Following his death last spring, friends and bandmates remembered Dave Cloud as a fountain of creative energy with the magnitude of several volcanos, which he funneled into a multitude of pursuits including fronting his band, The Gospel of Power, as well as occasional acting gigs like Harmony Korine's Trash Humpers and the country-spoof web series Bluejeans.
One role in which you probably didn't see Cloud was as the host of Nashville's Sound Fest (Mountain Thunder!). Cloud's long-time GoP bandmate Matt Bach tells the Cream that circa 1996, Laurel Parton (who you may remember from her group Trauma Team) helped Cloud & Co. assemble Hi-8 footage from several concerts around town, with Cloud introducing the clips in the enchantingly enthusiastic and majestically strange way that only he could.
The goal was to air Sound Fest on public access TV, but there was a catch — they needed three 27-minute episodes to get on the rotation, but only two were completed, so the project was shelved. Fast-forward 20 years, and the first episode has made its way to the Internet, preserving a little slice of Music City's underground rock scene from well before we were riding the wave of "It" or anyone was considering a smoking ban at Springwater.
You'll see:
* a perfect moment from a Fugazi show at 328 Performance Hall, during which Ian MacKaye pulls a slam-dancing dude onstage to chill him out
* Spider Virus with original drummer Tracy Coss, from before they caught Steve Albini's ear
* a scintillating performance at the long-defunct Hayes House by The Tony Guides, a Sun City Girls-inspired group featuring Bach, FMRL Arts co-founder Chris Davis, James Clauer and Josh Elrod
* cuts from a Working Stiffs jam at Springwater (before the red tinsel curtain!) featuring an early incarnation of Lambchop and producer-engineer Mark Nevers' punk band CYOD (also with Paul Booker and Lambchop's Matt Swanson)
* and wrapping it up, an early Gospel of Power show from just after Bach and Chris Davis joined the band, showing off their Martian rock at its most primal.
Go ahead and pop some corn, make sure you've got a beer or three in arm's reach, and check it out.
