Local band markets innovative style

by Sarah Laubacher
For The Post

Some people say “Loesha the Swan Goddess” is one of the more intriguing band names in Athens, but guitarist Andy Dunfee will offer no more than the phrase “big, black and beautiful” for a clue to its meaning.

Dunfee started the band with roommate Phil Patterson (drums) and friend Jared Prosek (guitar/main vocals) last spring. They recently added bass player Jake Wargo into the mix.

Still a young band, Loesha admits it hasn’t developed a fan base yet, but it can make predictions on which demographic will be most appreciative of their post/progressive-rock sound.

“Dorks and other musicians,” Dunfee said.

Patterson said he thinks their fans will be people who hate the radio.

“I don’t think any of us ever really listen to the radio,” he said.

The group’s list of influences aren’t exactly Casey’s Top 40. The members cite Modest Mouse, King Crimson and Godspeed You Black Emperor! as sources of inspiration. These bands, branching from the indie-rock family of music styles, are noted for their quirky sound, moody overtones and experimental approaches to writing. Composing the music takes priority over writing the lyrics and songs often remain instrumental.

Loesha definitely relates to this writing technique. “Everything we write is instrumental and then we add vocals later,” Dunfee said. Concepts behind the band’s songs often shift over time. One song, “National

Disaster,” has taken many turns since its initial formation last April. It didn’t truly take shape until after the instrumental piece was given a title, which was conceived, oddly enough, two weeks before the Sept. 11 attacks.

“The reason we named it didn’t hold a lot of meaning (at first),” Prosek said. “We were just kind of throwing around names, but once we named it we started thinking of the song in terms of the name.”

The group added new movements to compliment the new concept. Lyrics have not yet been set, but Prosek has been working on it.

“The only way the lyrics (he wrote) will fit to the song is if the idea of a national disaster isn’t a physical destruction ­ buildings falling down ­ but more of a psychological disaster where a large group of people realize some kind of truth that they didn’t know before,” he said. “It sweeps across the nation and it kind of ruins any kind of preconceptions that they had.”

Ignoring society’s standards and searching for self-validation seem to be the driving force behind Loesha’s work.

“We always try to keep Howard Roark in the back of our minds,” Dunfee said. He explained how Roark, the main character in Ayn Rand’s novel The Fountainhead, acts as a role model.

“The book is about making all decisions based on your own values,” he said. “Not being corrupted by outside factors, such as status.

Dunfee said the band takes one particular Rand quote as a driving force: “I will not live for anyone else, nor will I ask anyone else to live for me.”

Loesha the Swan Goddess plays at The Union, 18 W. Union St., with Anne the Drosendoff and the M-19 Movement. The concert is part of the Film Festival Benefit, and starts at 9 p.m.