CMJ Day 4

The unofficial Pitchfork showcase in Williamsburg fulfilled my expectation of a music festival in the City That Never Sleeps, with a line wrapping around the block and set times running way into the wee small ones.  After a long hour in line, I made it through the doors into the bare brick walls of Villain for the midnight set of seventeen-year-old emcee, Joey Bada$$.

While most of 2012's hip-hop heavyweights under 25 - Odd Future, the A$AP's, Kendrick Lamar - hype themselves to a stratospheric level in their hook-heavy mixtapes, Bada$$ takes a more laid back approach, slinging rhymes over butter-smooth beats, channeling the sound and the flow of early 90s New York rap.

DIIV

Over the past year, Zachary Cole Smith bailed on his day job as guitarist for Beach Fossils in favor of his kraut-influenced bedroom project DIIV. I've spent a lot of time with their first release Oshin, and several listens in, noticed an intentional lack of cymbals. Hearing it live, sped up and intensified, the reliance on a bass-and-snare kit creates an interesting sonic map, making the layers of guitar the audible focal point.

Death Grips

Hip-hop's primary audience in both sales and reception has been a white middle class ever since suburban kids threw on Raiders hats and started spitting back the lyrics to Straight Outta Compton. That being said, it feels strange to me that Danny Brown's tooth-little grin fronts the ads for NPR music- an institution known for its Schweddy Balls, vanilla blandness - and the NPR CMJ showcase lists Flying Lotus and Death Grips as headliners. At the same time, Death Grip's abrasive  approach makes sense according to NPR's intended purpose of providing a space for engaging music looked over by Pop's reception.

Death Grip's set was just as challenging as their three albums over the past two years, 2011's Exmilitary, The Money Store, and the dick-clad and controversial No Love Web Deep.  Thrash specialist Zach Hill wailed on the drums harder than anyone I've ever seen hit a kit, while MC Ride's gnarly, Iggy Pop-gristly body commanded the stage with berserk energy. To my surprise, the subtleties of their production shone out through the amphetaminic set.