Saturday, The Cabin Sisters played a set at the Grand Victory in Williamsburg. The folk duo has two claims to fame: one is that Zosia Mamet of “Girls” and “Mad Men” is a Cabin Sister. (The other sister is Clara Mamet, an actress on ABC’s “The Neighbors.”)
The second claim would be nothing without the first: in May, following the leads of successful projects like the Veronica Mars movie and Zach Braff’s sequel to “Garden State,” the scions (their father is filmmaker David Mamet) established a Kickstarter to fund their first music video. The media backlash against privileged, otherwise well-connected people to crowdsource funding for their pet projects fixated onto the women for weeks, who raised less than 10% of the project’s $32,000 goal.
Whatever the case, the Cabin Sisters make pretty good music. Their voices are delicate with a hint of rasp, which lends the otherwise purely-folk styling (Clara often accompanies on the banjo) a vaguely bluesy feel. Together, the voices mirror each other, harmonies weaving, echoing each other. The women sing fast and low, like putting music to a rant. They’ve said that their inspiration for the band was vicious heartbreak; that influence is evident.
The eight-song set ran just under 45 minutes. Though the sisters had a four-man band to accompany some of their songs, they describe their act as a “unique brand of folk via body percussion, banjo and harmonies” on their website. The stand-out songs were the most acoustic: “Bleak Love,” easily the best song of the bunch, was accompanied solely by hand claps, smacks, and foot stomps.
Following the second song, “Sinner,” Zosia peered out into the crowd. “Is someone playing with implants out there? Is that what’s happening?” she asked, prompting an audience member to quote the Bushwick party episode of “Girls” and call out “tits out for Christmas!”
Check out our above video for the song… and the implants. And listen to another song below.
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