The largest submission-based music festivals in Los Angeles, Brokechella, has become an alternative experience to Coachella for five years counting. One stage that’s found success for the past three years is from event promotional outlet Brownies and Lemonade.
Known for their local Camp Trill and Double Cross parties, founders Evan Washington and Kush Fernando said their events began as “festivals for the homies.” Fernando explained coming up with the idea from the line of notable L.A. hot dog spot Pink’s. The rest was history.
“We started up with a website to put some music up and look cool and then we also used the name to throw some random house parties,” Fernando says. “After a while, we did some legitimate parties before I met Evan.”
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Both had various connections to L.A.’s indie urban scene and hoped to eventually provide a bigger outlet for local artists. “It kind of became a sense of responsibility to like uphold and put-on for the indie artist when the blogs aren’t posting them, they’re not getting shows or can’t sell 50 tickets at $20,” Washington says. “Just to be able to have this platform where somebody with 200 SoundCloud followers and 26 plays perform in front of 4,000 people can go home with 400 SoundCloud followers and 260 plays.”
For both Washington and Fernando, it’s also about finding the right artists. This year, Executive producer for Brokechella and leader of L.A. based collaborative cARTel, Negin Singh, said the festival has garnered more than 1,000 submissions from around the world. Submissions were screened for the four stages representing various genres from rock to electronica during listening sessions and scaled down to 25 acts.
For Brownies and Lemonade, the goal is always finding the next “it” artists. Their record of finding acts with real career potential has more hits than misses. Artists such as Bad Lucc, Raven Sorvino, Oh Blimey, Chippy Nonstop and Azad Right have all gone on to find fans outside of their humble beginnings.
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“We just kind-of year by year wanted to see who is going to be poppin next year,” Washington says. “This year hopes to be elevate the brand even further by showcasing each aspect of underground L.A. Hip Hop.”
“We have the spectrum of turn-up shit and really experimental music, conscious rap, indie Hip Hop and neo-soul,” Fernando says. “That means emerging locals Marty Grimes, Reem Riches, Jetpack Jones and Tiffany Gouche, among others.”
Set for Saturday, April 18 in Downtown L.A., tickets for the 21-and-over event are $20 can be purchased here.
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Line-up announcement video below.
