Ahead of my scheduled interview with Cody Landress-Gibson, frontman of Chattanooga sludge Metal band Dope Skum, I was given the address for his office.
When Google Maps informed me that I had arrived at my destination, I was surprised to find myself in the parking lot of the 23rd Street Waffle House. For a moment I assumed I’d gotten the wrong address. But that’s when I saw the van.
The van is a 1998 Ford Econoline 150 with a Dope Skum sticker on the bumper. This image – the Hesher van in the Waffle House parking lot, ghost of Lookout Mountain aglow with the twinkle of distant porch lights – is the very image on the cover of Dope Skum’s new EP “Gutter South.”
The album has suddenly come to life all around me, and except for the stench of baked urine along 23rd Street, it’s an enchanting experience.
I find Cody alone in a corner booth, presiding over a stack of waffles like Al Pacino and talcum powder. His bushy beard and tattooed flesh are intimidating, but his innocent eyes and charming drawl are reassuring. I had planned to open with a compliment on the new EP, a brisk and brutal five track collection that veers unexpectedly between Black Sabbath and Ralph Stanley. But instead, I tell him how I cool I think his van is.
Cody’s eyes light up at the mention of his van, and he happily divulges its origin story – which in its own way is an origin story for the band. “At the time I had no intention of playing metal,” he tells me between waffle bites. “Country music is in my blood, and I assumed I’d follow in the family footsteps,” he says, referring to a family tree that includes many Grand Ole Opry regulars.
“I knew if I was going to tour I’d need a van, and I found what seemed like a pretty good one,” he recalls of the day trip he and his drummer, Scott Keil, took to Cocke County. “Apparently, that area has a rich history in regards to moonshining. That’s where ol’ Popcorn Sutton ran his operation for 50 years.”
Cody remembers pulling up to a dilapidated rural farmhouse with the Econoline parked in the overgrown front yard. “A 98-year-old widow lived there alone. She invited us in for sweet tea and told us all about the van.” It had belonged to her son, Caleb Isquith, who like several generations of Isquith men, had made a career of moonshining and running illicit substances throughout the greater Appalachian region. That van was his baby, and he had customized it over two decades until the day federal agents finally closed in on him. He vanished, abandoning both his mother and his prized Econoline van.
“They never found his body,” Cody says as his forks more waffle into his mouth. “According to legend, he left it all behind and disappeared into the ‘Gutter South.’ Supposedly it’s this underground network of old time bootleggers and hellraisers and other malefactors trying to stay hidden from the eyes of the law.”
All that remained of Caleb Isquith was his beloved van and a collection of homemade audio cassettes Cody found in the glove compartment, each filled with improvised heavy metal music Caleb had made by banging on the steering wheel and playing air guitar while evading cops on mountain roads.
“I drove home that night by myself but I wasn’t alone,” Cody explains to me as a breeze inexplicably chills the air inside the Waffle House. “The spirit of Caleb Isquith was in that van with me, brought to life by the music on those tapes he made.” By the time he returned to Chattanooga Cody explained to his drummer that they were no longer a country band. From that moment on, they would make heavy metal. “But metal that honors the Appalachian roots of Caleb’s music and his life and his Econoline,” Cody tells me.
By the time we finish talking about the van, I realize I’ve forgotten to ask any questions about the album. Unfortunately, the hour scheduled by his publicist has lapsed and the reporter from Rolling Stone is waiting in the vestibule.
Dope Skum’s new EP ‘Gutter South’ is available for streaming on all platforms.