I think it’s safe to say Gainesville, FL’s Grabass Charlestons – vocalist/drummer Will, bassist Dave, and guitarist PJ – are a bunch of carefree, laidback individuals, which is great to see in the punk scene.  Always prepared to “fill [people’s] heads with more knowledge about the sport of jai-alai than you can imagine,” and having plenty of silly remarks at the ready (for instance, the guys gave some rather amusing incentives to go see them play live, such as “we all weigh 400 pounds” and “we personally give everybody five dollars [to come to our gigs]” among others), speaking with these guys is a pleasure.  Nevertheless, in between their jokes and a sadistic penchant for rubbing in how wonderful the weather was in Florida while we in New York were suffering from truly god-forsaken weather, I somehow managed to coax a good deal of relevant information out of them during our engaging phone conversation. 

As demonstrated on their fine debut full-length humorously titled ‘The Greatest Story Ever Hula’d’ (on No Idea Records), an interesting aspect of Grabass Charlestons is how well they fuse contemplative lyrics with infectiously entertaining, speedy punk rock that has a charming and playful feel to it.  About this seemingly contrasting style and the possibility that the fun sound might take away from the message, Will sets the record straight, explaining, “I don’t think it [does]. I don’t really care if it does or if it doesn’t.  I’m not worried about people overlooking the seriousness of the lyrics.  I mean as serious as they may seem, I don’t really take myself that seriously nor do I take whatever we create all that seriously.”  And he makes a good point, adding, “It’s kind of annoying when people take themselves too seriously or take any band too seriously.”  Dave agrees, stating, “If the music wasn’t fun, then I wouldn’t wanna listen to it and I wouldn’t wanna play it, and yet if the lyrics weren’t somewhat thought-provoking, I wouldn’t be interested either,” philosophizing, “It’s a yin-yang situation.”

They began writing the material for ‘The Greatest Story’ after they recorded their split on No Idea with another Gainesville band, Billy Reese Peters (an act that just so happens to include Will and PJ), which was around July 2002.  Will wrote all the lyrics (except for the cover of “Cold, Cold Mountain”, a Tom Waits song) and says he writes about “whatever’s around me if it’s kinda funny or ridiculous or depressing, you know, makes me mad or whatever.”  He divulges that much of the subject matter is “almost embarrassingly personal.”  One topic that comes up is just how dehumanizing work can be, as on my personal favorite “Suicide at $8 an Hour”, describing the dire rut of “being bled ‘till you’re all bled out” to a tee.  And when hearing where Will wrote the songs – he penned a majority of them while “working at a kitchen in a restaurant,” sitting alone “doing crappy shit-work all day” – it’s no wonder why he came up with material like this.  He elaborates, “I wrote a lot of these lyrics at work ‘cause I had this job for a really long time and it was pretty menial…so I guess I kinda have that restaurant to thank.”

Overall, the band is quite content with how the album turned out, though they do admit there are certain things that could’ve been done better.  Admits Will, “I’d be lying if I ever said I listen to it and don’t wince in fuckin’ disgust every now and then.”  He says he’d like to re-record it again, knowing what he knows now.  PJ expounds, “We’ve…learned a lot about recording…since then, so we would definitely record it better if we did it now, but I think we’re happy with it.”  And Will is confident that “it’s a pretty good document as to where we were at the time.”

They just released the full-length in January of 2004, yet the hardworking guys already have basically all the material written for their next album, have recorded a demo, and say they’ve been playing some of the songs live for a while now.  They expect the record will come out some time this year.  About the quality of the new material, Will says he’s “pretty confident it’s the best stuff that we have to date” and appropriately, he’s “really excited about it.”  He reveals that many of the songs are “more developed” and “a little more complete” than their previous material, adding that they have some slow songs but also ones that are inevitably “fun, rocking fast stuff.”  Could we expect anything less?

As for touring plans this year, in February and March they will be hitting the entire U.S. - EXCEPT for the Northeast, as luck would have it.  Will reveals a humorous factor (at least to them!) for skipping us poor souls, quipping, “I saw the Weather Channel the other night and it was like -300°.”  Says PJ, “We don’t like cold weather much.”  Hmmm…maybe THAT’S why their sound is so refreshingly cheerful and bright…  In any case, they’ll be out with Against Me! and Lucero until mid-March, and then will be going on tour with Dillinger Four for a week-and-a-half.  Over the summer they’ll tour Europe, which will mark their first time getting to play there as a band.  So, as can be seen, Grabass Charlestons are doing pretty well for themselves, building a big fan base through their undeniably fun record ‘The Greatest Story Ever Hula’d’ and what truly must be an electrifying live show.