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Hasid Is a Punk Rocker!

The Punk Jews project

by
Dina Mann
June 18, 2010
Joey Ramone, born Jeffrey Hyman.(Wikipedia)
Joey Ramone, born Jeffrey Hyman.(Wikipedia)

Oh, that’s not the song. How did I confuse “Sheena” with “Hasid”?

Now that I have your attention, I’d like to introduce you to Punk Jews, an online documentary series set to air in the late summer, featuring the characters that make up the, well, punk Jewish scene. Not punk, the genre of music, but punk, the attitude. The spirit. (Incidentally, among those who do represent Jewish punk, the genre of music, are the Ramone brothers—they were born Jeffrey and Mitchell Hyman in Forest Hills, Queens.)

The documentary’s subjects include Hasidic African-American rapper Y-Love; Levi Okunov, a fashion designer originally from Crown Heights; and Rivka Karasik, a mixed-media artist who grew up Lubavitch. Also featured is the crowd from Cholent, the Thursday night free-wheeling party that was thrown in the Millinery Shul and named after the stew-like concoction containing beans, barley, flanken, potatoes, and, of course, kishka.

Filmmakers Jesse Zook Mann, Saul Sudin, and Evan Kleinman just met their $10,000 fundraising goal through kickstarter.com.

They hope to add to that sum this Saturday night at Manhattan’s Sixth Street Synagogue. The event will feature performances by Golem, Y-Love, Moshiach Oi, Eden, and Blanket Statementstein, with art installations by Rivka Karasik, Elke Reva Sudin, and Ira Kaufman.

The event will take place this Saturday at 9:30 p.m.

For more information please visit PunkJews.com.