We Versus The Shark’s newest CD “Dirty Versions” gets reviewed in The Onion’s AV Club and on Pitchfork. Harvey Milk’s “Life, the Best Game in Town” gets the Pitchfork treatment.

By Sam Bishop

We Versus the Shark
“Dirty Versions”
Hello Sir Records

As the warmly distorted opening chord slowly rings out on “Hello Blood,” the opening track of We Versus the Shark’s latest offering, “Dirty Versions,” so also ends the most accessible portion of the record. The 11-song tumult that follows is an awe and obscenity inspiring tour-de-force - very few printable words can succinctly describe the immediate emotional response to the glorious noise which WVTS is transmitting.

Billed as their attempt to capture the raw, “too-loud house party element” of their live show on tape, “Dirty Versions” was recorded over two days of live tracking with minimal overdubs. Theirs was a successful venture, as “Dirty Versions” doesn’t merely stream from one’s speakers or earphones; it explodes. Loud, hyper-energetic and often non-repeating, the songs of “Dirty Versions” are complex in an almost Zappa-ish fashion, encouraging repeated listens just to make sense of it from song to song and as a larger piece of work.

It is band lore that members of WVTS formed out of a shared appreciation for DC punk acts like Fugazi, Dismemberment Plan and Q and Not U. Well, they do their forebears proud on “Dirty Versions.” If history is kind, future bands will form out of a mutual appreciation for We Versus The Shark.

By Sam Bishop

With AthFest 2008 just around the corner - the 12th annual music event takes place downtown June 18-22 - Ghostmeat Records has once again released the official CD accompaniment. This year’s release was produced by Ghostmeat founder Russ Hallauer and features a varied offering of 19 Athens-based acts, 12 of which have never appeared on an AthFest CD. The CD also features 15 previously unreleased tracks by bands such as Five Eight, Titans of Filth, William Tonks, Hope for Agoldensummer, Dubconscious, Dead Confederate and Russian Spy Camera, among others.

Crafted with loving care, like a well-ordered mix tape, the AthFest 2008 CD features a number of highlights. The collection kicks off auspiciously with the driving and singable “Curious Markings” by Bicycles and Gravel, followed immediately by the warm and slightly melancholy “Lit Elephants” by Madeline. Titans of Filth’s jangly stomper “Our Impending Announcement” keeps the momentum going a third of the way in, with a guitar melody pleasantly reminiscent of Love Tractor, Athens’ own patron saints of jangle-pop. The injection of bluegrass courtesy The Packway Handle Band provides a refreshing change of pace at the halfway mark with “Gets Me Every Time.” And both Dead Confederate’s dark rocker “Guns” and Russian Spy Camera’s shout-along “This Town Has Placed a Curse on Me” provide the tail end some heft, rounding out an overall strong showcasing of Athens talent.

AthFest 2008 CD is available at AthFest.com, Ghostmeat.com, select record stores, AthFest merch booths and globally via iTunes or your favorite digital music store. CD proceeds benefit AthFest, Inc., a 501(c)(3) nonprofit corporation created to educate citizens and visitors about the music and arts scene of Athens.

Listen to Dead Confederate’s “Guns”:

By Sam Bishop
Correspondent

In interviews surrounding the release of their 14th studio album, R.E.M.’s members have presented “Accelerate” as a “turbo-charged,” immediate and urgent collection of songs. They’ve made no secret about it also being a course correction in terms of both musical direction and their ability to communicate effectively to each other about it (referencing 2004’s lackluster “Around the Sun” specifically). “Course correction” would actually make for an appropriate two-word review of “Accelerate” as it connotes improvements, while not necessarily meaning “completely back on track.”

Where R.E.M. succeeds on “Accelerate” is in reclaiming the sonic and energetic ground lost since 1996’s “New Adventures in Hi-Fi” (possibly the band’s most underrated record). “Hi-Fi” presented R.E.M. finally fulfilling their promise as an arena rock band, which they had been for a decade, give or take a year or two, but really only in a technical sense.

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