Fortunately, no such bad luck should affect the dual CD-release party for the Nerves (see below) and atombombpocketknife, scheduled for Friday night at the Bottle.

For atombombpocketknife, a band that's circulated around the Chicago area for a little more than three years, the show celebrates the release of its second full-length record (and third overall), "God Save the ABPK" (Southern).

Atombombpocketknife had its genesis in Knoxville, Tennessee, evolving as a side project to lead guitarist/singer Justin Sinkovich's Thumbnail, though he notes that in Tennessee "it was a different line-up and a totally different thing than it is now—in fact, it was really just an afterthought on the side then." After moving to Chicago, Sinkovich joined with current bassist Allison Hollihan and drummer Matt Espy, and decided to revive the name. The band released a self-titled EP in 1999 on Southern Records, followed by its debut full-length, "Alpha Sounds" (also on Southern) last year.

"God Save the ABPK" finds the band developing the uniquely trademark sound it began fleshing out two years ago. There's a more obtuse nature to the record that shows Sinkovich as a songwriter even further removed from the more sporadic, schizophrenic days of Thumbnail. Leading off the record with the ultra low-end/bass-heavy "A Room Full of Perfect People," ABPK lets off the accelerator a bit until the fifth track, "The Methadone Actors," and from that point on, the distortion levels on the guitars never falter. The record—and indeed, the band—defies even a ballpark genre-fication; perhaps a umbrella description would read something like "brutally psychedelic, hard-edged smartrock for punks who like more than three chords." Maybe.

Genre-specific or not, "God Save" finds the band with a beefed-up sound, thanks to the addition of a second guitarist, Che Arthur. Though this marks his first appearance as an official band member on a record, Arthur became an ABPKer last year. "We'd already been thinking about adding another guitarist. [When we were touring for 'Alpha Sounds'], we asked Che to run sound for us on the West Coast," recalls Sinkovich, "and somewhere—I think Pittsburgh—it finally occurred to us that he should be the one. We didn't even really ask him, we just left him a message on his answering machine telling him he was playing guitar for us, and headed west."

Friday's show should prove a tangible arrival for ABPK as well, which has gradually built a solid local fanbase over the last two years, despite the eye-rolling "you're starting a rock band, huh?" comments that Sinkovich recalls being greeted with by Chicago's post-rock-happy scenesters three years ago. Energy should be compounded by the fact that this marks the band's first show in six months. "We wanted a little break," explains Sinkovich, "and we wanted to get people excited again to see us."

Certified "Gold":
While our musical neighbor to the east, Detroit, has picked up the pace of raw, over-the-top rock music, Chicago continues to seek a calmer, more soothing edge. Except the Nerves, who are without a doubt, the most gut-level, instinctive rock band in the city, making music without any genre-specific pretension.

The band's third full-length record, "World of Gold," is out now on Thrill Jockey Records, and fans of the band's first two records might be a bit taken aback by the Nerves shift to a less frantic methodology. "I think sonically it's different," says bass player Seth Skundrick of the record. "But it's not that much different than where we were with the first record. It's still rock, or R&B or whatever. Though the first record was a lot faster."

A lot faster. "World of Gold" harkens more to the unadulterated rock of the sixties than to either of the Nerves' past two efforts, stripping the songs of any buzzsaw-flavored guitars in favor of musical brevity. As Skundrick says, the band wanted "space to become a bigger part of the record." In short, the fury and nervous energy associated with the Nerves has become bridled. Repeated listens also mark "World of Gold" as their best to date.

And even though Skundrick doesn't believe the record to be that far away from past efforts, he acknowledges the growth in songwriting. "After you write songs for a while, you just naturally change in subtle ways that maybe you don't notice, but other people do. You just find a better way to say want you want to say."

Since the release of their first record, the Nerves have been the most un-Thrill Jockey band on the Thrill Jockey roster, a record label known more for Tortoise and Oval than knuckle-rending rock music. Has a lack of open-mindedness from the average loud rock fan—directed unfairly at Thrill Jockey—hurt the band in the rock world? "Fuck yeah it has," he answers. "That's a question everyone asks. But the thing is, we did Thrill Jockey because no one else would put out our fucking record, and [label head] Bettina [Richards] said she'd put out three and then see where we were." So is another label in the works? "I don't know; I can't tell the future."

Note: The Nerves also play Saturday, September 22, at the Fireside Bowl with Zeke and The Killer Elite.

Also by Dave Chamberlain

RAW MATERIAL
For those not in the know, Thumbnail is the product of Knoxville, Tennessee, where Jason Morris, David Burns, Steve Schmidt and Justin Sinkovich—now a member of Atombombpocketknife—were students at the University of Tennessee.
(2001-09-13)

CLOSE CALL
On the morning of September 11, Ryan Gowing and his friend James Cole were returning to their home in New York from San Francisco, on an ATA flight headed toward LaGuardia Airport. "It didn't look like a plane crashed into it, it just looked like a big black splotch," continues Gowing. When their airplane passed the World Trade Center towers, only one was burning.
(2001-09-13)

RAW MATERIAL
Pinetop Seven, who first appeared in Chicago's music scene when it released an eponymous record in 1997, has gained increasing critical notoriety with each of its four records.
(2001-09-06)

RAW MATERIAL
For three years, the Hideout has been the site of Chicago's Finest Hour, a monthly event held on Wednesdays. For the Finest Hour, bands (or a few members from bands) take the stage to cover other local band's songs—the catch being that the other bands/artists are usually on the bill as well.
(2001-08-30)

CONTINENTAL REPAST
(2001-08-30)

RAW MATERIAL
(2001-08-23)

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(2001-08-09)

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(2001-08-02)

RAW MATERIAL
(2001-07-26)

DISCOVERIES
(2001-07-19)

RAW MATERIAL
(2001-07-12)

RAW MATERIAL
(2001-07-05)