Newspaper Page Text
MIKE WHITE deadlydesigns.com
JL
Don't Cel Lost In The Shuffle
Besides Those Big-Name Headliners, What Are Your Best Bets For AthFest Shows?
The Flagpole Music Staff Points You In Many Fine Directions
■ifMQDragE^ m\m m
Supercluster
40 Watt Club
11:50 p.m.
Hm, how to play this game... Pylon + New Sound of Numbers?
Jolly Beggars + Olivia Tremor Control + Circulatory System?
Whatever. Supercluster is a great name for this could-be-stellar
assortment of local talent making its Athens debut tonight (a one-
song performance in Atlanta took place earlier this summer). Pylon
vocalist Vanessa Hay and guitarist Randy Bewley collaborate on an
open-ended project with New Sound of Numbers experimentalist
and OTC percussionist Hannah Jones as co-leader. Other members
of the E6 gang—John Fernandes and Will Cullen Hart—join in,
as does Bob Hay (Jolly Beggars, Squalls) and Bill David (Jolly
Beggars). "Supercluster is an 'outreach' project," says Vanessa Hay.
'That means the space to have fun, write, create and perform ma
terial that might not fit in with members' other current projects.
Anyone is welcome to bring in something and work on it or just
jam. Sort of a club, sort of a collective. I had songs appearing in
my head that were not the type of material that Pylon would nec
essarily be interested in... The fun and risk of a live performance
always helps jell up things." Head on over following the Music
Awards. Show up early, show up on time, but don't show up too
late: the set as it stands now is scheduled for only a brief 15 min
utes. Could be the start of something great. [Chris Hassiotis]
Casper & the Cookies
Caledonia Lounge
12:45 a.m.
Most of the songs on Casper & the Cookies' 2006 clbum The
Optimist's Club tell the story of a couple falling in love during a
trip to New York City. The ro nance unfolds, however, not against
a romantic city skyline, but amidst traffic, street preaching and
DuChamps pieces. Similarly, infectious, almost bubblegummy melo
dies that trace a line from doo-wop to K Records and back again
slice through field recordings and subtle hints of psychedelia.
Between the stories and the songs, we get a picture of Casper &
the Cookies' greater project: to situate romance and wonder within
a world that has spilt its coffee in its lap during rush hour; that
has had its very idea of what art is blown to bits; a world that has
been on a really bad acid trip. [Phillip Buchan]
Murder Beach
Caledonia Lounge
8:00 p.m.
Once upon a time, in a wonderful place called Athens, there
was this great and hilarious band called Murder Beach that
played all the time, at least once a month and sometimes more,
or at least so it felt But then, well, who knows what happened
then, but Murder Bejch doesn't play nearly as often as it used
to; November of 2006 was the band's last club show. Last year's
AthFest brought the band's rendition of "Crazy," rendered in seri
ous goofball style. And so, the members of Murder Beach are
26 FLAGPOLE.COM - JUNE 20,2007
committed: to pop, to short songs, to making you and each other
laugh. They deserve your time. [Hillary Brown]
“Mantooth Music Presents”
Tasty World Upstairs
10:00 p.m.-2:00 a.m.
This lineup is a great chance to experience the breadth of the
Athens hip-hop scene, with a lot of love flowing among its mem
bers. All night long and in one’place you've got Son 1, Big John
Burbon, Mr. C, Bear, Deaf Judges [see below], Figaro and others.
If you haven't picked up mixtapes from any of these folks, they'll
probably all be available in one location—local
rapper C-FreSh is spring-boarding off tonight's
show with a release of one himself—and you can
sample their live shows to see who you want to
hear more of. Unfortunately, Elite tha Showstoppa
had to cancel his scheduled appearance at the
last minute, but no doubt there will be plenty of
collaboration going on with the T-Nebula Family
showing up. No, it's not absolutely everyone in the
scene, but it's a great chance to taste some of the
31 flavors. [HB]
Deaf Judges
Tasty World Upstairs
10:20 p.m.
Pound for pound, Deaf Judges is the most excit
ing live band in Athens right now, screw genre. The
combined forces of the hyper-kinetic Old White
Women, Bellyache's Austin Darnell (known here as
the mighty Produce Man), and the enigma in black
we call Rorshak comprise a supergroup of combustible hip-hop
that eliminates self-conscious hipster bullshit in a single swipe.
Deaf Judges moves crowds, period. [Jeff Tobias]
Bob Hay & the Jolly Beggars and The Squallz
Melting Point
10:00 p.m., 11:00 p.m.
Yes, both 4 acts are the same group of people, and
if you missed their lovely double feature show at the
Melting Point a year ago, you can pretend you just
found a time machine. Apparently, Robert Burns' 17th-
century drinking songs and the philosophical concerns
of the 1980s in Athens have a lot in common, or at
least it doesn't take very long to switch gears. Both
are melodic and swing from the support of Bob Hay's'
voice, which still hits those high notes nicely. Coupled
with the superior sound at a venue I am not always
willing to pay S35 to experience, this show should be
mature, not moldy. [HB]
Jack Logan
Flicker Theatre & Bar
10:30 p.m.
The best part about AthFest is that Jack Logan,
the best-ever oddball pop songwriter to check out of
the Classic City and make a new home for himself in
New York and then come back, performs. Concerts are
rare for Logan, so make a point to savor every one
of the songs he plays, because they're better than
funnel cake, better than Little Italy at 3 a.m., better
than your boss letting you slide into work two hours
late on Monday, because, dude, you were at AthFest. I
kid, of course, but I speak in earnest when I tell you
that Athens—or any other town, for that matter—has
hosted few songwriters as versatile, witty, consistently
rewarding and perennially underrated as Logan. So, /know, if
qualities like melody, personality, and, urn, quality are what draws
you to music, then try to squeeze your way into Flicker to catch
Logan and whichever ragtag crew of locals he'll have supporting
him. [PB]
Caledonia Lounge
11:00 p.m.
This time last year there were exactly three bands in Athens
playing that could loosely be called "shoegaze-country." Sleepy
Horses has reformatted its lineup and is still finding its (new)
footing, and The Low Lows are in the studio this week, and then
there's Push!. The band sways, not swings, with an emotional cur
rent and a Georgia-via-Manchester, England sound that betrays the
influences of its members, yet keeps 'em solidly homegrown. Very
good. [Gordon Lamb]
Venice Is Sinking
Little Kings
11:30 p.m.
Career-wise, Venice Is Sinking is in the same boat as a handful
of other prominent local indie-rock acts. The band has one full-
length under its belt (2006's Sorry About the Flowers), and that
album received a none-too-shabby amount of college radio airplay
and positive reviews from across the Internet, but the blow
up—that point where we must quit thinking of VIS as only "our"
band and come to terms with the idea of sharing it with the rest
of the country—hasn't quite happened. VIS has taken the crucial
next step more swiftly than many of its peers, though: in late May,
the group began work on its second full-length with studio stud
Scott Solter (Mountain Goats, Spoon). If the new record is as ex
ponentially better than Sorry About the Flowers as Sorry About the
Flowers was exponentially better than the debut EP that preceded
it, the day when America's iPods swell with Venice is Sinking's
sweeping pop harmonies may not be too far off. [PB]
Dead Confederate
40 Watt Club
12:30 a.m.
Over the last two years, the members of Augusta/ Atlanta
psych-rock band Dead Confederate, formerly the Redbelly Band,
have done something highly recommended by another of Augusta’s
favorite sons/ funky godfathers and that's "tighten up." The group
is virtually unrecognizable now compared to its original, looser
version. Dead Confederate is now a much denser, more sonically-
charged beast with Southern rock trimmings and new additions
to the formula arriving with each subsequent album. [Michael
Andrews]
Niiyaband
Caledonia Lounge
1:00 a.m.
To see Cinemechanica's video game side project Megaband
perform at the Georgia Theatre this past spring was to witness no
small feat in creating an overarching effect of unity: a crowd both
overjoyed and overwhelmed with a combination of NES nostalgia
and pro-sports nail-biting. In case you somehow missed the boat
on how the Contraband/ Megaband formula works, here's a refresh
en Cinemechanica provides a flawless and thoroughly rocked-out
soundtrack to gamer-savant Noah McCarthy's ruthless domination
NEWS & FEATURES I ARTS & EVENTS I MOVIES I MUSIC I COMICS & ADVICE I CLASSIFIEDS
COURTNIE WOLFGANG