Musical Matinee at Baker Falls for New Colossus Festival NYC.
March 8th, 2025
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-“Look at the schedule. This band submitted their genre as Male”
March 10th, 2025
Last week New York City hosted the 6th annual New Colossus festival. From March 4th through the 9th the Lower East Side sprung to life to present nearly 200 artists from around the globe across the neighborhood's eclectic family of independent music venues. This event truly is a colossal experience. Last year we covered just the shoegaze day and night party at Arlene’s grocery. This year all we covered was the musical matinee day show at Baker Falls. Still, these eight incredible acts put forward an entire world of sound under a single roof, nearly blowing it off in the process. Here’s our coverage of Ready Atlantic, No Waves, Shishi, Matching Outfits, Holiem, Flowers For The Dead, Daydream Twins, and Humdrum, in black and white Rrrat Vision. Enjoy!
Ready Atlantic kicked the day party off with a song about “You and me against the world”. It was giving strong early Shiny Toy Guns vibe, if you were there for peak Myspace then you know what we mean. Their bombastic maximalist splashing of everything seemed impossible for just a duo. Guitarist was on everything duty, tackling riffs, backing vocals, and an array of sample pads, triggers, and effects. Their set was like your friend that’s the undeniable life of the party, relentless bursts of outsized energy.
No Waves wasted no time unloading blistering double time punk beats. “If you want to buy us a drink, or slice of pizza, feel free to” their lead recommended between songs. They could switch between sweet melodic and harsh dissonant on a whim, and seemed to enjoy doing both. All three stooges had a microphone which gave their choruses a three voice exclamation point. This wasn’t Cali surf, it was Cali slam dance. Guitarist could riff, solo, tap, and dance.
Shishi travelled all the way from Vilnius, Lithuania, to grace us with their presence. We took no notes during their set because our whiskers had dropped to the floor in amazement. But we remember clear as day. They were groovy, precise, and locked in. Three part vocal harmonies were a cakewalk for this super group, a Šakotis to be specific. Hands down one of the best performances we’ve seen in the last year. They continue their journey through the states to SXSW, the first Lithuanian band to do so. We wish them best of luck, Linkiu sėkmės!
Matching Outfits also flew across the Atlantic pond from Berlin, Germany. True to their name they matched in purple, blue, and yellow, an early blooming spring. We’ve never seen a fusion of heartfelt and deadpan like the cocktail they delivered. One song called Obituary told the story of the narrator's old dying grandma telling her to cut her hair short because when it’s long it just hangs there. Which they found insulting, but couldn’t deny that grandma was right. It ended on a reflection “I hope she sees my bob from heaven”.
Hometown heroes, Holiem, brought their own Marshall cab, which meant they meant business. The first ever Marshall on the new Baker Falls stage, according to the owner. “Loud amps save lives”, Holiem declared before diving into a bone deep bass groove for their second song. The Titan submersible imploded before making it to the depths that Holiem conjures. They turn the shoegaze into a piercing stare. Some people can handle it, some cannot, and that’s just the way it is. Their second evolution is well under way.
Flowers For The Dead, from D.C., Opened with a vivid daydream alt rocker that eventually deconstructed into a noise jam, an unexpected formula they put to use more than once to great effect. The two front women donned matching dresses and packed their pedalboards inside of small vintage suitcases. We liked how high the drummers' cymbals were, don’t know enough about drumming to understand if that’s personal preference or a flex. They played a bunch of songs off their newly released album Magnolia.
Daydream Twins, from Austin, Texas, were the biggest band of the day. We wondered if this remarkably tall quintet of trees had a height requirement to even be in the band. Their frontwoman channeled a Mazzy Star-like presence with lofty vocals and a cool white tambourine. They also just recently released an album, Solstice For Embodiment. This group enjoyed the moment and was in no rush, which is a prominent feature of the album with the shortest song running three and a half minutes. That’s what daydreaming should be, anyway. Unhurried.
Humdrum, from Chicago, had no drummer. Humnodrum. Humdrumless. Maybe they got left behind by mistake. Regardless, they constructed a new wave swing to their beat. That kind of half inspirational, half nervous type of energy that propels into an uncertain future with optimism. Their frontman had not one, but two capos on his guitar. Never seen that before. He also was wearing a Wild Horses Rolling Stones shirt.
That was that for our coverage, but it was only 6:00pm when the show ended, so onward we pushed. The rest of the night accelerated into an epic time warp of sight and sound, like a marathon pinball game spiralling out of control towards a new high score. We caught Panik Flower and Camp Blu at Berlin, cootie catcher and Last Waltzon at Pianos, back to Berlin for Prostitute in front of a packed house, then to Sour Mouse for the manic moshing that Snoozer and Wax Jaw unleashed on the concrete floor. Through these moments we got a greater appreciation for the scale of New Colossus, and a greater appreciation for all the artists, organizers, and people involved. For a beautiful night, life was art, and art was life. As it should be, in our book. We can’t wait til next year. Rrrat Pack, out.
| Keywords: | New Colossus Festival | New York City | Ready Atlantic | No Waves | Shishi | Matching Outfits | Holiem | Flowers For The Dead | Daydream Twins | Humdrum |
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