You've
heard of garage rock, you're familiar with the Basement Tapes. Now open
up your ears to Athenaeum's attic pop. Why attic pop, you ask? Well,
this Greensboro, North Carolina-based band's first practice space was high
atop drummer Nic Brown's mom's house, and that's where their songs
and sound began.
"That's
where Nic kept his drums," singer/songwriter/guitarist Mark Kano says.
"It was really big. We bought a PA and started rehearsing up there. Basically,
there was just a bunch of old Fisher Price toys and a drum set, so we just
set up in the attic."
From
the attic to Atlantic, Athenaeum's seven-year journey has brought them
from mom's house to their splendid debut album, "RADIANCE." A sparkling
collection of smooth harmonies, rich guitar melodies, ringing hooks and
Kano's warm, knowing lyricism, the album places Athenaeum among today's
best new pop rock combos.
Back
in 1991, seventeen-year-old high school junior Mark and fourteen-year-old
Eighth Grader Nic formed a band to play Brown's middle school dance. They
learned their chops as they worked their way through a number of covers
by AOR touchstones like the Eagles, Rush, Steve Miller, Living Colour,
and Led Zeppelin. After the departure of Athenaeum's first bass player,
they brought in Alex McKinney to take over low-end duties.
"As
the band developed we started to gel as a unit," McKinney says. "We all
have similar musical tastes and our originals developed out of that."
The
band's very original moniker-pronounced Ath-a-nee-um-was Ma Brown's idea,
lifted from the century-old literary society found in Louisville, Kentucky's
high schools. Athenaeum alumni includes not only Nic's dad, but such lions
of belle lettres as one-time poet laureate Robert Penn Warren and the master
of gonzo journalism, Dr. Hunter S. Thompson. With their somewhat
unwieldy handle, an assortment of mispronunciations and misspellings has
haunted the band.
"Anthony-um
is a big one," Nic laughs. "We were in one town where they were calling
us Anthem Mayhem. So, it has been a bit of a curse, but once people hear
it, they really can't forget it, either. I'm more surprised now when I
hear people say it right."
Despite
the tongue-twisting nature of their name, Athenaeum gigged regularly at
Greensboro's Somewhere Else Tavern, occasionally playing local parties
and school functions. They recorded their first demo tape in 1994, which
they dubbed "The Unofficial Demo."
"It
had six songs on it," says Mark. "including 'No One,' which is also on
'RADIANCE.' Anyway, we made about three hundred of those and we sold them
out in a few months."
In
early 1995, the band parted ways with their original guitarist. Once Grey
Brewster hitched up with Mark, Nic, and Alex, Athenaeum as we know
it today was born. The band soon recorded their self-titled indie CD, which
included early versions of a number of "RADIANCE" tracks, including
"No One," "Away," "Different Situation," and "On My Mind." "ATHENAEUM"
sold upwards of 10,000 CDs, establishing the quartet as one of the Southeast's
shining new lights. They soon inked with Atlantic, giving them the chance
to work with one of their favorite producers, Gavin McKillop, whose work
with Toad The Wet Sprocket was a strong selling point to the band.
"The
Toad records had a real strong pop sense to them," Kano says, "and really
centered around vocals and lyrics. Gavin came out to see us play and we
went to his house the next day and had a pretty good talk with him.
He called us back a couple of weeks later and said that whenever we were
ready to go, he would be very interested in doing it."
The
band hit MacKillop's Master Control studio in Burbank, California in January
of 1997, where, as Nic recalls with a chuckle, "We were like four really,
really small fish going into a big, smoggy pond."
"It
was a big learning experience to work with Gavin," Nic says, "because it
was like having a new member in the band. It taught us to open our
minds up and see that, yeah, this is good, but it can be a lot better."
The
band spent more than three months at Master Control, fine-tuning their
arrangements and harmonies while filling in their sonic palette with the
assistance of esteemed session players like pedal steel whiz Greg Liesz
(who plays on "Spotlight") and accordianist James Fearnley, late of the
Pogues, who contributes squeezebox to the swinging "Different Situation."
After Athenaeum wound up the sessions, master mixer Jack Joseph Puig
(Tonic, The Verve Pipe) was brought in to work his magic upon the already-stellar
tracks.
"I
think we've really matured and developed our own sound," Alex notes. "It's
pretty distinguishable from other bands out there and I think when people
hear our songs, they can identify them as Athenaeum."
Writing
quality songs is top priority for the quartet. Though Kano is the band's
primary tunesmith, it takes the other three members to turn them into trademark
Athenaeum. "RADIANCE" kicks off with the unabashedly irresistable "What
I Didn't Know," a chiming chronicle of loss, regret and love gone
bad.
"Well,
it's about a relationship that I was in that was over when I wrote the
song," Mark explains. "It was me coming full circle with everything. I
felt like it was a summation of everything that had happened. It
was just me saying, 'Hey, you know, everything's okay. It was amazing,
but it's over and so be it and here it is in a song.'"
Between
Kano's husky vocals and the lilting guitar textures, "RADIANCE" is filled
with teriffic tunes, from the winsome and melodic "Flat Tire" to the energetic,
explosive title track which closes the collection.
"Man,
I'm so excited," beams Mark with impossible-to-hide pride. "I'm so pleased
with the record. I guess that's kind of a blessing in disguise. I don't
know how many artists are completely happy with their first record, but
we are, so we're very fortunate."
With
"RADIANCE" ready to rock radio across the land, the members of Athenaeum
are poised to take to road and bring their harmony-rich attic pop to America.
While the four guys have divided up across the Carolina area, Athenaeum
haven't forgotten their roots.
"We
all seem to move every six months into a new place," Nic - who currently
resides in Chapel Hill - says, "so our numbers consistently change, as
do the area codes. But we still practice in Greensboro, in my mom's attic."
