As the resident non-resident, I can’t really comment on the three most recent years of local music, though I have heard great things and managed to catch a handful of shows on the handful of visits I’ve made since moving to Michigan.  However, I thought I would give my brief history of Birmingham’s music scene to let the newcomers (and not so new) in on where we’ve come from.  Expect some bias because I can only accurately report on what I have witnessed.

The Slacker 66/Crush/Unity Years: The Segregation of Christian and Secular Music

This is where my journey began as a sophomore in high school.  I was also a recently-converted Christian at the time, and was trying to reconcile my love for metal, grunge, and punk with my new conservative belief set.  Some older friends of mine told me about shows in Homewood and Roebuck where bands that sounded kind of like the ones I had listened to in middle school were playing, and they offered me rides to the shows.  Generally, it took $5-$10 to make one of these shows a reality: $5 for the show itself, and $5 for gas and food [I think my age is beginning to show here; $5 really did pay for both my food and chipping in gas money for my chauffer].

Slacker 66 was a music store/skate supply operating in an industrial park in Homewood.  The owner Chad Johnson–who would later form the label Takehold Records, start the Furnace Fest at Sloss, and join Tooth & Nail Records–used this location to put on shows that promoted Christian and secular bands in an effort to unite the local music scene.  Bands that performed there included Living Sacrifice, Training for Utopia, and a rap-core band called Luti-Kriss (who would eventually be known as Norma Jean).  Zao had also scheduled shows there several times, but wound up canceling every one for various reasons.  Smaller bands and local acts also played, but I honestly can’t remember the names of many of them.  The first semi-local act to play Slacker 66 that I recall hearing anything about was Withstand FTHC (Flo-Town Hardcore, hailing from Florence).  They were also the first band to sign with Takehold.

Once Chad started Takehold Records, he began holding Takehold Mini-Fests at the church he attended, which was located in the same industrial park as Slacker 66.  These mini-fests typically featured roughly six bands: two local, and the rest from the label.  This was my first memorable exposure to truly local music, as I first began seeing bands like 2 O’Clock Rock (slow, melodic indie rockers who played with their backs to the audience; they later became The Getaway Vehicle, which spawned Old American Dream) and None But Burning (melodic post-hardcore a la boysetsfire; former members are now in bands like Ex-Members of the Holy Trinity and Now I Have a Machine Gun.  You may have also seen them in Blue Eyed Boy Mister Death).

At the same time that Slacker 66 was operating, another venue presented Christian music in Roebuck and Tarrant.  The Crush operated as a youth ministry through live shows and a radio program on the local Christian music station.  I never experienced any shows at the original Tarrant location (dubbed “The Crush Warehouse”); all of my experiences were at the location in Roebuck at the Vineyard church, where my old band Dredge played one of its first shows [shameless self-promotion, anyone?  Sigh...those were the days!].  Many acts that played at Slacker 66 also played the Crush; however, the Crush ran as strictly a Christian venue, so all the local bands I saw were Christian.  This was also where I saw my first Zao show (during their “Liberate Te Ex Inferis”/Event Horizon concept album era).  Along with Dredge (a punk/metalcore–or as some critics called it, “cheesecore”–outfit during this time), other local acts to grace the stage included Last Flight In (an emo group in vein of Texas is the Reason and The White Octave) and Lasting Value (a pop-punk group that just might have out-MxPx’d MxPx).

While these predominantly Christian shows were taking place, another venue had been operating in Birmingham: Unity 1605.  I was aware of it in name only because of flyers that got passed out at Slacker 66, but I never managed to see any shows there before its closing.  The only band that stands out to me from this venue is Caption, a Birmingham-based hardcore group that originally had Jason Wasserman–one of the club’s founders who later played with None But Burning–as a vocalist.  Other ex-members of this group, along with James McCracken from Angels Never Answer, went on to form the death metal band Catchfire.

(stay tuned for Part Two: Big Dan’s Fantastic Planet and the DIY Ethic)

Tags: 2 o'clock rock, blue eyed boy mister death, caption, catchfire, crush, dredge, ex members of the holy trinity, florence, furnace fest, getaway vehicle, homewood, last flight in, lasting value, none but burning, now i have a machine gun, old american dream, slacker 66, sloss, takehold records, tooth & nail records, unity 1605, withstand fthc

This entry was posted on Sunday, November 9th, 2008 at 10:00 am and is filed under Music News, locals. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.