I had a short but sweet day on Sunday, the final day of Athfest, Athens’s summer music festival. Sadly, history repeated itself and just like the 2018 edition, Sunday was plagued by weather issues that resulted in delays and many (myself included) missed the last few bands on the schedule.
The acts I did catch were great–C2 and the Brothers Reed was a real highlight for the entire festival for me. They have an awesome classic rock sound and the lead singer was extremely charismatic–I’ve never seen anyone jump rope with the microphone cord before.
The Hobohemians are always a blast–they’re regulars at Hendershot’s, a local coffee bar, and do really fun, jazzy tunes inspired by the 1920s and 1930s. The crowd was enthralled, particularly by their cover of People Are Strange.
The Pauses were up next for me at the Hull Street stage–the female fronted punk group was very inspired by 90s rock and I loved their pink microphone.
I absolutely love Pylon Reenactment Society and I can’t say enough great things about them without sounding like a total fangirl. They always look like they’re having such a great time up on stage. They seem like genuinely nice people and I want them to adopt me, or at least let me tag along when they go on tour. The band is fronted by Vanessa Briscoe Hay, who was the lead singer of 1980s Athens rock gods Pylon, and accompanied by Jason NeSmith (Casper and the Cookies, formerly of Montreal), NeSmith’s wife Kay Stanton, drummer Joe Rowe, and keyboardist Damon Denton. They “reimagine” the work of Pylon and as of 2018, now record their own songs as well. You can tell they have so much gratitude for their fans and being able to perform on stage and I just really, really love them.
The last act that I caught was The Producers, who started as a Beatles cover band and quickly grew much larger, eventually headlining at 1982’s New Year’s Rockin Eve. While they officially retired in 1991, the group still gets together for various events like Athfest. They sounded great and I’d love to see them again.
Athfest is such a great event and it’s always a bummer when it’s over. The whole Athens community always comes together for great music at a variety of venues and it feels so Athenian that it is hard to not enjoy it.
