More than just a re-enactment of one’s own indie past.
A hot spot for original postpunk sounds in the late 70s and early 80s was Athens, Georgia. A notable descendant of this vital scene (alongside heavyweights like REM and B-52’s) was the band Pylon around singer Vanessa Briscoe Hay. Now Pylon has been gone for a long time, but Hay didn’t want to let her old band be completely forgotten and founded the Pylon Reenactment Society in 2014.
But simply replaying old songs was probably too backwards for her, which is why the debut album MAGNET FACTORY is now being released. And how successful it was! There’s a life-affirming, good-humored indie anthem like “Flowers Everywhere” next to no-wave and Sonic Youth-infused pieces like “Messenger” or “Compression,” and there are fiddly postpunk songs like “3×3” (a song from the old Pylon days) as well as the closing track “I’ll Let You Know”, which is almost reminiscent of a murder ballad. You can hear Hay and her three new bandmates telling how much music history they have breathed in. Athens is back on the map!