(MusicPortal.com) (01/03/05)

Edited By Michael Bennett

ATHENS, GA, USA - Highly touted Southern Rock band TISHAMINGO are set to release their second album, "Wear N' Tear," come next month.

The band, comprised of Jess Franklin (guitar/vocals), Cameron Williams (guitar/vocals), Stephen Spivey (bass) and Richard Proctor (drums), play a brand of music that reflects a high caliber of musicianship, making the group both somewhat of a throwback to their musical ancestors and a frontrunner in today's crowded musical bandscape.

Two bluesy-yet-melodic lead guitars with fat tones and two lead vocalists with world weary Soul have drawn comparisons with numerous legendary artists such as The Allman Brothers, Grand Funk, Lynyrd Skynyrd, Jimi Hendrix, and Stevie Ray Vaughn.

"Wear N' Tear" has a strong southern flavor mixed with good old Blues-based Rock 'N' Roll, skillful jamming, soulful singing and honest lyrics. To ensure a creative vibe on the new album, the band secured producer David Barbe (Drive-By Truckers) and mixing guru John Keane (Widespread Panic, R.E.M., Stockholm Syndrome) to take the controls.

Tishamingo are slated to begin a U.S. tour shortly after the album sees its release in February.

As far as similiarities go as to how the band initially grew to come together as a unit, flash back to the following scene in the movie "O Brother, Where Art Thou?": The three main characters stop at a crossroads in rural Mississippi, where they see a black man standing with a guitar.

The man asks if they're headed to Tishomingo, a place where he heard people can get paid for singing into a can. They pick him up, and they all go to a radio station in Tishomingo.

There, under the moniker "The Soggy Bottom Boys," they record a song that becomes a huge hit.

In Tishomingo, four drifters came together to become a band.

As it turns out, four guys who now call Athens, GA, home thought the name fitting for their own band.

They altered the spelling a little bit, and Tishamingo was born.

Maybe they aren't exactly drifters - more like long-time friends originally from Tallahassee, FL - but take the Rock, Blues, and Soul music of the late '60s and '70s, mix in a healthy dose of childhoods spent in the swampy wetlands of northern Florida, and you have a concoction that pleases the ears.

Williams and Proctor have been writing and playing music together since they were in seventh grade, and were the founding members and songwriters for both the Black Creek Band and Uptown Rudy.

While touring with Black Creek during the early '90s, they shared the stage with such bands as Widespread Panic, the Derek Trucks Band, and Tinsley Ellis, to name but a few.

While the latter two members were doing their own music thing, Franklin and Spivey founded Jess Franklin And The Best Little Blues Band way back while they were still in high school, Franklin's reputation as a guitarist growing to the point that seasoned musicians were coming out to see "the kid" play.

The Best Little Blues Band toured throughout the South, and played with the likes of B.B. King, Gov't Mule, the Derek Trucks Band, and Kenny Wayne Shepherd.

The four members who were to become Tishamingo knew each other through the Tallahassee scene.

As is always the case, bands came to an end and the musicians found themselves playing in different combinations.

"I was doing a solo acoustic thing in Atlanta," Williams says. "Richard and I were also playing together. Jess and I were doing an acoustic duo thing in Tallahassee."

"The three of us ended up together, and we recruited Spivey, who'd been playing with Jess before. We played our first gig at The Warehouse in Tallahassee in March of 2001."

That date cemented what the band's members suspected all along: that all four really wanted to work together.

A mutual decision to move to Athens happened around the same time, and while Jess was finishing up at his job before the big move, the others joined him in Tallahassee for a month to rehearse.

They got a regular Friday night gig at Potbellies, but realized they only had enough material for one set per night. Proctor had the idea to cover an entire album for their second set, and the band embraced the challenge.

In addition to rolling out all of the Tishamingo originals they'd been working up, they covered, in order: The Allman Brothers Band's self-titled record, Black Sabbath's self-titled album, Led Zeppelin's "Led Zeppelin," Jimi Hendrix's "Axis: Bold As Love," and Derek & The Dominos' "Layla."

The experience, which they dubbed "band camp," meant the foursome learned fifty-two songs in a month.

It was a great way to find out how everybody played and how we all interacted with each other," Williams says.

Eventually, they settled into a farmhouse in Athens, where they rehearsed for several hours virtually every day.

Once they felt they were prepared, Tishamingo was unleashed on the Southeastern United States. Rampant touring followed, adding up to over 200 live shows in the past year.

When the band was ready to record, they knew who they wanted to work with and had no qualms about reaching out to the person directly. "Proc looked in the phone book, found John Keane's number, and called him up," Cameron remembers.

"He came out to hear us play a few times. When he said he wanted to work with us, it was a huge compliment."

Keane, whose production credits include R.E.M., Widespread Panic, and the Indigo Girls, "was the perfect person for us at that point in our career," Cameron says.

"John's got a really good method of how he records. I really loved what he did with the vocals and the time he took with it. Working with him was a really special time for the band."

The resulting self-titled debut album was initially sold at the band's shows and via their official website. The strength of their sales drew the attentionof Innerstate Records, who picked up the album for national release.

Featuring twelve original tracks that showcases Tishamingo's diverse musical ability, the debut also included a guest appearance by keyboard player Jason Fuller of Ween.

As for what the future holds, the members of Tishamingo have plenty of confidence in their abilities.

"We want to be able to live our lives and play music and make a living at it," Cameron says.

"The touring and the shows are what we love. I feel like there really is a place for us and what we deliver - keeping rock 'n' roll alive, especially in the live arena.

"We don't have a get-rich-quick scheme. We didn't go into the studio to make an album that sounds like what's hip and what's in."

What's hip and what's in are also typically very fleeting and flavor-of-the-month, and Tishamingo are anything but that.

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