Rain, Rain, Come Again

CONTACT had the recent pleasure of attending An Evening With The Raincoats at the Museum of Modern Art here in New York City this evening. This program was put on as part of MoMA’s Pop Rally winter roster.

MoMA is really onto something with their Pop Rally programming; though often the tailored kitsch of these events cannot help but force a lens through which to view everything from the art on the walls to the people in the halls, the curating of an event with the same detail as an exhibition has been brought to a new level within the last several years of this program’s development. Each event caters to a particular audience and, in this way, is a prime contributor to targeting particular demographics.

Whereas January’s presentation of Jen Denike’s Scrying brought the money-marinated Beau Brummel crowd to applaud fifteen minutes of fame, the whiff of Wall Street seemed a million miles away in a sea of post-punk feminists ready to rage. Though I personally have never followed the career of The Raincoats, I was pleased to find that within seconds the atmosphere that had once seemed so sterile and impersonal was transformed into what felt like a new-age-y version of Lillith Fair or — dare I say — the Michigan’s Womyn’s Festival, even. This alchemy was a refreshing reminder that New York is, indeed, a melting pot and that MoMA seems to be looking out for the diversity of individuals therein, without missing a beat. The pairing of The Raincoats and Kathleen Hanna was adroit and seamless, seemingly a nod to the mix of generations in the crowd. While Hanna in her DJ set pumped jams that I remember wailing to as a fish-net-wearing-Don-Hill’s-going high school riot grrl-aspirant, The Raincoats with their tunes shed light on the lineage of ladies who paved the way for everything from Le Tigre to Lykke Li.

With the mix of ages and genders in the crowd (the guys, the gays, the girls, the grannies and everything in-between), I was impressed and invigorated by the positive energy in the room — a perfect remedy for an otherwise sub-freezing New York winter night.

— Legacy Russell of CONTACT