2 FN Hot

A month ago, you could have seen Slack and Feable Weiner together, but it would have been tough. You’d have had to fly to Los Angeles and catch a cab to in-demand Studio 606. Then you’d have had to hide out somewhere near Dave Grohl’s basketball court. How much easier just to see them Thursday night at the Exit/In, where both bands make their local homecoming after extended stays out west. Over the summer, the two Murfreesboro bands each went to Los Angeles to make new records: Slack with Grammy-winning Foo Fighters producer Nick Raskulinecz, Feable Weiner with relocated Self frontman and Beck guitarist Matt Mahaffey. With the albums not due until next year, the Thursday show offers a sneak preview of material both Slack and Feable. “I hate to say being in L.A. makes you want to work harder, but it does,” said Slack singer-guitarist Chris Slack. “It’s like that movie Groundhog Day, with nice weather.” His group’s manifest destiny was a summer tour sponsored by a clothing company. It fell apart after a few dates, leaving them to crash in L.A. with fellow Middle Tennessee rock refugees the Pink Spiders. After extensive contemplation (“We drank all day,” Slack says), the group hooked up with Raskulinecz, an acquaintance from his early days with the Knoxville pop group Superdrag. Slack already had a completed album in the can, but at Raskulinecz’s suggestion, the band set it aside and spent a month devising all-new songs to record at 606, the studio Raskulinecz runs with Foo Fighter Grohl. For his hosts, Slack has only praise. Grohl invited them to his family’s Labor Day cookout, while Raskulinecz kept the band pumped with techniques ranging from positive encouragement to mandatory Vinnie Vincent and Gwar breaks. The result sounds “more advanced,” he explains, “without feedback and noise just for the sake of doing it.” The only trauma was when they returned from a few days’ break to find that interim visitors Tenacious D had devoured their stash of frozen pizzas. No such problems for Feable Weiner. The band’s self-run label, Heinous Records, attracted major-label interest with its very first signing, the Austin group Cruiserweight. For 2FN Hot, the follow-up to their breakout indie release Dear Hot Chick, Feable Weiner turned to former Murfreesborean Mahaffey, who had seen the band every time they played in L.A. Chief Weiner Atom Andersen says going with the basement-pop guru was the best decision the band ever made. “I honestly can’t think of one song on our record that isn’t a chart-topping smash hit,” Andersen says with characteristic reserve. “We’re already dubbing this record the most important record of two generations from now.” The band plans to spend all of 2006 touring to support the album. Chris Slack says that a friendly rivalry among Feable Weiner, Slack and the Pink Spiders has kept them all working to impress each other. (When Geffen signed the Spiders, they and Slack playfully compared the thickness of their contracts.) With acts like The Features, Kings of Leon and Be Your Own Pet also getting national attention, does this mean there’s anything to the latest sighting of that music-biz snipe, the “Nashville buzz?” The difference now, Andersen observes, is that groups like Slack, Forget Cassettes and The Features have taken a more active role in promoting themselves outside Nashville. “Bands that take chances and don’t expect everything to be done for them or handed to them build better scenes,” Andersen says. Show up Thursday night and see if he’s right—and bring that snipe net, just in case.