The sun sets around 4 p.m. now, so FLESH & STEEL music festival will be debuting the perfect soundtrack to the season during the three day “descent into darkness” kicking off this evening, December 1 at Saint Vitus and taking over stages throughout Greenpoint and greater Brooklyn.
Described succinctly as a showcase of “machine music,” the fest features artists specializing in darkwave, industrial, EBM (electronic body music, combining industrial synth-punk with disco and dance), coldwave, and “other forms of moody opaqueness,” including Boy Harsher, Psyche, Ms. Boan, Soft Crash, Riki, and many more. The festival is a creative, conceptual labor of love from LA-based promoters Restless Presents in conjunction with Saint Vitus co-owner and booker David Castillo and journalist, event curator, and DJ Andi Harriman of SYNTHICIDE, who Restless recruited for their close, long-standing relationships with said music communities.
“It kinda seemed like a natural collaboration. And when [Restless Presents] asked me, I brought in David Castillo from Saint Vitus because I work with Dave pretty closely,” Harriman explained. “He’s more of a business guy. I’m more of the artsy curatorial side. So I knew I could trust Dave and together the two of us, we got four venues going and it was just really seamless and easy putting together the lineup.”
The venues in question include Saint Vitus — which will be home to the opening night of the festival with headliner Psyche, a legendary Canadian goth-pop band with music dating back to the early ’80s — Knockdown Center, Meadows, and Good Room.
“Naturally we chose Saint Vitus because Dave owns it, and I work with ’em pretty regularly. And then Good Room because I treasure Good Room as a DJ-sort of mecca in Brooklyn. It’s got great sound, it’s really fun. The vibe is awesome and I really wanted to curate a DJ night. Saturday night at Good Room is kind of my baby. I’m really excited for that one,” Harriman said. “For Meadows, we wanted something like a little bigger than Saint Vitus. And then Knockdown is like the mammoth, we wanted the challenge of filling it up with Boy Harsher and trying to see what we could do…on a big scale.”
And as the festival moves from the planning phase to full-steam ahead, above all, the team behind it just wants everyone to have a good time discovering new music or just enjoying what they already love.
“I really just want there to be a good vibe and people to have fun. I want it to be an opportunity for people to see artists that maybe they didn’t know about or artists that they never thought they would see, such as A Split-Second from Belgium. The same for Psyche, you know, these classic bands, you don’t really expect to see them, but now and then they’ll come by and it’s just incredible,” Harriman noted. “I love both of those bands so much and I just want people to have fun and dance and you know, just enjoy themselves. The world is pretty crazy these days. It’d be nice to have some form of escape and just spend the weekend dancing with friends and discovering new artists and just like having a good time and forgetting about the craziness of the world. That’s my goal.”
Both single and three-day tickets are available HERE. While there will be limited tickets at the door of each venue, FLESH & STEEL recommends buying in advance to guarantee entry.