The Messthetics (feat. Brendan Canty and Joe Lally of Fugazi and Anthony Pirog) with James Brandon Lewis and Solid State Radio play The Earl on Tuesday, March 26. $20 (adv). $22 (day of). 7:30 p.m. (doors). 8:30 p.m. (music starts).
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Radfest is back after a three-year Global pandemic hiatus! RadATL’s founder celebrates one more year around the sun, this time at Eyedrum Art & Music Gallery on Friday, January 19.
This year’s show features performances by seven post-punk, post-hardcore, and pure noise greats spread across two stages.
Athens-based cassette label \\NULL|ZØNE// gets the party started with a showcase of Georgia-bred noise acts including x.nte, Grant Evans (of Quiet Nights), and label boss Michael Potter’s own project The Electric Nature. Each act is cranking our short, powerful sets that challenge the traditional notions of what music is, and what it can be. Potter has been on the frontier of this scene for a long time, and it’s been far too long since his last Atlanta appearance, so it’s great to have him back.
Gebidan marks its live debut. The recently founded four-piece features Mike Patton of Orange County’s late ‘70s hardcore outfit Middle Class. The group is often hailed as the first North American hardcore act EVER. Patton’s musical resume also includes time spent playing with Jack from TSOL in the band Cathedral of Tears. He was also in Eddie And The Subtitles, and Trotsky Icepick. But really, check out his credentials on Discogs to see that he worked as a producer and backup vocalist on the Adolescents’ self-titled “blue album.” He also produced the Minutemen’s “Joy” single, along with a handful of other Minutemen releases.
Patton lives in Georgia these days and is singing and playing bass with the new outfit. Gebidan’s first recordings find the group embracing a more abstract, psychedelic take on indie and alternative rock songwriting. Great stuff!
WREK 91.1 FM’s “Destroy All Music” co-host and bass player Tony Gordon teams up with guitarist Curtis Stephens for tONY cURTIS. Together, they create a scrapping, smoldering grind of earth rattling textures. Gordon (also of FREEBASS, Zandosis, and Charlie Parker fame) is well aware of the power of subtlety, especially when it’s blasted at maximum volume. The 11 numbers that make up their latest release tc2 lull the ears and the brain into a meditative state by commanding a deeper level of ecstatic listening. Beyond rhythm, beyond melody, and beyond the drone lie the pure sonic textures of steel strings, and they are teeming with abstract beauty and limitless possibilities for the imagination.
Whiphouse brings a high-energy and death-afflicted punk dirge to the stage. It’s one of my favorite new bands to emerge from these parts in quite some time. Lots of homies in this group! Michael Keenan, Mike Bison-Beavers, Debbie Beat, Stanley Jackson, and one of my favorite former interns Kelly Stroup! It’s just an awesome assemblage of people tearing up on stage the only way they know how.
Loud Humans close out the show. More info. coming soon.
This is an ALL AGES SHOW! Doors open at 7 p.m. $10 gets you in. Fri., Jan. 19. 515 Ralph David Abernathy Blvd. Park in the lot across the street if the side street and front lot are full.
Thanks to this year’s sponsors! Eyedrum, Topo Chico, Pabst Blue Ribbon, Emory University’s Stuart A. Rose Manuscript, Archives, and Rare Book Library, Record Plug Magazine, The Tight Bros. Network, and to Dain Johnson who created this year’s magnificent flyer.
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Saddam Death Cave, Scratch Offs, and Blood Circuits play The Earl on Fri., Dec. 8. $12 (advance). $14 (day of show).
All three bands on stage this evening feature longtime friends who cut their teeth in a more civilized era of hardcore, post-hardcore, and indie rock—the ‘90s. Now, they’re elder statesmen of the scene, raising the bar high while fusing furious rock, noise, and angular riffs without pretense. It’s called experience, kids.
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Scratch Offs hit hard with Tidal Wave, an 11-song debut that distills the traditions of post-hardcore’s top-tier and most forward-thinking luminaries—Fugazi, Hot Snakes, Jawbreaker, Quicksand, Helmet, et. al.—into a streamlined and modern-sounding opening salvo.
Variety is key when propelling vocalist Mike Ligocki’s penchant for screaming melodic catharsis. Ligocki’s voice sits high atop guitar players David Lane and Jason Beebe’s winding riffs, melodies, and leads in songs such as “Puma,” B.Y.R.,” and standout cuts “Hand Replacements” and “The Chapel.” Each number draws out a balance of naked and gnarly emotions with driving force.
Bass player Lloyd Benjamin and percussionist Greg Stevens’ pounding rhythms show off depth and confidence. Together, their musical chemistry epitomizes strength, intelligence, and a full-bodied groove while exploring complex structures and tense dynamics, never losing sight of the rhythm and the sprinting momentum of the song they’re playing. The flexed arrangements of “Mountain of Light” and the powerful charge of “Jesus Night” and “Text Fight” are steeped in unrelenting tension and atmosphere—the accumulated experiences of a band made up mostly of Atlanta punk and post-hardcore scene vets. Lane plays in Skin Jobs, and has been playing alongside Stevens since circa 2001 when they made up the rhythm section for noise rock trio Hex Error.
Benjamin was in All Night Drug Prowling Wolves and is in Uneven Lanes with Stevens, who also plays in Total Peace Band. Beebe played in the Liverhearts and recorded a grip of singles for Rob’s House Records in the early-to-mid aughts. Ligocki is a Maryland-born, New York City transplant who cut his teeth playing with East Coast bands Bound & Buried (with Matt Krupanski from Boy Sets Fire on drums), Habits, and Killtakers. Look them all up! As such, Tidal Wave is an accomplished and formidable collection of fast-urgent punk and post-hardcore anthems that draw from the past to promise a bright future.
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Hammered Hulls play The Earl on Fri., Jan. 20. Alec MacKaye (Faith, Ignition, the Untouchables) fronts a lineup of veteran players that includes guitarist Mark Cisneros (the Make-Up, Kid Congo Powers and the Pink Monkey Birds), bass player Brendan Canty (of Fugazi, the Messthetics, et. al. standing in for Mary Timony), and drummer Chris Wilson (Ted Leo + Pharmacists, Titus Andronicus).
The group is touring behind the October arrival of its debut full-length, Careening (Dischord Records). The album was produced by Minor Threat, Fugazi, and Dischord Records’ co-founder (and Alec’s brother) Ian MacKaye, and was recorded at Don Zientara’s Inner Ear Studio. With Careening, Hammered Hulls carries Washington D.C.’s post-hardcore and post-punk legacies into powerful and direct new musical terrain with the winding rhythms of songs such as “Bog People” and “Rights and Reproduction,” and the slower tempos of “Not Gone” and “Mission Statement.”
Gentleman Jesse Smith also performs, backed by a lineup featuring bass player Chris McNeal, drummer Sean Zearfoss, and Milton Chapman on keys.
D.C. post-punk quartet Clear Channel and Atlanta’s Scratch Offs also perform. $15 (adv). $17 (at the door). 7:30 p.m. (doors). 8 p.m. (showtime).
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