Atlanta Mess-Around presents:
ATLANTA MESS-AROUND 2018 W/ ROKY ERICKSON & PROTEX!
Roky Erickson
Protex
Bush Tetras
Gentleman Jesse
Radioactivity
Death Valley Girls
Bad Sports
Dan Melchoir
Country Westerns
Static Static
Benni
Dinos Boys
GG King
Dunch w/ Greg Cartwright
few more tba!!
Protex
Bush Tetras
Gentleman Jesse
Radioactivity
Death Valley Girls
Bad Sports
Dan Melchoir
Country Westerns
Static Static
Benni
Dinos Boys
GG King
Dunch w/ Greg Cartwright
few more tba!!
FRIDAY October 26, 2018
doors open at
7:30pm
Dan Melchoir | Country Westerns
SATURDAY October 27, 2018
doors open at
2:00pm
Patois Counselors | Animal Show | Vincas
SATURDAY October 27, 2018
doors open at
8:00pm
Dinos Boys | Static Static | Bênní


This time, the production quality is more lean and tense, giving an air that is decidedly frustrated, more world-weary. And not to say that this isn’t an enjoyable listen – it’s just not the kind of record to pogo in a pit and shotgun a beer to. Bad Sports has grown in substance.There’s a balance to keeping enough of the old and forging ahead with the new to remain relevant and compelling.
Fans will find much to get enthusiastic over and feel invigorated about as Bad Sports is still great at simply being a stripped-down classic-leaning punk band with deep power-pop vs. proto-punk feelings. Make no mistake, though: Bad Sports are not a “retro” band. Constant Stimulation is simply a timeless-yet-modern masterpiece, that sounds like it could have come out of just about any era of rock, but is also as NOW as anything else currently out there.
Their history with its Texas peers of the same ilk paired along with their time spent in projects like OBN III’s, Radioactivity, Wax Museums and VIDEO (among others), has served Bad Sports well. They’ve honed themselves into being a complicated and calculating rock machine instead of just a talented party band, dishing out fuzzed-out fury, chugging chords and yelled vocals. Now, there’s a little more finesse and more care taken to let Neeley’s words and voice ring out; as close to sing-singing the band has come on a record.
There’s a general nimble brightness to the production, throughout. Gone are the days of fuzz and total distortion making the songs into jumping fleas from one track to the next. Adding a little pacing and extending their palette – the lazy chug in “Everything We Wanted” is fed by ample tremolo and loiters in its own 90s slacker rock vibe while “Ode to Power” and “Constant Stimulation” could be intertwined among the tracklists of the newest Rolling Blackouts C.F. or Shame records – equalizes things a bit because the main chunk of this record is straight-up punk, fed on busted pieces of guitar strings and broken drumsticks. It’s lean and tough.
2012’s King of the Weekend and 2013’s Bras was love (and lackthereof)-focused, covered in equal parts, sweat, lipstick, beer, grime and glitter. Granted, there are little flashes of heartbreak thrown in on Constant Stimulation, but not quite like before. This record moreso broils and stews over a response to the modern world and its eroding and addling effects, kicking its lyrics out to be heard clearly. No track exemplifies this better than the title track on which Neeley sings, “I need constant stimulation in my ears and in my eyes or I don’t sleep at night…deprivation chambers only worsen my dreams.” Maybe this more spaciously spare sound is their response to that veritable constant stimulation. Welcome to the modern age.

Thankfully, ex-frontman Greg "GG" King wasted little time in yanking up his knickers and pursuing new noise. He wrote a series of tunes not unlike those he contributed to the Carbonas – that winning mix of hyperstrummed '70s Europunk and brawny stateside r'n'r pummel intact – and amassed a crew of friends and former bandmates to help him flesh out the din. He released a handful of solid teaser singles, played a number of good shows. He reasserted himself as one of Atlanta's greatest exports.
And now, with the release of Esoteric Lore, his first full-length longplayer, the venerable GG King moves beyond his old guard, skindiving in new sinkholes.
Yes, herein we find some highly Carbonic moments – traces of Hubble Bubble, The Kids, Zero Boys, et. al. – but we also hear the King & Co. vamp on vibes harnessed only previously by goth-punk forebears: early Christian Death, 45 Grave. We sense smudged traces of minimal mania a la 100 Flowers. We catch whiffs of the emblematic hardcore of the Germs & T.S.O.L., feel the plod 'n' thud of Negative Trend. We're treated to bits of hijacked shortwave, aural static clinging 'tween songs proper, bleeding into the tunes themselves. And we hear a walloping wayward punk rec that nods knowingly toward L.A.-circa-'82, but in melding its influences, somehow sounds distinctly Atlanta, and right now.
PATOIS COUNSELORS
ANIMAL SHOW



