The Red and Black

Issue date: 10/3/08 Section: Variety

Media Credit: FRANNIE FABIAN The Modern Skirts first appeared in Athens and produced their first album in 2005. [Click to enlarge]

Media Credit: FRANNIE FABIAN Athens-based band Modern Skirts rock out at its most recent show at the 40 Watt Club. The band will return tonight. [Click to enlarge]

They're back and the skirt is new.

Coming from the basement of the Athens music scene, the Modern Skirts made its music known in 2005 when its first album, "Catalogue of Generous Men" was produced. However, the guys are three years older and three years…wiser?

"The past three years have enabled us to learn to embrace our imperfections and let them color our music. I'm a big fan of imperfections," said lead singer and main lyric writer, Jay Gulley.

However, Phillip Brantley said the band still is moving in the direction they saw unfolding from the beginning.

"We're all three and four years older than when we put the first record out. Those are some pretty pivotal years," Brantley said. "We're striving for the same goal. It has been kind of a slow maturation of relationships for us all."

During the first year of its formation, the Modern Skirts had become an apartment-hold name in town. Phillip Brantley said you could even call their reception lucky.

"I feel like it was easier for us than a lot of bands," Brantley said. "We really saturated the town. We'd play almost every other weekend."

Manager Troy Aubrey of Nomad Artists said he noticed the band immediately after hearing them play at Speakeasy and didn't hesitate to introduce himself.

"I approached them, gave them my card and told them I'd love to book them for AthFest," Aubrey said. "I put them on an outdoor stage that year."

Having played in AthFest, at the 40 Watt several times over and on fraternity lawns, Gulley said at first the crowds were friends and acquaintances. Now the band has been featured on NPR and in Paste magazine. The members' response - excited.

"I still am wondering if this could be something big," Gulley said. "We want it to happen so badly. Music is all I really want to do with my time."

Brantley shared Gulley's sentiments.

"So many people have a different perspective of what it means to be in a band. All we want out of it is that it would be a self-sustaining career," Brantley said. "We've had this really nice growth, and opportunities just keep presenting themselves."

And now it has its new record in hand. Partly produced by Mike Mills of R.E.M. as well as David Lowery of Camper Van Beethoven and Cracker, "All of Us In Our Night" will be showcased tonight at the 40 Watt.

The guys produced six of the tracks alone, creating a post on their path of maturation through a transformed sound.

"To me, it is completely different than the first record," Brantley said. "The song writing is more abstract; it has more of a free willing nature to the songs. There is still all the catchy melodies, but structurally it is a big step ahead for us."

Gulley said he agreed that the album was a departure from the first as the band's comfort level within the studio and the music has changed.

"My favorite song on the new album is track three, 'Chokehold.' I like it because it was kind of birthed last minute in New Orleans, and I didn't know it would come out as well as it did. It is also very different than something we would have been able to write three years ago, complex in its simplicity," Gulley said.

"Motorcade," a song on "All of Us In Our Night," was paid special attention by Mike Mills, building a relationship that also granted the guys room on tour with R.E.M. in the U.K. The band rose to the challenge, Gulley said, and found the experience a liberating confirmation.

"The European crowds responded to us well - people who knew nothing about us and to who we had everything to prove," he said. "The challenge was fun, and I think we held up pretty well."

Brantley said Mills and R.E.M. were encouraging them throughout their time together overseas, which was a strong validation for them.

"We were treated like kings," he said. "We were easily the underdog or the least established, but we really stepped up and did well."

With its official album release set for January, the band's gigs will be the only place to snag a copy until then, Brantley said. He said the guys are ready and eager to see where the record takes them.

"It is exciting to have this thing that you put so much into and you believe in, and to get it out to people," he said.

He said the music is more electronic, but that "pop" will never be a bad word to their members. The lyrics are not personal and the subject matter spans the spectrum.

"As far as the songwriting, we were really unafraid to say weird things and to do weird things on the record. We've kept our pop sensibilities, but it doesn't necessarily sound like anything a band who did Catalogue would write," Brantley said.

"Most of the songs don't really do what you would expect. Things are sort of dropped in here and there. If this record was a book and all the songs were chapters, they would all be from different books."

As far as the future goes, Brantley said they are in talks with some good people in good directions, but they left out much of the specifics as they are trying to make the best choice for the band.

"There are options that are open right now that we are being very trepid about," he said. "It is sort of a matter of, you only want to make a decision that is going to be 100 percent forward and progressive."

Aubrey said the album has been much anticipated and they're excited about the outlets they are pursuing in promotion of it.

"We've got some national publicity going on in January when it comes out. We are working on building up press and radio, and that takes time," he said. "We are pretty pumped about this record and where it can take the band. What level that will be, we don't really know."

Gulley said he hopes the album takes them where they can be fully devoted to producing music.

"I don't know what to expect in this next year. Hopefully, the album will pull us up on top of the stage that we have been at the foot of for a few years," Gulley said. "I am proud of it and I think people will like it."

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