Catchin' Up With The Drag

For fans, it's been a super drag: Knoxville's premiere power pop quartet has been pretty quiet since last year's release of 360 Sound, the web- and locals-only compilation of their early independent singles. But despite the amicable departure of bassist Tom Pappas (now the driver of his own Flesh Vehicle) and all of the attendant break-up rumors, work continues—albeit slowly—on Superdrag's upcoming third Elektra Records CD.

Diminutive drummer Don Coffey tells us that the next record is about "70 percent complete." Work began last spring at Nashville's Woodland Studio, then came to a temporary halt when the band decided to take a break from the music.

Now, the 'draggers have resumed intermittent touring, with September gigs scheduled for mid-Ohio, and November shows planned in Nashville, Atlanta, Philadelphia, New York, D.C., and Baltimore. Look for another Knoxville date, at Moose's Music Hall, around the first of November.

In the meantime, the boys hope to reenter the studio in late fall in hopes of releasing the next record in March or April. "It will sound different, because we're producing it ourselves," Coffey promises, adding that former Knoxvillian Nick Rasculinecz will aid in the production chores. "So far, the new stuff is a good combination of our first two records. The slow songs are more like Head Trip in Every Key [the band's sophomore album], and the rock songs are more like Regretfully Yours [their Elektra debut.]"

While on the subject...

Speaking of Rasculinecz, the Bearden High graduate and former member of Knoxville thrash-funk unit Movement has reportedly continued his steady climb up the ladder of big-time record-making. The bass player-turned-local-producer moved from Knoxville to Los Angeles with his former band a few years back, whereupon he took a job at the venerable Sound City studio and rapidly graduated from gopher to assistant to engineer.

According to Coffey, Rasculinecz has since left Sound City and gone solo, acting as engineer on larger projects and producer for smaller bands. His latest efforts include work on the new Verbena record with Foo Fighter frontman David Grohl.

"Word is that he got pretty tight with Dave," Coffey chuckles. "Nick is doing really well for himself."

Put Up or Shut Up

The Opposable Thumbs
Chicks Ahoy (Disgraceland)

"I feel like I'm feeling again," declares Todd Steed in the lead track on his latest congregation of tunes, and he's right. Chicks Ahoy is his most rockin' album in years, chock full of energetic riffs, crunchy guitar solos, and even smarter smartass observations. The Opposable Thumbs—with Dave Jenkins on drums and Paul Noe on bass—bring out the rocker in Steed, and this collection is as focused and straightforward as anything he's done since the demise of Smokin' Dave and the Premo Dopes. While his current local project, Apelife, may be more loose and experimental, the Thumbs crash ahead with short, snappy numbers in that all-too-rare genre known as simple rock 'n' roll.

You can hear it right away in that first song, "Nobody's Full:" insistent guitar strumming that builds to a jumpin' beat and finally rocks out with the kind of immediate, joyful hooks that make you turn up the knob on the car's CD player. But underneath those catchy chords are lyrics examining Steed's own motives for continuing to play in a rock band: "Nobody's full/if you still want me/My dreams are cool/but they still haunt me/Wonder why I was born—was it just an accident?/Was my bad luck homemade or heaven-sent?" While "maturity" may be code for "getting really dull" when describing most aging rock singers, for Steed it just means he's balancing his rambunctious wit with an even stronger sense of self.

Either you get Todd Steed's persona and humor or you don't; for rock fans more accustomed to flashpots and blood, mascara and heroin addiction—you know, real rock stars—Steed won't make much sense at all. He's a nice guy in his 30s armed with a guitar and rather sardonic views of the world and of himself, who eschews the typical rock song topics (which, these days, seem to focus on just how awful everything is) for stuff actually happening in his life at the moment. And that ranges from telling a girl to dump her boyfriend ("Free Advice From Me") to how much he misses vinyl record album covers ("I Miss LP Covers"). The songs are often just as goofy as those old Smokin' Dave favorites, but with Chicks Ahoy Steed sounds like he means what he sings even moreso than before—not more serious, mind you, but perhaps more heartfelt.

Check out another stand-out tune, "Five O'clock"—stuck in an office job, Steed confesses his fears of becoming "one of them" as he waits for the clock to hit five. As guitars ring and drums pound, he chants a rush of desires: "I want to get out, be there, at home in my chair and get stoned, just by lookin, just by lookin around/I want to cut loose, get loud, burn words, hang out, shift back...shift back to who I think I thought I was." This is not the kind of self-reflective wistfulness you're going to get from a rocker in his twenties; but it is the honest thoughts of someone who's found himself in an unexpected place later in life. And as I type this in an office downtown, it's the kind of hummable tune that becomes a private anthem.

We've said it before (to the point where other local music scene experts have accused us of playing "favorites"), but I'll say it again: Knoxville's lucky to have Todd Steed. And, yes, he is a favorite—because he's as fine a songwriter as our beloved scene has ever had. So get over it, and then go see the Thumbs play at their CD release party, October 1 at the Longbranch Saloon.

—Zippy "Proud Member of Sardonics Anonymous" McDuff