by Mark Kadzielawa

Atheist originally formed back in 1984, in Florida. They went through few names (Oblivion, R.A.V.A.G.E.) before settling on Atheist. The original band included Kelly Shaefer on vocals and guitar, Rand Burkey on guitar, Roger Patterson on bass, and Steve Flynn on drums. This initial version of the band recorded Piece of Time in 1988. Piece of Time was a revolutionary album displaying extreme technical playing, and over the top scales not heard in the metal genre. The band took the material on the road, supporting Candlemass in their first and only US tour. As the band was returning home from that tour, a terrible car accident claimed the life of Roger Patterson.
Atheist recruited Tony Choy, and recorded Unquestionable Presence. Another tour followed with Cannibal Corpse. The band found it difficult to establish a solid fan base, and their progressive approach was beyond what an average metal fan could relate to. Both records however were regarded highly by the critics, and there was small but very dedicated fan base. At that point, the group fell apart. Kelly Shaefer put another version of Atheist to record Elements. Elements was the last recording Atheist contractually owed their record label. Shortly after, the band disbanded for the second time.
During the downtime, Shaefer was quite successful with Neurotica. Other members didn’t do much musically. It took many years for the music to mature, and the legend of Atheist continued to grow. There was a lot of demand for the band’s records which were now out of print. In 2005, Relapse Records re-issued the entire catalog, shortly after the band reunited for some special appearances. These appearances led to a full fledged reunion. Currently the band is writing new music, and hopes to release a record in the near future. The latest release from Atheist is a live recording from Wacken Festival.
The current line up includes Steve Flynn on drums, Kelly Shaefer on vocals, Tony Choy on bass, and the two newcomers Chris Baker and Jonathan Thompson on guitars. Baker and Thompson play in Gnostic with Flynn as well.
Drummer, Steve Flynn, talks about the break up of the original unit, and explains how the band was revived. Flynn explains how the Gnostic/Atheist combination works in great detail.

What caused the break up of the original band?
Steve Flynn: I think there were a lot of factors all at once, the main one being of course Roger’s death. His bass playing and his writing style combined with my drumming was always the central part of the music. Everything always revolved around it. And he wrote all the crazy riffs that the band became known for. You know Piece of Time and Mother Man, and Retribution. He wrote all those things, and it was Kelly and Rand that did the harmonies around it. When he was dead it was really hard to replace that particularly in the early 90s when there were very few bass players that could play that kind of music. There were very few technical bands out at the time. That was one major reason. Another was, we just came back from our second tour. Roger was dead, and Unquestionable Presence was recorded and released. It received great reviews, and still nobody bought it. Nobody liked it. We toured with Cannibal Corpse, and that was not a good pairing to say the least. People were there to see them blast-beat, and the grotesquely heavy. They weren’t there to see us play harmonies, and complex riffing. We weren’t heavy, and we weren’t fast, we were sort of in the middle. And they weren’t there to see that. We weren’t received well in most places. There were only a couple places in which we were booed offstage, but the albums were not selling and people just weren’t getting into it.
Having met Roger in person, and experiencing his natural intensity, I doubt he would let you break up the band.
That would’ve been a real critical juncture. Had he stayed alive, I think things would’ve been a lot easier to deal with. But it’s hard to say whether or not we would have. We definitely would’ve done another record, but whether or not we would have gotten past that. It took about 10-12 years before the first two records became accepted. So, if we would have done another one, who knows. We already felt like we were beating our heads against the wall. Not getting anywhere. When we got back from that Cannibal Corpse tour, I’d had enough. Roger was dead, people weren’t getting into us, what were we to do? We’ve been together since we were like 10-year-old kids. It was like “Well we tried.” I went away to college. The band was still under the obligation to do another record, so they did. Kelly put another line-up tighter and continued. It was still a brilliant record they released, and I can’t imagine how it would’ve turned out if Roger and I played on it. I felt the band was maturing as far as the songwriting went. The songs were becoming more sophisticated, and more textured and layered. The structure was getting better.

What was happening during the downtime?
Well, we all had really different paths. I went to college, and then to a graduate school. I got my master’s degree. I broke into a corporate environment, the 9 to 5 job and all. I worked for a global communication company. I got married, and have a wife and two kids. It was an absolutely non-musical life. Kelly had Neurotica which was very successful. He was on the Ozzfest tour, and had a major label deal. He stayed in music this whole time. Tony Choy started a Latin band called Area 305, and they are still together releasing records. He stayed in music as well. Rand Burkey, our other guitar player, just sort of, bounced around and didn’t really do much musically or professionally. He just sort of existed for lack of better term.
The reunion came as a surprise at first, what sparked the process?
We just started talking again, and it really took people so many years before they got into the music. It was just continued demand for the catalog. Before the reissues I hadn’t played drums for probably 13 years. From the time we got off the last tour until 2005, I really didn’t play. I woke up one morning in January and decided it was time to start playing again. So I started the band Gnostic with the guys who are also in Atheist. That was before the reissues came about. Had that not happened I’m not sure if we would’ve gotten to the position we are in right now. It took me few months to get back into shape as far a being a drummer again. The ongoing demand for the catalog was the motivating factor. People were bidding a lot of money on Ebay for long out-of-print cassettes and CDs. Kelly was insistent about the catalog being available again. He had a lot of talks with a lot of labels about reissuing the recordings. Relapse Records finally stepped up to the plate, and put together a really good offer. We knew that they would handle it right; they were big fans of the band from back in the day. It just kind of spawned from here. So Kelly called me and told me Relapse would be the label doing it, and I just said sure, what do we have to lose? That was as far as it was going to go.
The reissues are very nicely done; there are plenty of bonus tracks, great liner notes, and photos. It’s a very attractive package for anyone interested. Was it easy to research, and find all the materials?
Actually, it was funny. We had to go on Ebay to find some of the original packaging that we used as a model for the artwork. I had a couple of copies, and Kelly couldn’t even find his. We basically bootlegged our own stuff just to get it done. And Relapse was just a top notch outfit, and really wanted to pour everything into it that they could. There was only a fair amount of stuff that we had. We had the demos, and some pre-production recordings. We had a radio performance that made its way through. There were never any extra songs that we could pull out. There was never any unrecorded material. What there was we released already. They were just really good at packaging and marketing the albums.
For the band that in their heyday had a hard time attracting an audience the music really did stand the test of time. The reissues were a big hit among many fans worldwide.
I’ll tell you one of my concerns. I was afraid the albums would sound dated when they came out. I mean look at what’s going on right now in music. So I was thinking people will say this sounds like it’s really from the 80s. When it actually came out, the music still had freshness about it. We were touring with Obscura in Europe recently, and I was talking to them about it. One of the Obscura guys shared a story about driving with a friend and listening to Unquestionable Presence in the car. His friend was asking him who is this? So he tells him it is Atheist, and the album is about 17 years old. The other guy was very surprised the record was this old because the music didn’t give away its age. A lot of things like that let us know it still has a life of its own in today’s world. Every night we go out and play with those young kids who are just unbelievable musicians. We go out there and it still works. I think we’re all quite surprised.
How did you actually get the band on stage from that point on?
That’s a lot of work. Kelly lives in Sarasota, and Tony lives in Miami, and me and the rest of the guys live in Atlanta. So, when we decided to do this, we sort of sat down and said how are we gonna make this work. Given that I had started Gnostic with these guys we had a kind of nucleus in place that allowed us to rehearse, and rehearse a lot. Everyone had to re-learn the material. Some of it came easy, but some of it we really had to work on. We’re still working on it. The fact that we were able to have that nucleus in place, and continuously rehearse helped. Kelly was just going to be singing, so the absence of his vocals was not going to slow us down musically. It was getting Tony from Miami to come down from Miami to rehearse that was really difficult. That was by far the most difficult part of the process because a lot of the shows we played were one off shows. We’d fly to Wacken and play there, and fly back home. And you got to get it right on that one shot. We only had a limited amount of rehearsals after more than a decade of not playing to get it right. It was a real stretch. Sometimes we hit it out of the park, sometimes we struggled. The reactions were unbelievable.
I know there are plans to record new material, how is it shaping up?
We’re going to see how it comes out. I think we don’t quite know. I think there are basic elements that we know for sure. The drumming is going to be busy and crazy. The guitar playing is going to be complex and rich. There’s going to be a lot of harmonies. There are plenty of good ideas that are floating around and it is just a matter of time before we make it happen. It will sound in many ways like Atheist, and in many ways it will sound updated and different. I mean, our styles have changed over the years, and the music will reflect that as well.

Gnostic and Atheist, how does that work?
In a big picture, it works pretty well, so far. It’s been an experiment, and we all kind of know our places and we do wear different hats even tough we share a lot of members. There is just a whole different vibe, and a whole different feel. There are stylistic things that overlap, the drumming of course. I have a style that overlaps, and you can hear it between the two. But there is a really distinct difference between the two bands, much more so than I thought when we started. I was afraid there’ll too many similarities. There is just such a radically different feel between the two on stage. Just the introduction of Tony and Kelly to the mix does something special. And the way the Gnostic guys apply themselves to this situation is just great. It all recreates an entirely different mood. Logistically it’s a lot to manage because of the physical performance on the nightly basis. It’s gone well, we’ve managed it. It’s all been a great experiment. The two bands tour together, and play twice per night. And from the marketing point of view, it’s being handled as two different entities. So far it is working great, and we all get along very well. We’ve been friends now for years, and everyone likes each other. Everyone is a lot more mature than let’s say when we were touring with Cannibal Corpse. We were kids then, and had a different perspective on what this is. There is an element of fun that wasn’t there in the past, and it has to be because it’s really difficult to be touring and doing this. Touring is rough, you drive from place to place, and people are getting sick. If you don’t love and are not having a good time, it can be a miserable experience. I think our camaraderie among the 7 of us makes it special.
One member which is not participating in the reunion is Rand Burkey. How do you explain his absence?
Rand had a long history of personal problems. We tried like hell to make it work with him. When the first reunion shows were being arranged Rand was a full part of it. We talked on the phone many times. He was supposed to rehearse with us, and it will be good. We didn’t know that he had a lot of pending legal problems. We went ahead and arranged shows promising the original line up. He had a whole string of legal issues that we were not aware of. He spent a good bit of time in jail while we were doing these reunions shows. And we also came to realize that he is not in the frame of mind that would allow him to be able to do this. We tried very hard to make it happen. Kelly went over to his house on multiple occasions to sit down with him, and to work on things. It’s just a tragic kind of case because he is a brilliant player, and would really bring a great element to our sound. On the flipside, Chris Baker and Jonathan Thompson have done a really great job emulating Rand’s style where they need to and carrying forward our sound. I don’t think the guitars as a unit have ever been tighter as they are now. We miss Rand, and people would love to see him play. He sure is a novelty because he plays his guitar upside down, and has a really unique style that nobody else really has. He is a very good player. We miss him, and we tell him that all the time, but I don’t think there is a way he will ever play in a band again.
Finally, what is the biggest surprise of your career?
It is 2009 and I’m still able to play shows. We were in New York the other day, and the place was packed. People were singing our songs, and just couldn’t believe it. I think one of the biggest surprises is that so many bands that we end up playing with, especially at the festivals, come up to us and say you’re the reason I started playing music. Even if we didn’t reunite as Atheist that in itself is payback enough for everything we did. That’s validation that you inspired so many people. Every town we go to we meet someone who was influenced by what we did, and it feels good. That’s really been amazing to us. It blows me away every single time. We never see it. We were just a few kids from Bradenton, Sarasota who sat down and strummed some stuff together. The fact that it evolved into this entity blows us away. It’s been hell of a ride, and if I quit now I will be forever satisfied.

Links:
http://www.officialatheist.com/
http://www.myspace.com/kellysatheistwebsite