Anijimle and Brotherkenzie
Johnny Brenda's
1201 Frankford Ave.
Philadelphia
June 2, 2026
On Tuesday night, about 20 people waited around the stage at Johnny Brenda’s while D’Angelo’s woozy, psychedelic-soul epic “Ain’t That Easy” poured out of the house sound system. The bill that night featured Dallas-born singer-songwriter Anjimile as well as Brotherkenzie, a singer-songwriter from Minnesota. Brotherkenzie opened the evening with a set of new songs from his soon-to-be-released album.
“I've never played these songs, so thanks for bearing with me,” Brotherkenzie confessed into the mic.
It’s a daring choice to debut such fresh music in front of an audience. While publicly performing songs before they're fully committed to mental and muscle memory can lead to some interesting outcomes, it can also lead to disaster. Brotherkenzie’s set struck a lovely balance between the tenderness conjured by the music and the playful acknowledgements of flubbed chords and forgotten lyrics. His rich, plaintive voice and warm guitar tone offered every song a certain emotional depth. The lyrics included everything from sincere ruminations on the human condition to clever turns of phrase like "Don't know how I ended up being the worst driver in the family… I always feed the hand that bites me.” Brotherkenzie ended his set with a soaring, triumphant song with the word “Nothing” repeated vigorously. All heart, no flubs.
Next, Anjimile took to the stage, joined by Sinclair Palmer on bass and keyboard. In March, Anjimile released You’re Free to Go, an emotional tidal wave of an album packed with tender folk and indie-rock songs. Each of Anjimile’s songs were achingly soft, and as they unfolded, him and Palmer held the entire room suspended in time. The wistful song “Waits For Me” used driving rhythms as apt backing for lyrics about self-discovery and self-invention. Anjimile’s lyrics paint lovely and vulnerable images of a transmasculine person revisiting his youth and pursuing a journey to break outside the confines of the gender binary:
“When I was a little boy I wanted to be real
I wanted to feel
all of the things my
body wanted me to feel
When I fell in love
my wonder burning in the sun
exactly like the sun
exactly like a call of the
wild I almost didn’t hear”
Another standout from the night’s set was the song “1978” from Anjimile’s 2020 album Giver Taker. A tour de force that connects family trauma, the ecstasy of romantic love and pain of heartbreak, the song and the set reminded us of the magic that one can make with just a voice and a guitar.
