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MIKE WHITE • deadlydesigns.com
A+h^NS Cr^°W s U P
J ason Griffin is not worried about
maintaining his singing voice. "I hate
my voice," he says. "The only thing I
do is soak [my vocal chords] in beer."
Approaching the 20-year mark of play
ing music in Athens and a veteran of punk
bands such as No!, American Cheeseburger
and Shaved Christ (with whom he still plays),
Griffin recently founded Harsh Words with
Gripe vets guitarist Tom Needham and bassist
Brandon Goss. In the group, he plays drums
and returns to singing for the first time since
fronting Tres Kids, a band Griffin started when
he moved to Athens in 1995.
Shouting over the familiar rapid assault of
hardcore punk—raw, high-speed and at times
dissonant, Harsh Words' music might also be
classified as power violence or grindcore—
Griffin's hollering lands somewhere between a
growl and a bratty shriek. It's enough to make
any voice teacher cringe, but it's a welcome
sound to local punks, who have slim pickings
to choose from in the local scene, especially
as they get on in years.
Like any other genre, punk music has its
tropes, among them angry young men who
spend their days frustrated by service industry
jobs, fueling their music with the agony of
being broke and catering to the ungrateful
moneyed. But the members of Harsh Words
aged out of that demographic some time ago.
Needham teaches math at UGA, and Goss is
a student. Griffin maintains his ties to the
service industry world by cooking at The Grit,
where he's been a staple for many years (no
pun intended).
But if he's frustrated, it doesn't show. Tall
and rocking an enormous pile of fluffy blond
hair, he's a warm dude with a gentle speaking
voice. (It just so happens that he also likes to
use that voice to kick off songs by screaming,
"What the fuuuck!")
Griffin is also known around town as a one
time regular of the house-show scene, particu
larly as a host during American Cheeseburger's
heyday in the mid-to-late aughts.
"I did house and warehouse shows, starting
with Tres Kids, for 15 to 16 years," he says. "I
had a good run, but I got tired of destroying
houses I lived in, and I haven't done them in
my own house for the last four years now. We
still love to play houses, and I still love book
ing shows. I just don't have a space anymore."
That shift reflects an overall turnover in
the punk community, with younger groups
like Muuy Biien, which retains a patience for
trashed residences and a general lack of peace,
taking up the D.I.Y. mantle. Griffin and his
cohorts, meanwhile, have found new homes
downtown, often organizing shows around
touring acts, as they've done with Thursday's
show at Flicker for Finland's Sokea Piste.
"If we played a house show, we'd be play
ing to different people than we'll be playing
to at Flicker," says Michael Clancy, who plays
alongside Griffin in Shaved Christ.
But centering shows on touring acts comes
with its own set of problems: namely, raising
enough money to make the out-of-towners'
trip worthwhile. Athens' wealth of artist-
friendly venues is a boon in that regard.
"Several venues, like Flicker, Go Bar and
Caledonia, charge smaller production fees for
bands, which is helpful when we need to get
money for bands on tour," Griffin says.
But regardless of the venue, the ethos
remains the same.
"The songs are short, not sweet, and to the
point. No filler," Griffin says of his work with
Harsh Words. The band's debut album, Reptile
Brain, supports that statement. The longest
of its nine songs clocks in at 1:17, with most
tracks coming in under a minute. So, yeah:
short. And with titles like "Tears" and "Icy
Resolve," they're certainly not sweet either.
What they are is fast, frenetic fun from
three of Athens' punk doyens. And once you're
in their thrall, it ceases to matter whether
you're thrashing around on the floor of the
bandleader's house or in a local bar. Griffin,
Goss and Needham are mainstays of Athens
punk, and they don't concern themselves too
much with the question of where it happens.
To them, it's pretty simple: "Hardcore is fast
and fun to play." Enough said.
Rachel Bailey
/ \
WHO: Harsh Words,
Shaved Christ, Sokea Piste
WHERE: Flicker Theatre & Bar
WHEN: Thursday, Jan. 9, 9 p.m.
HOW MUCH: $5
V )
MUSIC NEWS AND GOSSIP
Welcome to 2014. No doubt about it,
folks: We're in the future now. Between mile-
a-minute news feeds, big-screen TVs in every
possible place of public accommodation and
the blind sprint toward packing the classrooms
of the attention-deficient national student
body with more and more technology, it seems
we're just out of time. And inclination. Toward
what, you ask? Keeping up with everything
as it happens, of course. So, in the spirit of
not only riding the cutting edge but actually
cutting the edge, here's the annual Threats &
Promises that brings you tomorrow's news,
today. If you want to know what happened in
Athens music in 2014, this is the place to be.
spokesman Ryan Lewis said, "Rock and roll
may not last forever, but with Kindercore, it
can sure feel that way."
June: AthFest came and went without founder
Jared Bailey in the driving seat. It was OK.
July: Athens musicians figured out how to raid
every single apartment complex pool at the
same time July 4, likening their exploits to
some sort of vague heroism that only that one
history major dude really understood.
August: Too hot to move. Everything was can
celled forever.
January: Everyone's long winter's nap seemed
to get longer this month, as Athens' many
musicians continued to forget when their
soundchecks were. A goodly handful of them
forgot when their shows were, as well, forcing
local clubs to enlist the services of glittery
handmaiden to the unreadable-flyer fairy,
Mercer West, and his cast of thousands once
again. Crowds were alternately thrilled and
confounded, but hell, all the shows were free.
February: Valentine's Day continued to baffle
the Athens music scene, as no one could
figure out if they should mask themselves in
faux-romance or faux-resentment. So, every
one got together for the first Athens Pity
Party, at which perma-bachelors tsk-tsk'ed at
the betrothed-'n'-yoked while those who had
a ring on it wore fake
noses to be able to look
that much farther down.
>- March: Kai Riedl's
entertai n ment/tech-
nology thing Athens
Slingshot finally made
its mark on the nation
by getting real with its
name, single-handedly
reviving the careers
of The Verve Pipe,
Yellowcard, Deadeye
Dick and former Athens
road warriors Dayroom.
When asked about this
change of focus, Riedl
remarked, "The original idea was to 'slingshot'
bands coming back east from Texas after
SXSW, but after some reflection, that seemed
like a situation where 'boomerang' would be
more appropriately used. So, I just looked
for bands—or pieces of bands, lying around,
taking up space—that should be shot from a
sling, and it all started coming together."
April: Building off its success with its
Green Room offshoot, the Georgia Theatre
announced its "Rock in All Colors" initiative,
opening the Pink Palace, the Blue Cupboard
and the Beige Bungalow. After failing to find
enough mid-level indie acts to fill the clubs,
management invested heavily in karaoke
machines, which packed the joints daily, prov
ing yet again that the most desirable sound
on earth is that of one's own voice.
May: Kindercore Records reimagined and
relaunched itself for the 22nd time. Having
already represented twee indie-pop and brag
gadocio-laden rock and roll, the 18-year-old
concept was again reconfigured as a mutual-
fund investment scheme and retirement
planning consultation service. Co-founder and
Kai Riedl
September: The influx of college freshman
saw the Athens population rise by several
thousand. Concerned citizens and beleaguered
audiences petitioned the Athens-Clarke County
Mayor and Commission to impose a mandatory
three-day waiting period on the purchase
of all guitars so as to tamp down those really
awful ideas found brewing in the quad.
October: Flagpole Music Editor Gabe Vodicka
and City Editor Blake Aued were plowing
through their second year of townie football
coverage, in response to which Taco-Stand-
munchers asked why this space wasn't being
parceled out to "realer" Athens things like
craft fairs and start-up amateur carnivals.
Several readers had something to say, but
those thoughts slipped their minds as it was
announced that their
lunch order was ready.
November: Musicians'
resource center Null's
Space made a hostile
takeover bid for online
streaming service
Bandcamp. This unusu
ally aggressive move
was justified by the
necessity of a repository
for all the new record
ings—both well- and
ill-advised—produced
by its Camp Amped
program. An anonymous
source said, "Look at
all the crap that's been flooding Bandcamp. I
bet you half those 'artists' never even went to
camp! We're gonna bring honesty back to the
music world. Also, we need the server space."
December: Still reeling from the decision to
spend precious rehearsal time two months
prior learning a bunch of cover tunes in order
to celebrate All Hallows' Eve with their bros,
Athens bands jumped whole-hog on the Mike
Turner-promulgated Krampus Fest. All the
groups began furiously writing tunes for the
event, which mostly took place via Internet
insult-trading but came to glorious fruition at
the Parade of Lights when everyone played as
loudly as possible inside Bryant Williamson's
Sprinter van, driving up College Avenue sur
rounded by renegade skateboarders. Turner
had a headache that night and couldn't make
it out, but was eventually soothed by some
tea and a nap. When asked about Krampus
Fest, he chuckled slightly and said, "Y'all took
that seriously?"
Thanks for another great year, Athens!
Gordon Lamb threatsandpromises@flagpole.com
14 FLAGP0LE.C0M • JANUARY 8, 2014