Chattanooga Girls Rock release a true “must have” album
2016 saw the debut of the Chattanooga Girls Rock project here in the Scenic City. CGR is a non-profit group that sponsors a weeklong summer day camp in which girls age ten to seventeen are given instruction in all aspects of rock music.
The whirlwind curriculum includes instrumental performance, song writing, stage craft, and ancillary topics like promotion, crafting badges, buttons, shirts and fan ‘zines. It’s a one-stop shop for all things rock and roll with the goal of encouraging love for music and performance and, on a deeper level, fostering confidence, self-reliance, cooperation and empowerment.
Per the group’s website, CGR exists, “to provide the girls the platforms and tools they need to tell their own stories and be heard.”
The first year was an unmitigated success, so much so that the camp is back again this year, bigger and better than ever. As a non-profit the organization’s success is due in large part to the work of dedicated volunteers and community support. Fund raising is a serious matter relying on benefit concerts, donations of time, money and material from individuals and businesses and the general goodwill of the community at large.
This year the group has found a particularly apropos avenue of revenue generation with the release of the Chattanooga Girls Rock compilation album, a collection of twenty years of the very best punk music the area has to offer, described as. “A history of women in the underground music scene in Chattanooga.”
Never minding for the moment that the album’s purpose is to raise much-needed funds for a worthy cause, this compilation stands out as one of the most important albums of the year. Nowhere will you find such a definitive look at women in the local punk scene.
Coming in at forty tracks (that’s right, forty) the collection is a who’s who of some very well-known names and some that are perhaps not as well-known though certainly as deserving and the unifying element through it all is that the album positively kicks ass!
Rag Race, Driller Killers, Possible Side Effects, Rock Paper Stupid, Anna Banana, How to Make a Monster, Young Egyptians, Panty Shanty, Savage Weekend, Sandal Stomp, and Rowdy Downstairs are just a fraction of the phenomenal acts featured on the disc. There is a marked variance in sound quality between tracks which, believe it or not, only serves to enhance the overall impact of the album.
Tunes like “Walk the Floors” have a crisp, clean, pro-studio quality which is immediately followed by “Mistakes” which has a perfectly DIY quality. Lo-fi, hi-fi, live performances, open air recordings, it’s all here and it all should be. It is quintessentially punk in execution.
For more reasons than I can enumerate here, this is a must have album. The quality of performances and breadth of performers is incredible. That the proceeds from the sale of this album go to support Chattanooga Girls Rock is just so much icing on the cake. The album is available at any CGR event and can likewise be found at bandcamp or by emailing chattanoogagirlsrock@gmail.com