In 1986, a group of friends recently graduated from the University of Georgia, returned home to Dalton, GA (The Carpet Capital of the World) to find themselves bored with it all. We’re talking about a bunch of guys that were in and around the thriving music scene in Athens, Ga. and always had something to do. They loved music and were into the underground scene with constant exposure to it – in the clubs, on the radio, and in the friends they kept.

Fast forward to 1988 in Dalton, GA. No clubs, radio was a joke, but they still had the friends part. Having gotten some decent work, these guys became exposed to a new-to-them post college phenomenon – the tax refund check. Here was an opportunity to create a band and they took it and their tax refunds to an Atlanta music store/pawn shop. On the way there, they decided who would play what. Brian Broadwater would play guitar, Al Rollins would play drums, and Gary Keeble would play the bass. They bandied about a couple of names for the band – the Bangers and Bugs Meanie to name a couple. Then one day Brian’s brother, a local top fuel funny car racer, said, “You ought to call it the pushrods.” They really liked it. So they dropped the “The” and pushROD was born.

They practiced almost every night in the boat shed (Brian’s brother also raced boats at one time) in the back of Brian’s parents house. Having no p.a. to mike vocals they resorted to screaming at the top of their lungs over the noise, and I mean noise, of the instruments. After a while, they decided that they really needed to amplify the vocals, so Brian bought a new amp, and they miked the vocals through Brian’s old Crate amp. They also thought a lesson or two might be in order, so they went to see Ray at one of the local music stores. Ray gave a couple of lessons to Brian and Gary, and after showing them ZZ Top and Lynyrd Skynyrd songs, they decided that was enough. They knew what they wanted to play and how they wanted to sound, and that wasn’t it. And when they exposed Ray to the music they wanted to be influenced by (X, Husker Du, the Ramones, the Replacements among others) he just kind of shrugged and didn’t know what to do with it. However, he did show Brian the one thing he needed to know – the bar chord. Al took a couple of drum lessons from a local legend who played in a band called St. Elizabeth, and he took it from there and never looked back. One interesting side note is that the equipment the band bought was shitty and didn’t have the power to give them the volume they wanted and needed. Al’s cymbals sounded like those aluminum ashtrays that they have at McDonald’s. He eventually tore right through them and was constantly pounding a hole in his snare. He hit ‘em hard. Gary’s bass amp would constantly short out because he was playing it on ten. He was due for a solid-state melt down. New equipment was in order.

They played their first gig at a teen club called Club Soda, 30 minutes north of Dalton in Chattanooga, TN. They still regard this show as the best they’ve ever played, because the kids were really into the pushROD sound and moshing and slam dancing all over the place. And they blew the Butthorn 4 off the stage. They were off and running. It was time to start documenting the band. They took their first trip to the recording studio under the guidance of soon to be Grammy award winning producer/engineer Joe Randolph. The debut recording would be called “SKONK”, rumored to be the mating call of Tunnel Hill, a rural burg minutes north of Dalton. In “SKONK” they would call out their influences in I Wanna Be A Ramone, Husker Du, and top it all off with a cover of Big Black’s “Racer X”.

With this recording, they toured various regional venues in Chattanooga, Atlanta, and Athens opening for various acts including Jack Logan and the Liquor Cabinet. In 1990, they took on another guitar player, Willie Garrett, to help freshen up their sound and just to see where it would go. They went back to the studio of Joe Randolph to record the follow up, “Pull My Fanger”. The addition of Willie G gave the band a more refined sound and allowed Brian to sing and write songs, two of which appeared on the record (“Be My Baby” and “Good Time Man”). The record finishes with a cover of Husker Du’s “Turn on the News” that caused no. 1 fan Raymond Valley to exclaim, “Husker Du only wishes they could play The News like that!”, when he heard it live.The band became a regular at a local skateboard park called the Wall that was ultimately done in with a performance by the late G.G. Allin. The band also opened at the local trade center for Collective Soul just prior to the release of the Grammy Award winning debut “Hints, Allegations, and Things Left Unsaid”. Engineer/friend Joe Randolph played rhythm guitar for Collective Soul at the trade center show, but left the band just prior to their achieving national prominence. However, his production credits on the album landed him a Grammy Award. But I digress.

The latter part of the 90’s is a blur, because Brian and Gary began spawning offspring. However, Willie left the band and pushROD became a 3-piece again. And it was into the studio again, this time to record under the guidance of Athens, GA mainstay and former Sugar (Bob Mould’s band) bassist David Barbe. Barbe had long been a supporter of pushROD, even reviewing the bands debut record in the Athens zine FlagPole. They recorded 8 songs, 6 that made the record “Hammer Day”. This recording was the bands most aggressive to date and included no covers this time. (2 were recorded but none made the cut.) The record includes a pleading to those with body odor (B.O.), the sacrifices one makes for matrimony and child rearing (You Can’t Go), and a tribute to one of the bands favorite Athens acts, Big Top.

After recording “Hammer Day”, the band laid low. Various personal projects sidelined the band. Al started a side project with some new friends called Tweeky Heirs. Gary would later join the Tweeks as bass player. Jake Sane, a guitar player for Tweeky Heirs, began jamming with pushROD adding lead licks here and there and adding texture to the guitars. The band clicked with Jake and he has become a permanent member of the band. pushROD returned to the studio, this time recording with a local Dalton native Chris Bentley at his 2nd Bedroom Studios. A four-song EP was recorded that includes two new originals plus covers of the Killer’s “Wild One” and Husker Du’s “Heaven Hill”.

pushROD is:Rollins – Drums, Broadwater – Guitar, Keeble – Bass, Vocals, Sane – Guitar

For more information on pushROD, bookings, cd’s or otherwise contact us at pushrod@musician.org.