With a long list of sponsors including Orbitz, The Inns at Lincoln Park, The Chicago Reader, UR Chicago to name a few, Estrojam is an event totally organized by women (but open to all), and has its profits donated to women’s non-profit organizations. This year’s beneficiaries were Girls Rock! Chicago, and the Chicago-based chapter of the National Organization for Women (NOW).
This year’s festival brought names such as sweater-collector “Leslie and the Ly’s”, the queer punk group “Team Dresch”, who is back to Chicago after 10 years with a reunion show, the improv indie rock act “The Tuna Helpers”, and bands with even more suggestive names such as the Montreal-based electronic “Lesbians on Ecstasy”, and the somewhat hip-hop “Fannypack”. With concerts running for four days both at the Metro and the Abbey Pub, Estrojam had no one else other than German punk icon Nina Hagen to lead the festival to a closure at the Metro on Saturday night.
The last evening of the Estrojam Festival had a tight schedule comprised of short performances by the “Jagged Tulips”, “Chitown Sisters” and “Aerial Dancing” before key attractions were announced. It was then when charismatic hostess Miss Tamale, who wearing a suggestive outfit made out of tampons hanging out of her belt, took charge of the stage and of the audience with “What Can You Do With Your Body Competition”. Several candidates who were either yoga practitioners or blessed with extreme flexibility show off their body skills, only for the prize to go to David Beck, who could in front of a punk audience, effortlessly fold his legs behind his head…I warned you this was an unique Festival.
It was then Jenny Hoyston’s turn to break on stage with her side project “Paradise Island”. Yes, the same indie-rock-punk-weird Hoyston who also sings, plays piano and trumpet with the band, “Erase Errata”. Hoyston, dressed in strange zebra pants, delivered an impressive acoustic performance, which served well as Nina’s opening act.
It’s midnight, and in spite of Nina’s modest entrance on stage, there she was, still sounding as if she smoked a pack of cigarettes right before the concert and looking as funky as a legendary punk star should look like. Now in her fifties, and a lengthy career that can be tracked down to the mid-70’s, the German punk rocker may not look like a schoolgirl anymore when wearing a black mini-skirt outfit. However, she does still look a lot more fit than most of the women out there who are twenty years younger than her.
Nina Hagen’s performance this Saturday was the literal definition of the word eclectic: Her set list showed varied influences from African reggae, to country, to pop and back to heavy metal, with sometimes extremely theatrical performances, sometimes sung in English sometimes in German. It was almost like listening to an ipod shuffle going from Offspring to Metallica then to Bob Marley and back to Elvis Presley.
After the tune “Zero Zero UFO”, Nina mentions the 2005 pseudo-scientific documentary, “Dan Aykroyd Unplugged on UFOs” which she apparently may have a small appearance in. With a very strong stage presence throughout the night, Nina also performed a cover of Rammstein’s “Seemann”, and a melodramatic cover of Nirvana’s “All Apologies” when she dragged herself onto the floor while singing it. Least but not last, I don’t think anyone else could make “Ave Maria” sound so incredibly beautiful when sang in German.
Even though I really enjoyed myself that evening, it may not be your type of music or crowd. However, I must say the night was well worth if only for people watching: we had a plethora of provocative costumes, exaggerated make-up, funky hair styles, plenty of tattoos and good ole attitude. My only disappointment is that I didn’t have the time myself to die my own hair blue for the evening. But no problem, that gives me one more reason to look forward to Estrojam’s Music Festival next year.
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Written by Guest on 2006-10-13 14:55:55
You are a better music critic than you are a chemical engineer!!  |
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