ATHENS, GA

Growing up in California, the first time I heard of Athens was by way of an EP called Chronic Town from a then rather obscure indie band known as REM that had a profound effect on my psyche. Later while living and attending college in the Northern California town of Chico, I grew more obsessed with Athens since most of the bands I loved seemed to have some sort of connection via with or located somewhere near it. I loyally belonged to the REM fan club and would recieve flyers or information about events in that town that made me think my sleepy college town shared a unique kinship in quirky character since it was also filled with oddball artists and its own great bands like 28th Day and Vomit Launch (of which Larry Crane went on to open Jackpot studios in Portland, recording the likes of Sleater Kinney and Elliot Smith). Sometime in the mid 80s a haunting documentary was released entitled Athens GA: Inside Out, that cemented this mysterious idea of the South as being some sort of iconic blueprint melding individualism and a deeply rooted regional history; a general philsophy I still vividly ascribe to my own way of relating to Place now more than ever.

Later I would move to Seattle and there find out Peter Buck married the woman who owned the Crocodile Cafe, now divorced from. Over the years I’d see him in my neighborhood and come to know and meet some of the other players in REMs later incarnation like Kevin Stringfellow and Scott McCaughey (who knew the brother of one of my dearest friends Beth from college). Other people I knew in Seattle came to know the REM people and my friend David Belisle ended up becoming Michael Stipes’ personal assistant. So in one strange way or another the band remained connected to me, though I never really knew any of its core members personall and the band doesn’t really touch me know the way they used to. Stipe was a role model for me. Now he’s just another celebrity who lives in NYC. Times change.

Athens was sadly not at all what I hoped it would be. 20+ years is a long time and things have changed. Like most cities in the USA it has reached that kind of general state of homegeny with new ugly architecture and icky subdivisions springing up like so much cancer on the face of our country. I felt lucky to have been in Chico, as Cara did Olympia for her college experience. We were probably the last people to really get a taste of the best of our locations before the great sprawl occured, so our times where we were had been truly precious and unique.

Cara and I toured the downtown core on the holiday, and it being a college town was typically dead for this time of year. Bars seemed to be in abundance and most of the places I’d about like the 40 Watt club and Wuxtry’s records were closed. We left to take a nap and then headed out for a longer walk, stumbling upon by accident The Tree That Owns Itself, and wandering in and out of the projects past monumental Kudzu overgrowth (prominent all over the south actually) and onto the campus, which was so much like UW’s back in Seattle. We headed back to our motel, and uninspired to watch fireworks that night, we went to the movies and saw Ratatouille, which was just about perfect.