When you hear the title The Destroyer's Club, what comes to mind? A rock band? A gang of comic book super-villains seeking world domination? A stable of wrestling heels (bad guys)? Those are all fitting to carry such a title however in this case, The Destroyer's Club is a collective of artists from Chattanooga, Tennessee.
How I came to discovering The Destroyer's Club comes as a result of the write-up I made about the band Moonlight Bridge. The Destroyer's Club produced the teaser video for Moonlight Bridge's Twin Lakes EP. When the write-up was finished and I went through the now standard act of sharing the post across the other social media venues, I noticed the following day that The Destroyer's Club had picked up on it. What might be taken for granted for those with a bigger voice and audience, always catches my attention because it just doesn't happen often. It's one thing for the subject in which I've written about to pick it up and give recognition to it. It's another when it's another party with ties to the subject notices it. I think it's cool.
So I checked out who exactly were The Destroyer's Club and it did not take long for me to become a fan of the collective works of Michael Mahaffey, Carl Cadwell, and Drew Belz. These three are the self-proclaimed Destroyers and their works are not only showcasing their amazing talents as producers and artists, but also the talents of those in the arts and music scene of Chattanooga. When you visit the website you see right away a collection of their work. The first video is titled, "There's A Fire Down Here."
Shot by Drew Belz with help from Kelly Lacy (under the production name Fancy Rhino) and local area poet Jonathan Cate (who also provides narration) the video features the neighborhood of East Lake and their people. It was a submission to a contest in which other Chattanooga neighborhoods were called to prove why their neighborhood rocks. The video won and it is easy to see why. You watch it and it's easy to think about Clint Eastwood's "Halftime In America" commercial that got a lot of us talking about it during the Super Bowl. Yet there is something a whole lot more to "There's A Fire Down Here" than just highlighting a beauty that's not just exclusive to East Lake. This could have been shot in a million other neighborhoods and the words of Jonathan Cate are ones I find myself listening to over and over. Art has many definitions, but one universally accepted one is that it is something that invokes emotion. This is what I get when I watch "There's A Fire Down Here."
The Distribution are a R&B/funk/soul band that if you're a fan of Sharon Jones & The Dap Kings and all this Motown, must check out. Play it loud and enjoy the sounds crafted by the band and Destroyer Carl Cadwell. I can only imagine how fun the recording sessions were.
Michael Mahaffey designed the package for Matt Downer's Showtime Fields Recordings, a project highlighting four musicians from the Tennessee, Georgia, and Alabama tri-state area. Drawing inspiration from blues and bluegrass posters of generations ago, this is what Mahaffey came up with. In Showtime Fields Recordings, Volume 1 - Alabama, Downer had informal interviews and recording sessions of Wayne Heard, Jess Moore, Willie King, and Cast King. First, a picture of the packaging that Mahaffey designed and after that a preview of the first volume of Downer's project.
Home is where the heart is and it is evident that the passions of not only telling a story, but also invoking an emotion to their works shines. You wouldn't think Chattanooga, Tennessee as the next hotbed of rising artists, but The Destroyer's Club are definitely working to change that. Who knows, maybe in due time, the national eyes and ears will catch wind of what the artist collective with the really awesome sounding name is doing.
The Destroyer's Club (official website)
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