Athens Legends Come to Life in Weirdo: The Story of Five Eight
Photo by Sanjeev Singhal
Few concerts during my college years in Athens, Ga.—soaking up the local music scene and eventually contributing to it with my own band—had as big an impact on me as seeing Five Eight at the 40 Watt in 1992. Three-fourths of the band pogoed with their guitars, always on the verge of veering out of control, while the one actually nicknamed Tigger sat behind the drum kit, holding it all together. Frontman Mike Mantione was an emotional force, singing about the pain of losing his mind while the audience reveled in collectively losing theirs. With all the brands breaking big out of Athens, it seemed like a foregone conclusion that Five Eight was next in line.
But most bands don’t become household names, and whether through bad luck, bad labels or self-sabotage, stardom never really came calling for Mantione, bassist Dan Horowitz, guitarist Sean Dunn and drummer Patrick Ferguson. But they achieved something maybe rarer—a longevity that continues and friendships that remain. Dunn and Ferguson left the band for a time, the latter temporarily replaced by Mike Rizzi, but they’re still making music together.
Last weekend, all four members plus Rizzi were at the Plaza Theater in Atlanta to celebrate the release of a new documentary on the band, Weirdo: The Story of Five Eight, a nine-year long project from director Marc Pilvinsky.
“I was looking for a fun side project and this one just bloomed to life effortlessly—at the beginning of the project, anyway,” Pilvinsky says of the film’s origins. “In 2015 I helped the band put together a short 20-minute documentary about one of their records being remixed/remastered and I was really taken by how emotionally open these guys were when I interviewed them. …But they had matured a lot over the years—as did I, I think—and there was a real depth to their answers about how and why things went wrong for them over the years. But their gratitude that they still get to play together all these years later, writing great songs, making great records and blowing people away in small clubs was what hit me hardest. They’re lucky to be alive and I think if they had the opportunity to trade early 1990s mega-success for their current lives, they wouldn’t change a thing. That’s a really healthy place to end up, and this is not a band that was usually in a healthy place by any measure.”
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
