You can order the cd now Right here!

The ANTICOMP FOLKILATION is a 2 disc set containing new or out of print tracks from 34 amazing artists from the Lower East Side NYC music scene. You will soon have links to the following artists. We will also reveal a new song every single day until the release party on February 11 at The Sidewalk Cafe during The antifolk fest. Check back often for updates. Todays song is M+M's (I Love You More) by Dan Costello. The second song  is Tripping Yourself by Major Matt Mason USA. {Brook Pridemore-Sugar Coma (Snakes on My Brain)  plays third}      - enjoy

New songs have been added by Kimya Dawson, Frank Hoier, Dead Blond Girlfriend and the elastic no-no band!




The artists on the cds are as follows:

CD (67:05)
1. Major Matt Mason USA-Tripping Yourself
2. Brook Pridemore-Sugar Coma (Snakes on My Brain)
3. Soft Black-The Earth is Black
4. The Wowz-You're Lovely
5. Toby Goodshank-Black Eye
6. A Brief View of the Hudson-She Will Never Speak
7. Jeff Lewis and Diane Cluck-The River
8. Jason Trachtenburg-Anyone Can Tell (In the Rain)
9. Kimya Dawson-Live Song at Sidewalk
10. Masheen Gun Kelly-Don't Bug Me I'm On My First Cup
11. Lowry-Boone's Farm
12. Elastic No-No Band-Sally's Strut
13. ThREe DrinKs tO LizZie-splash'o'gin
14. Beau Johnson-Gypsy
15. The Real Urban Barnyard-Pooper Scooper
16. Dan Penta-Joyless Now
17. Lach-Baby
18. Dan Costello-M&M's (I Love You More)
CD (65:03)
1. Eric Wolfson-Sleeping is a Sucker's Game
2. Griffin and the True Believers-Beautiful Weather
3. Ivan Sandomire-Drunk Faeries
4. Matt Singer-VHS
5. Erin Regan-Your Mom's Car
6. Paleface-I Don't Think I Like You (As Much As I Used To)
7. David LK Murphy-Peace of Mind
8. Dead Blonde Girlfriend-Velvet Coffin
9. The Festival-The Ink Festival
10. Ben Godwin-Terminus
11. The Sewing Circle-Sewer Gators NYC
12. Creaky Boards-I'm So Serious This Time
13. The Bowmans-The Slumber
14. Dan Fishback-Faggotssaywhat?
15. Frank Hoier-I Can't Love You Anymore
16. Debe Dalton-Ed's Song
17. Urban Barnyard-Johnny's Kitchen



ANTIFOCUS
Jonathan Berger

So Brook Pridemore called me up and asked me to give him some notes for some CD compilation about AntiFolk.

"What AntiFolk are you referring to?" I asked him.

"What AntiFolk?" he repeated, "AntiFolk AntiFolk. The scene. The music. Just give an overview."

"Yeah, but which AntiFolk are you talking about," I said, "You want stuff on historical AntiFolk, on New York AntiFolk, current-day AntiFolk, international AntiFolk, the people on the scene or the people actually playing AntiFolk music?"

There was silence on the other end of the line for a minute. "I'm talking about AntiFolk from the last few years, New York-based, scene-driven players who go to the open mics."

"OK, so which scene of AntiFolk? There are lots of Williamsburgers who never come into Manhattan , and a bunch of Ludlow Street players that stay south of Houston . And what about the actual music..."

I'm pretty sure that's about when Brook hung up on me, leaving me alone with my thoughts on AntiFolk.

AntiFolk is flexible. There are more definitions of AntiFolk than there are ways to spell it (I prefer AntiFolk, though, lately, I've been typing anitfolk), and more sub-styles in a genre that nobody's heard of than you'd imagine possible. If you poll ten members of the AntiFolk community, you'd probably get fourteen different explanations as to what the scene's about. That's because the definitions change so regularly.

AntiFolk is transient. The people who played the scene three years ago, real open mic veterans who would come out every week to play their new songs to excitable small crowds, they never come around anymore. They're too busy with their albums or their tours or their day jobs or their kids. But when they do show up, they see the scene they used to be so active in, and they say, "It's not l ike it was when I came up."

And the people who played the scene eight years ago, they say, "It's not as cool as when I was around." And the guys from ten years back, they shake their heads and say "Where's the fire? It used to really ROCK!" And the geezers from twenty years ago, they don't even understand how the kids today call what they're doing AntiFolk. And the four or ten people who were in the room twenty five years and came up with AntiFolk, I don't even know what they're doing…

AntiFolk is reactive. Back in the early 80s, when the term was coined, the AntiFolk scene was in direct opposition to the twenty year folk scene losing steam on Bleecker and MacDougal Streets. Younger kids breathing fire, spitting venom, would bring their acoustic instruments to Folk City and Sun Mountain Café, and be figuratively booed off stage, for singing off-key, for being too crazy, or disrespecting the altar of Livingston Taylor. Those kids started playing the parks and squats and creating their own clubs in Alphabet City, and that was early AntiFolk. It was new wave in spirit, DIY in mentality. It was acoustic punk. It was a reaction to what was out there. Back then, it was ANTI-Folk.

AntiFolk is iconoclastic. Those kids who got kicked out of the West Village, some of them, they wanted to spew in the ear of the establishment, even if the establishment was some thirty something booker at Gerde's. They wanted to do it their way. That spirit goes on strong, with snot-faced assholes at open mic week after week trying to get a rise out of audiences by cursing at them, or insulting them, or doing Peter Yarrow covers (sometimes all at once). AntiFolk is looking to get a reaction – any reaction.

AntiFolk is educational. Year after year, songwriters who are just starting out, or singers who haven't even begun, or audience members who are just looking for a good time, they come onto these AntiFolk clubs, and they see something special; something they want to be part of. And they begin playing, and writing, and trying things they never thought they'd try before. They enter the world of AntiFolk, and their horizons expand. They become one of the AntiFolk, and they are transformed.

AntiFolk is about composition. Most everyone is trying to create a distinct honest vision of their own, through song or poetry or interpretive dance. It's the attempt to communicate personally, originally, and (usually) primitively that keeps it all together.

AntiFolk is communal. Like school, like camp, like a cult, performers make friends in the AntiFolk world, friends for life. Friends that intrigue and inspire, that they want to be more l ike, or less like, or something in-between. People who start out on the scene want to be accepted by the cool kids. The cool kids keep changing.

AntiFolk is a growing. It used to be in one club in Loisaida. Now, you can hear AntiFolk in the US and Europe and I hear even Philadelphia's getting in on the act (it may be just a rumor…)

AntiFolk is a clique. You're never gonna get inside the scene if you want to be a part of it. You gotta be aloof, man. But if you stick around long enough, doing your own thing, maybe you'll get to be invited to submit a track for the latest and greatest AntiFolk compilation. If you don't make the cut, though, don't worry. There'll be another comp coming out, sometime real soon. It won't be as good as this one; it's never as cool as it used to be.

AntiFolk is unrehearsed. I wrote this right after getting off the phone with Brook.

Jonathan Berger has seen more AntiFolk shows than he ever thought possible, and twice as many as he ever would have wanted to. He writes for zines on the scene.