CMJ Music Marathon is an annual music festival held in New York City. Now in its 35th year, it is the city’s largest and is considered one of the world’s penultimate festivals for discovering new and emerging acts from around the world.
CMJ Music Marathon is as much an event for industry professionals as it is for music fans. By day, the festival is a business-like conference that bases itself out at New York University, where people who work in the industry attend seminars, panels sessions and other special groups. By night, the event takes over the majority of live music venues across Manhattan and Brooklyn, where fans and industry peeps come together to enjoy the huge range of music on offer.
The size and scale of this event is staggering. Check out these numbers – over 5 days this event will host over 1,300 artists playing across 80 different venues and with an expected audience of over 125,000 music fans.
Overwhelmed and not sure what to see? Yeah, me too! In looking at this year's extensive line-up, it’s tempting to gravitate to shows from established acts like Bombay Bicycle Club, RAC, Cold War Kids, and The Kills. But my advice for tackling an event like CMJ is to use it as it’s intended – for music discovery.
CMJ offers an untapped goldmine of undiscovered and exceptional talent. Forget about what you know or think you like and get out there and find what's new and fresh. Discover these acts now and follow their progression as they become more established and their popularity grows. Some of my best CMJ discoveries have come from doing no prior research and just fronting up at a random venue and seeing 5 or 6 quality acts all in a row. In the spirit of random discovery, my playlist contains a very tiny sample of my most anticipated CMJ acts.
CMJ Music Marathon runs from October 21 – 25. Full details are here. Tickets are available from participating venues or grab your festival pass here.
