Brooklyn Americana Fest Returns LIVE — and as Lively as Ever

The annual Brooklyn Americana Music Festival (BKAMF) was back live again this year after having to go virtual in 2020. Six venues hosted more than 40 performances from Thursday Sept. 16 to Sunday Sept. 19. Brooklyn Roads was on hand for the Friday night show at the Dumbo Archway, which presented a representative sampling of the weekend’s musical fare.

Emerald Rae / Photo by Ernesto Gonzalez

Fiddler/folksinger Emerald Rae kicked off the evening following an enthusiastic introduction by “the godfather of New York folk,” Gordon Nash. It was the second of Rae’s four performances during the four-day fest. John Platt, host of WFUV’s “Sunday Supper,” arrived in time to MC the remainder of the evening, beginning with local favorites Bobtown.

Bobtown / photo by Ernesto Gonzalez

Fronted by singer-songwriter-instrumentalists Karen Dahlstrom, Katherine Etzel and Jen McDearman, with superlative support from guitarist Alan Lee Backer and bassist Dan Shuman, Bobtown focused primarily on songs from their latest Gothic-folk-Americana album, Chasing the Sun. Highlights included Dahlstrom’s “Daughters of the Dust,” Etzel’s “Kryptonite” and McDearman’s “Hazel.”

Next up, Eleanor Buckland, a Brooklynite by way of New England, played a breezy set of songs that included two singles – “Don’t Look Down” and “Static” – from her forthcoming debut solo album, You Don’t Have to Know. She wrapped up with another album track, “I’m Not Saying,” and a single from her days with folk-rock trio Lula Wiles, “It’s Cool (We’re Cool, Everything’s Cool),” which she described as “the only funny song I ever wrote.”

Crys Matthews and Heather Mae/ photo by Ernesto Gonazalez

Crys Matthews & Heather Mae, marked their two-year anniversary with a musical celebration of love, diversity, and social justice. Bookending their set were “Be Not Afraid” and “Women Gonna Rise Like the Water.” The former is a fierce love song that is at once both LGBTQ-specific and universal in scope, perhaps best illustrated by the refrain “Holding you is worth the pain of what’s coming.” The latter is a rousing feminist anthem exhorting potential allies to “fight for me now.”

Mike Younger’s appearance at BKAMF coincided with the recent release of his long-lost 2001 album, Burning Down the Big Top. While the recording includes contributions from Rock and Roll Hall of Famers Levon Helm and Spooner Oldham, and production by Memphis music legend Jim Dickinson, Younger proved that he and his songs stand strongly on their own. Highlights included album tracks “Soulsearching” and “Lord of the Fleas.”

Brooklyn’s own Jesse Lenat, something of a fixture at BKAMF, brought the evening to a strong close. Accompanied by his brother, David Lenat, on guitar and harmony vocals, he brought a John Prine-like vibe with one of his early compositions, “I’m Not the Only One,” with lines such as “I’ve been quiet long enough / the isolation, it gets tough.” In the pensive “Rest These Eyes,” he’s seeking that dark, quite place one needs to find peace. Another true highlight was “Devil Be,” a helluva song about having to choose between two evils. Fortunately, the kind of choices BKAMF attendees had to make during the weekend all but guaranteed a good time for all.