DromFest, the annual festival put on by the legendary Dromedary Records, returns to Catskill, NY this Labor Day weekend with a bunch of cult indie rock bands from the '80s and '90s. At the top of the lineup are Das Damen and Madder Rose -- two bands who both reunited for the first time in decades back in 2023 -- as well as the Dambuilders, who'll be playing their first show since 1997.
Das Damen and Madder Rose both had short-lived stints cutting their teeth in New York, but Dambuilders -- whose classic lineup featured future Guides By Voices drummer Kevin March -- formed in Honolulu in 1989 before relocating to the more indie rock-friendly Boston.
The rest of the DromFest 2025 lineup will feature Scrawl and Moviola (who both also played the fest last year), along with bands like Bunnygrunt, Beth Kaplan, New Radiant Storm King, Phantom Tollbooth, Cathedral Ceilings, and other very niche groups that'll probably get you excited if you were ultra-tapped into the scene at the time. Here's the daily breakdown:
Friday, August 29:
Sunburned Hand Of The Man, Chris Brokaw, and Roger Clark Miller's Solo Guitar Ensemble
Saturday, August 30:
Madder Rose, Scrawl, Moviola, Bunnygrunt, Beth Kaplan, New Radiant Storm King, Vehicle Flips, Lupo Citta, Five Hundred Dollars and Erin Barth-Dwyer, plus poetry readings from Annie Christain, Bel Simek, and Karen Schoemer
Sunday, August 31:
Das Damen, Phantom Tollbooth, Cathedral Ceilings, The Dambuilders, Rebecca Gates, The Thalia Zedek Band, Mark Robinson, French, Fly Ashtray, King In Yellow, plus a special screening of the documentary film Flipside by Chris Wilcha
Tickets are available here.
