was pretty blown away. Their set design, for starters, was fantastic––interactive light-up cocoons filled the top of the stage, while beat-maker Corin Roddick worked his fantastical (and self-designed) light-releasing instrument that kind of resembled a tripped out xylophone. Singer Megan James, clad in a flowy white dress and witchy black lace-up boots, also played with an strangely fantastic drum that, when hit, would explode with light and color. Their entire stage looked like something out of a creepy, supernatural fairy tale. They played a bunch of songs from Shrines––with Young Magic’s Isaac Emmanuel joining them onstage for “Grandloves”––along with their brilliant cover of Soulja Boy’s “Grammy.” The combination of James’ haunting vocals with their stunning props and instruments made for a totally weird and beautiful performance.
In short, day 2 of the Downtown Music Festival was a great success. The acts were solid and diverse, and it was pretty awesome to attend a “festival” that didn’t require use of portable restrooms or worrying about sweating to death under the hot sun. Lastly, if you ever get the chance to see Purity Ring live, I encourage you to take it.
Review by Nicole Woszczyna
