The Drug In Me Is Emo Mosh Pits: Emo Night Brooklyn at The Song & Dance
Joshua “Jbat” Batista, DJ for Emo Night Brooklyn, provided a high-energy show with classic emo songs that set the dance floor alight.
Words By: Vivian Baltzer / Photography by Hollis Mehling and Jamie Christensen / Graphic by Griffin Turner
The moment I walked through the main door at The Song & Dance, I heard the recognizable lyrics of “I’m Not Okay (I Promise)” by My Chemical Romance blasting. I giddily ran down the stairs once my ticket was scanned and slammed through the door to enter a dark room complete with booming music and flashing lights. I immediately bolted towards the center of the floor and started dancing to “My Friends Over You” by New Found Glory.
Spending time with this genre in middle school trained me well for the night, allowing me to know almost every song that played. On the other hand, the people I went with weren’t as familiar with the music, but their lack of experience didn’t take away from the amount of fun we had. The best part about shows like Emo Night Brooklyn is that knowing the songs doesn’t matter – everyone there just wants to enjoy themselves and appreciate the music.
Everyone in attendance was full of energy and bouncing around the venue. The look of realization on the crowd’s faces as they realized which song was playing was a ceaselessly amusing spectacle. The groups of friends who went together would look at each other and scream with excitement before dancing, singing, and moshing to every emo hit.
During the halfway point of the show, DJ JBat shared personal experiences with the crowd, one of which was being dumped after a series of unfortunate events. The crowd went on to support him by chanting “Fuck that bitch!” in solidarity with the DJ.
DJ Jbat performing at The Song & Dance’s Emo Night Brooklyn. Photo by Hollis Mehling.
Alongside pre-prepared songs, JBat also took song requests which resulted in floor-wide mosh pits. Some songs that caused a huge riot of throwing elbows and body slamming were “Bring Me to Life” by Evanescence, “Chop Suey!” by System Of A Down, and “Duality” by Slipknot. When “Duality” played, my moshing partner and I looked at each other with the cheesiest grins because we knew shit was about to go down! As the chorus boomed from the speakers, we launched ourselves into the pit and thrashed around going crazy.
The final song of the night was “Welcome to the Black Parade” by My Chemical Romance. As the starting G note played, everyone exchanged glances and held their hands out to the ceiling while some wrapped their arms around each other and sang the lyrics as loud as possible. Everyone ran around with sweat flying from their hair until the legendary track, and the legendary night, came to an end.