♫ Adult Purim Bash @ The Williamsburg Hotel (96 Wythe Ave), 6:30pm, $18, Megillah reading – Open bar – Hors d’oeuvres – Photo booth – Live music, Buy tix ♦ Film Screening Benefit: She’s Gotta Have It @ Dobbin St (64 Dobbin St), 7pm, $20, Dobbin St will be transformed into a luxury movie lounge with popcorn, chips, candy, ice cream sandwiches, cake pops, & chocolate mousse; cash bar & giveaways, Buy tix * Trivia Night @ Archestratus Books + Food (160 Huron St), 8pm, FREE, Expect categories to be various, beer innumerable, arancine aplenty, RSVP ♦ Waiting for Guffman @ Brooklyn Bazaar (150 Greenpoint Ave), 8pm, FREE, Screening takes place in our Main Ballroom! Seating is first come first served, More info ☺ New Greta Has Friends @ Vital Joint (109 Meserole St), 9pm, $5, We’re inviting an ALL STAR lineup of standups to inspire our improv set! More info
THURSDAY 3/1
♫ John Nolan (of Taking Back Sunday, Straylight Run) @ Union Pool (484 Union Ave), 7:30pm, $15, Buy tix ♫ Diet Cig, Great Grandpa, The Spook School @ Elsewhere (599 Johnson Ave), 8pm, $17, Buy tix ♫ The Undercover Dream Lovers, Future Generations, Wilder Maker @ Brooklyn Bazaar (150 Greenpoint Ave), 8pm, $10, Buy tix ♫ Minimal Disco w/ Connie & Mira Fahrenheit @ Rose Gold (96 Morgan Ave), 10pm, FREE, New York DJs Connie Yin and Mira Fahrenheit come together once a month to get weird and play top-quality tunes, from Minimal to Disco… anything goes! More info Continue reading →
Artist Jamie Toll on the rooftop of his bar, Northern Territory. Photo by Ian Hartsoe.
He might be the last cowboy in Brooklyn. Like those adventurers of yesteryear, Jamie Toll (that’s MRToll to you) wandered to a new land seeking adventure and opportunity. An immigrant from Australia, Toll moved to New York in 2003 and quickly rose from local bartender to worldly artist to social justice guru. His work has spanned continents and mediums; his cracked-open, silicone eggs scattered about the US border highlighting the fragility of the immigrant experience caught the attention of the United Nations who employed Toll to travel to El Salvador and Turkey to build community through street art. Alongside his wife, Toll is also crafting a documentary called I Am Migration. Based on their cross-country journey handing out free DNA tests, the film aims to unearth the perceptions of whiteness and blood purity, tackling racism and xenophobia along the way. Meanwhile in Greenpoint, he creates jubilant birds and clay eggs and cartoonish skulls that are peppered around the neighborhood as Easter eggs for residents to discover.
Toll is simultaneously planning, tackling, and executing a number of projects. Before this interview, he said he prefers to delve into just one and discuss its impact as opposed to scanning over many and diluting their effects. And so we discussed his one true love: Brooklyn. (“I’ve never put up art in Manhattan,” he says with pride.) He’s forthright, but don’t mistake this for harshness; Toll exudes compassion, is masterfully warm, and radiates an envious amount of charisma. Maybe it’s the Aussie accent, or the casual way he sipped a whiskey during our interview. He was in his own bar after all — the summer hotspot and winter hideaway Northern Territory, located at 12 Franklin Street. Perched on a barstool, he’s excited yet at ease, and it’s contagious. After getting to know Toll for an hour or so, it’s not hard to feel gravitationally bound to him, even as he tells you that in two years’ time his cozy bar will close. Come March 2020, Northern Territory’s lease won’t be renewed and the building will make way for a high-rise office space. This is just another verse in the dirge of local bars being bought out, but as with cowboys, another adventure is always on the horizon.
🇦🇺 Greenpoint’s Australian gastropub Northern Territory (12 Franklin St) is hosting Australia Day celebrations today (1/26)! The festivities kick off at 5pm (free entry), and they’ll have $5 Australian beer (Coopers) on draft, $10 Coopers + meat/veggie pies and the Australian dessert lamington cake. No word on whether they’ll have Vegemite toast and shrimp on the barbie. And… they’ll be live broadcasting the Triple J’s Hottest 100, which is kind of like an Aussie version of Casey’s Top 40, except the songs are picked by public vote. Ripper! Continue reading →
Sultry weather falls across the land—yet Halloween hour is close at hand. Creatures crawl in search of blood to terrorize our North Brooklyn ‘hood. And whosoever shall be found without the soul for getting down, must stand and face the shutdown of the L and rot inside Williamsburg’s shell. The foulest stench is in the air, the funk of Newtown Creek’s years. And grizzly ghouls from every tomb are closing in to share your doom. And though you fight to stay alive, your body starts to shiver; for no mere mortal can resist the evil of the thriller.
👻 🎃 👾 👹 🍂
[[[[[FRIDAY 10/27]]]]]
TIKI DISCO HALLOWEEN @ Good Room | 98 Meserole Ave | 10pm-4am $20+ tix, More info Tiki Disco started as a bi-monthly party at Roberta’s in 2009 and has transformed into a year-round happening, with popups around the globe. Eli Escobar, Lloydski and Andy Pry will hold down the floor with their deep selections of disco, funk, house and classics. Expect an evening of spooky vibes and ghostly dancing—costumes are definitely encouraged!Continue reading →
WEDNESDAY 9/6 * Awaken + Activate with Rockstar Shaman @ The William Vale (111 N 12th St), 7pm, $20, Join us as Alyson Charles guides a meditation, card reading & a chakra healing so you can deepen your connection to your purpose here on Earth, Buy tix ♫ Sofar Sounds @ Secret Location, 8pm, $15, An intimate concert in a secret Greenpoint location & BYOB. (use code GREENPOINTERS-5B7D8), More info * Ismay Ousten & Avery Leigh’s Night Palace @ Magick City (37 Box St), 8:30pm, FREE, A night of shimmery full moon magic with dreamy kombucha cocktails & sweet, intimate vibes, More info ♦ Michael Jackson’s Moonwalker @ Brooklyn Bazaar (150 Greenpoint Ave), 9pm, FREE, Concert footage, concept videos and a career retrospective make up a video portrait of pop superstar Michael Jackson, More info
THURSDAY 9/7 * North Brooklyn L Train Council Candidates & Com. Partners Forum @ Brooklyn Bazaar (150 Greenpoint Ave), 6:30pm, FREE, This is your chance to ask questions and get answers about how your local leaders plan to navigate the coming shutdown, More info ♫ Goldie Awards 1st Annual DJ & Beat Battle @ Brooklyn Steel (319 Frost St), 7pm, $20, Hosted by Dave East, Presented by A-Trak. Judges: Diplo, Mannie Fresh, Craze, Destructo, Just Blaze, Mija, & The Whooligan, Buy tix # Rachel Baiman & Nathan Xander @ Union Pool (484 Union Ave), 8pm, $10, Buy tix Continue reading →
A lot of people drive cross country from New York to California, but few people do it with a larger social and political message as a goal. On August 8th, Australian-born local street artist and Northern Territory owner Jamie Toll and his wife—Colombian immigrant, actress and filmmaker Paola Baldion—will do just that, while making a completely unique trip. For two months they will travel across America providing free DNA tests to total strangers, and then on the return leg of their journey they’ll interview the recipients of the kits about their DNA discoveries for a documentary film the couple plan to make while on the road.
Jamie and Paola conceived the trip after the success of Paola’s You Tube video, which went viral garnering 30 million hits! They will partner up with the genetic research company myHeritage DNA to shoot the documentary project I Am Migration.
A year ago, we were at the beginning of a five-day intolerable heat wave. Luckily, it seems we’ll only get a handful of 90°+ days this year which means more time outside drinking frozen cocktails! Boozy slushies are a bit of a trend right now and the neighborhood is full of them. It just so happens that they’re perfect for that cooling afternoon drink or to pretend you’re actually on a tropical vacation. Here are the spots happy to put a tiny umbrella in your drink. Continue reading →
We’re one week away from hamburgers, sparklers, and rooftop fireworks. With the Macy’s 4th of July Fireworks Show barges in the East River, literally between the northern tip of Greenpoint and Long Island City (where they properly should be!), our waterfront and rooftops are going to be prime viewing. If you don’t have a private rooftop to your avail, a few of our favorite places are going to be hosting parties, some complete with special menus and poppin’ bottles. But you better act fast as all expect to sell out! Continue reading →
Summer’s here! Summer’s here! It’s picnics in the park, (possible) ferry rides to the beach, and group yoga classes outside time! Unlike the massive outdoor free classes that happen in other parks around the city—I call b.s. when someone says they enjoy doing yoga with about 100 other people—the outdoor classes that happen in North Brooklyn tend to not get too crowded, and you might know an instructor or two. Some of these offerings are free and some aren’t, but it’s really a treat to get your om on outside. Continue reading →
The classic negroni, served up. Image via Negroni Week.
The classic negroni is a classic for a reason. With equal parts gin, campari and sweet vermouth on ice with an orange peel, sipping it makes me feel like I’m zooming around the Italian coast on a Vespa in perfect 72-degree weather while shouting “ciao!” at passerbys (even if I happen to be in a dark Brooklyn bar on a cold night). The bitterness hits you first, and then you start to experience the sensual bed of sweetness, which is what fully transports you to a specific time and place. This week, June 5-11, more than a dozen local watering holes are participating in Negroni Week, in which specialty negronis are sold to benefit charities of the bar’s choosing. Here’s who’s participating in the ‘hood, and the negronis and specials they’ve got going.
WEDNESDAY 2/28
THURSDAY 3/1
TIKI DISCO HALLOWEEN
WEDNESDAY 9/6
THURSDAY 9/7
Summer’s here! Summer’s here! It’s picnics in the park, (possible) ferry rides to the beach, and group yoga classes outside time! Unlike the massive outdoor free classes that happen in other parks around the city—I call b.s. when someone says they enjoy doing yoga with about 100 other people—the outdoor classes that happen in North Brooklyn tend to not get too crowded, and you might know an instructor or two. Some of these offerings are free and some aren’t, but it’s really a treat to get your om on outside. 
