Music for writing: WHORES

Some people have asked me what I listen to while I'm writing. Well my tastes from everyday tend to bleed over into my creative activities. Therefore, I end up listening to a lot of sludge and death metal with some atmospheric stuff and sometimes heavier music from the 90s tossed in for color. While these guys weren't on my radar back when I was finishing my first manuscript in early 2010, I have become a diehard fan since. They have two albums (Ruiner and Clean) that I have been rocking heavily while working on the second book. Ladies and jerks, I am talking about local Atlanta band Whores.
These guys are amazing on record, and absolutely unbelievable live. The two times I have seen them, they have not disappointed. Their music is harsh and gritty, but in person it is so incredibly tangible. The crunch of the guitars grinds harder, the visceral beats of the drums resonate louder, and the bass just rumbles. To top off their sound, they know how to rock a crowd. I've seen them twice now and both times something fucked up has happened. I saw a pretty good fight at one of the shows, and this past Friday night, someone got knocked into me causing my lower lip to get split and require stitches. There is something so nasty and driving about this music that it tends to conjure realities as gross as its sound when played live.
Noise rock is sorta meh to me on a lot of fronts, but Whores don't just reinvent the wheel, they utterly destroy it before dragging its remnants through a dilapidated parking lot of broken asphalt and shattered glass before smashing what remains into a devastated proximity of the original. Each set begins with an oppressive drone of feedback before exploding into a trawl through frustration and disappointment to build a crescendo of absolute catharsis. It was well worth stumbling down to East Atlanta even though I was tired as hell, well worth the roughly 40 minutes or so I was actually able to see, and worth being in the emergency room at Dekalb Medical til 0530 getting stitches.

Make sure you check these jerks out. As much as I bitch about Atlanta, there is some amazing talent here. It's hard not to be inspired after listening to them either live or on record.

http://whores.bandcamp.com/