re: "A RIVER OF BOOZE... Inside one college town’s uneasy embrace of drinking"...

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but in any case, I feel I can say with certainty that they were not really part the "Down Town" Music scene... in fact, they were the antithesis of it...

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Athens music-snobbery is an interesting topic. There's people that share your opinion, but I know that there's also people that reminisce about the downtown Uptown Lounge days of Widespread Panic, etc in the same condescending way that you talk about your view of the "downtown" music scene.

This much is true though. IN the 90's, while the the B-52s were making videos for MTV.....and REM was making unlistenable songs like "Losing my religion" and that rap song with KRS1........the jam-bands were stealing the Athens music scene out from under their proteges noses. And they reigned supreme over Athens for many years. That's not an opinion. That's just what happened.

I know there were hipster pockets of resentment to this, and there was still an ecclectic mix that makes Athens special, but the jam bands were at the top for a while. With Widespread Panic considered the grand-fathers of the "scene".

And what's funny is that the appeal of it was that these jambands were something different. It was a new sound and different from the artsy fartsy oh-so-impressed with itself stale Athens sounds. I'm not defending or criticizing any kind of music. It's just how it was.

The bands that filled the GA theatre were all jam bands. The fraternity houses and small bars downtown were full of jambands hoping to play the GA theatre one day. The annual Athens music fest that came to be known as "Super Jam" out at the fairgrounds was jambands from top to bottom with Panic as the headliners. And then, of course, they played their free show downtown that brought a million people to Athens.


Must have really been infuriating for hipsters and protectors of the "Down Town scene" back then.