![]() "Ryan and Frank were both about to move overseas to do post-graduate degrees," Tesche explains. Photo: Courtesy of the artist / Illustration: Sarah Gonzales for NPR If there's anything in their history that the members do agree on, it's that the group - named for The Battle of Algiers, the 1960s film about an anti-colonial uprising - has always prized a collective instinct, where no one vision is definitive. On June 23, Matador Records will release its second album, The Underside of Power, a work of political critique that draws on and repurposes aggressive '80s punk, Italian horror soundtracks, modern-day hip-hop and R&B, film, literature, current events and continuing tragedies, all conceived as national politics on both sides of the Atlantic were boiling over. Founded as a trio of Atlantans, it is now four musicians living in three cities on two continents, separated by one massive ocean. We've gone through just as many evolutions and phases as any band that's put out however many records, in however many years' time."Įxactly when and where Algiers began may be less important than where it is has ended up. When asked if he agrees, he laughs and responds, "No - but that's what makes this band interesting. Joining our conversation from New York, Franklin Fisher listens as Mahan lays out his timeline. It really didn't form until Franklin put down the foundations of 'Blood' and then it came into the world." "Before that, we were spread out: We were exploring our own musical and political spaces, and trying to figure out how it would work. "Claudette" picks up speed as layered coos and hollers accompany spark-spraying guitars the result sounds like Einstürzende Neubauten covering The Four Tops' raspy-voiced plea "Bernadette."Really, the band fundamentally came together in 2012," he says, pointing specifically to the day a tiny Southern indie released the group's first 7" single. Their self-titled debut couches its invective in feedback, guitar noise, bruising drum machines and Fisher's guttural howls.Ī martial drum tattoo, handclaps, a wordless hum and Fisher's deep, resonant voice open "Remains," sounding like the chant of a chain gang even as Fisher bellows, "And the chained man sang in a sigh, 'I feel like going home.'" That and the lugged-metal percussion of "Blood" evoke the spare yet thundering sound of early Nick Cave & The Bad Seeds. Guitarist Lee Tesche and bassist Ryan Mahan were heavily into post-punk's clamor when they connected with singer-guitarist Franklin James Fisher, who has deep roots in the Southern gospel tradition. ![]() Charlie Jackson's God's Got It and Fire In My Bones have shown, gospel can be as raw and visceral as punk.Īlgiers, which formed in Atlanta but now calls London and New York City home, has one foot in punk's protest and the other in gospel's resolve. But as compilations like Goodbye, Babylon, the Rev. ![]() One seeks to raze tradition, the other to embrace it. On the surface, punk and gospel might appear to be on different ends of the musical spectrum - one given to loud guitars, screams and nihilism, the other to solemnity, its sanctified voices professing the deepest of beliefs.
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