Artists Who Lit Up Our Radar In 2020

This past year, Brooklyn Roads Magazine interviewed several local artists whose genres and personalities reflect the great diversity that Brooklyn is known for. Here’s a recap.

FAST LEARNER: Following the release of Pom Pom Squad’s second EP, Ow, lead singer and songwriter Mia Berrin told Brooklyn Roads that punk and grunge “provided me a sense of comfort” during her troubled teen years. Her own music, she added, is “deeply rooted in lyrical introspection and ’90s influences.” Berrin also told us that playing for tough crowds in Brooklyn “made me have to learn fast.”

DEEP IN THE HEART OF BROOKLYN: While proudly touting the rich music environment of her native San Antonio, TX, Park Slope singer-songwriter Mariela Flor Olivo told us that our borough has “a far more prevalent bustle” and its music scene here is “welcoming, challenging and engaging” and that, “Brooklyn is usually the setting of the songs [I] write” (such as those on her debut EP, Decide).

FUTURE SOUL: Johnny Burgos told us that, “Growing up in certain [Brooklyn] neighborhoods with different ethnic communities exposed me to so many different worlds of music that I wouldn’t know otherwise.” That, combined with being part of a musically diverse family, led his to develop a style he calls “future soul” that is “rooted in principles of traditional R&B … but also forward-thinking.”

TAKING CONTROL: Indie rocker Aubrey Haddard said that moving to Brooklyn inspired her to “seize control of my muse” in a new way. “[It] definitely propelled my writing into a new stage.” Having to shelter in place this year has given her “time to really focus and work on a new repertoire. There’s definitely a new record brewing.” In May she released the video of a new song, “Thin Line.”

NO PLACE LIKE BROOKLYN: While Sari Schorr loves many of the places she’s toured throughout the world, Brooklyn, her home for 25 years, “still has the hold on me. It inspires me.” Indeed, she told us, the “great diversity of music percolating throughout Brooklyn” has figured prominently in her music. Our borough is featured in her music video, “Ordinary Life,” released in April.

SIDES FROM THE SIDEMAN: With live performances on hold, Akie Bermiss has stepped out of his role as a sideman for Lake Street Dive to work on several projects that he’s always wanted to do. He told us in September that he had already written “a good 30 songs” for a “soul-opera thing called ‘Alien Love Songs’ … a kind of cosmic ‘Romeo and Juliet.’”

BLUES IN BUSHWICK: Jane Lee Hooker have been playing their swaggering brand of blues rock since 2013. Front woman Dana “Danger” Athens, who spent her early years singing gospel in a Brooklyn church her family frequented, told us the band recently relocated their rehearsal space to Bushwick where they are working on their third studio album, planned for an early 2021 release.

DIVERSITY INSPIRES: Bedford-Stuyvesant native and current Park Slope resident Bette Smith told us that, “There is so much diversity in Brooklyn, with such a wide variety of activities and happenings, that it constantly sparks all kinds of inspiration in me.” The rock-and-soul artist’s latest album, The Good, The Bad and The Bette, was released in September to rave reviews.

FEMINIST FOURSOME: Perhaps proving that all musical roads lead to Brooklyn, the members of feminist blues-based rockers Fisty — Chantal, Rebecca, Heidi, and Lola – arrived here 12 years ago from various locales around the U.S. According to drummer Rebecca, they’re currently working on new material. “We have at least a couple of songs. We’ve all been writing at home.”

2020’s Greatest Hits

In addition to those mentioned above, here are some of Brooklyn Roads Magazine‘s favorite music releases of 2020:

The Lone Bellow, Half Moon Light; Joan Osborne, Trouble and Strife; Adrian Daniel, Night Wolf; Sari Schorr, Live in Europe; José James, No Beginning No End 2; Nicole Atkins, Italian Ice; Sufjan Stevens, The Ascension; Matt Berringer (The National), Serpentine Prison; Sharon Jones & the Dap Kings, Just Dropped In to See What Condition My RENDITION Was In; Adrianne Lenker, Songs and Instrumentals; Lou Reed, New York (deluxe edition reissue); and Chicks With Dip, Stomping on Eggshells (EP).