The Red and Black

Issue date: 1/17/08 Section: Out & About

Media Credit: Courtesy Jessica Horwitz Local bluegrass quintet Packway Handle Band shows off a new self- titled album tonight at the Georgia Theatre. The band kicks off the night at 8:15 with a CD listening party, followed by its show at 10. [Click to enlarge]

Packway Handle Band doesn't seem to fit into the typical mold of a bluegrass band - but it's sometimes difficult to pinpoint why.

"On the surface, it's so traditional - it's so old-time," said Wil Greene, owner of the Georgia Theatre, where the band will debut its self-titled third album tonight. "If you heard an album, you'd think it's standard, even though if you really focused on the lyrics perhaps it's not that standard."

However, lyrics are only as important as the live show in which they are presented.

"There's something about it when you see it live that lets you know that it's not standard," Greene said. "There's something very unusual and progressive, and different about it, and it's very hard to put a finger on it."

The band certainly attracts more than your typical bluegrass crowd.

"You look in the audience and there are all these indie kids and punk rockers. There's not a bunch of old folks in overalls in the audience," he said.

The band brings a unique background to the table, which may contribute to its uncommon sound. Banjo player and harmony vocalist Tom Baker, a 2002 University alumnus, said that four of the five members went to high school together in Kennesaw but bluegrass wasn't what they grew up on.

"We were all playing rock and roll growing up," Baker said. "I personally didn't have any real concept of bluegrass until I was in college."

Baker didn't even start playing banjo until right around the time the band was formed, but fell in love with the bluegrass style.

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