Celebrate Brooklyn! 2017: Mashrou’ Leila & Maciste All’Inferno
by Jenni Walkowiak
Brooklyn Creative League is a proud sponsor of the BRIC Celebrate Brooklyn! Festival. BRIC is “the leading presenter of free cultural programming in Brooklyn” (www.bricartsmedia.org) and aims to make art and media accessible, support artists and offers education throughout Brooklyn. Celebrate Brooklyn! Is an annual music and media festival with free concerts all summer long on the Prospect Park Bandshell stage. All the concerts are free (with a few exceptions for benefit shows), all they ask if that you donate $5 at the door upon entry.
Every year, Brooklyn Creative League gives free VIP tickets to our members, we ran a lottery to dole out the loot back in June. I know that I personally, had a lot of fun looking up all of the artists I hadn’t heard of yet. Earlier this summer, Brittany and I shared some highlights of the acts we were looking forward to, but summer is still rolling along! Here are a few acts you can still catch down at the bandshell:
Mashrou’ Leila | Photo courtesy of BRIC | source: https://www.bricartsmedia.org/events-performances/bric-celebrate-brooklyn-festival/mashrou-leila-dawn-midi-dj-khatir
Saturday, July 22 @7PM
Mashrou’ Leila/ Dawn of Midi/ DJ Khatir
Banned in several countries for their controversial themes regarding religion, sexuality and politics, Lebanese indie-alt rockers Mashrou’ Leila’s music is fun, sexy, dancy, and dark. They’ve been compared to Radiohead and Arctic Monkeys (two bands I love, obviously). Even though we speak different languages, their music resonates on a whole other level. The group experiments with non traditional instruments (like megaphones) and looping to create their unique and hauntingly beautiful sound. They are making music that is important and needs to be heard, I’m thrilled that they’re headlining right in my backyard this summer.
While writing this blog post, I pulled up Dawn of Midi on Spotify, listened for a moment and thought of how to describe this sound. I thought “oh this is a fun kind of electronic music”… looked them up and discovered that they are an ACOUSTIC ensemble based right here in Brooklyn. They opened for Radiohead for two sold out Madison Square Garden concerts, and I can hear why. Seriously, give them a listen. It’s intoxicating.
Maciste in Hell Poster| Image source: https://inprincipioerailmale.blogspot.com/2016/04/maciste-allinferno-1925.html
Maciste All’Inferno w/ live score by Sexmob
Maciste All’Inferno (Maciste in Hell) is a 1926 Italian horror film. One of the last of a series of films featuring the character of Maciste, during the silent era. Maciste the strongman was, in his time, a superhero. A loyal slave of tremendous strength , Maciste is described as Herculean, and in his twenty seven silent films, is put in different situations which he must overcome using his otherworldly strength. The character of Maciste was revived in the 60’s and briefly in the 70’s. Maciste in Hell was particularly controversial, as images of the devil and Hell were deemed blasphemous. The film is said to have been what inspired legendary director Federico Fellini to get into film in the first place. The film is described as niche, fantastic, and bizarre and I for one, cannot wait to see it.
Scoring the film live will be grammy nominated NYC jazz quartet, Sexmob. This is an original score from them for this film, which should make for quite an interesting evening. I’ll be there– who’s bringing the popcorn?
