The Sad Bastards offer Athens authenticity
By Jen Kessler, Entertainment Staff Writer
March 11, 2008 | 3 p.m.
Armed with clank of a heavy chain and unparalleled intensity, local folk rock band The Sad Bastards are making a name for themselves as they storm stages around Athens.
The Sad Bastards are comprised of Zach Oden (vocals/guitar), Robinson Lee Earle, (vocals/guitar), Jake Evans (bass) and a tight, talented drummer known elusively as “The Kid.” The band is a stimulating infusion of folk and “country punk” with an ethos that summons splashes of Johnny Cash and dashes of whiskey, dwelling under the self-dubbed genre “fuck-folk.”
“We’re not gentlemen, but we have that potential and we’ll ruminate on that,” Earle said with a smile.
Speakeasy had the opportunity to sit down over coffee with Oden, Earle and Evans and talk about the talents, the quirks and the possibilities that lie in the beating heart of The Sad Bastards.
The band is an eclectic collection of talented musicians that happened to be dumped in the lap of Appalachia. Oden hails from Alabama, Evans from Dayton “by route of Cincinnati” and Earle had traversed the globe before landing here in Athens, his current place of residence.
"My father was a diplomat,” Earle explained, reeling off an extensive list of former homes. “I was born in Spain, then I moved to Mexico, then I moved to New Mexico, and then to Virginia, then to Germany and back to Virginia. Then I went to school in Pittsburgh for a while, and then I came here.”
The Sad Bastards’ unlikely collection of roots adds a unique layer of depth to the band. As a band as well as individuals, The Sad Bastards seem to possess both a curiously modest sense of worldly wisdom and a concrete appreciation of geography, which come together in quiet confidence.
“I’m going to go out on a limb and say that the best artists are the ones who know geography and know where they’re from,” Oden said.
While a Sad Bastards record has yet to exist, the band has been playing frequently around town, pouring tremendous energy and ardor into shows. Each Sad Bastards set is unique and compelling, as the band members tend to focus their energies on the inherent feeling in their music as opposed to technical purity.
“We’d rather have passion over technicality at any given point,” Oden said.
The surrender of perfect technicality in the name of passion creates a riveting dynamic that renders the Sad Bastards impossible to turn away from. The palpable intensity of the band members, combined with their ability to play off of each other with incredible ease, results in an explosion of gritty authenticity.
“I think one of the reasons we click so well is our songs harmonically…the chord progressions, they’re not complicated,” Earle said. “There’s emphasis on delivery, and the loud-soft. It provides a lot of room for disintegration, and a lot of room for the opposite. It gets the energy, as opposed to something more technical.”
The ability to focus so heavily on delivery, as opposed to specific notes, is no doubt a result of immense natural talent. Each of the Sad Bastards is wildly proficient at what the members set out to do individually on stage, and it all comes together in perfect rapport. Earle’s songs are piercing poetry, and they mingle with Oden’s soulfully terse ones over instrumentation that ranges from simple chord progressions to fairly complicated folk melodies. The integration of instruments, such as a heavy chain and a washboard, add to the validity of their back-porch style. The manner in which the band delivers shows makes the performance entirely genuine and exciting.
“There’s always the potential of a show going terribly wrong,” Oden said. “I think sometimes, it’s like it’s a train wreck, and you almost fall apart but you don’t, and there’s always that possibility that the risk we take could blow up in our face … but I know the moment I feel comfortable is the moment I’m like well, let’s see what I can do to fuck this up. To put it out there in a different light.”
The possibility of a record is looming, but the band members want to wait until they’re sure they can capture the pure energy and riling emotion that thunders forth from their live shows.
“Considering technology today it’s so easy for people to lay something down, and I’ve been in bands like that where you just kind of jump to it and get something recorded,” Earle said. “I feel like you really need to cut your teeth in the live scene for a while. I want it to be tight, partially because I’m cheap, and I’d like us to be able to get into the studio and just hammer out a record in two hours, just straight set. I just want to get it to the point where it’s intuitive.”
“I think it needs to develop to a point where, by the time you’re done recording, you don’t hate it by the time it’s ready to be distributed,” Evans added. “You can still feel like it represents you and you don’t automatically feel like it’s representative of the past.”
Regardless of if or when a record drops, The Sad Bastards will be continuing to spread their unique presence throughout the Athens music scene by way of their exceedingly exciting live shows.
“I think everyone in the band is of the opinion that records are one thing, but shows and what you communicate live is indicative of what the band really is,” Oden said. “We’re cutting our teeth.”
The future looks bright for these sad bastards, so be sure to keep an eye out and catch a show. The Sad Bastards will be playing at The Union Tuesday, March 11, at 8 p.m., with Doc Daily, Midwest Kid and Damn Skippy.
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