Subkonscious

When people think of Chattanooga music, a few images immediately come to mind: bluegrass singers at festivals, street performers from SoundCorps, local hip-hop artists, and the other usual suspects. One genre that is relatively lacking locally though, is hard rock. That is beginning to change though thanks to rock groups like Subkonscious.

Subkonscious was created by Carl Foshay originally as an outlet for him to release his original music. In 2011 it took to the stage though as a full band. While it has seen a lot of changes over the years and many band members come and go, it has maintained itself as one of the areas main rock bands. Currently, the band consists of four members: Carl himself who plays bass, brothers Heath (the drummer) and Nick (a guitarist) Price, and Colton Bowlin on keyboards.

Despite having been around for so long, Carl thinks Chattanooga is just now starting to give rock groups like Subkonscious the same attention as artists from other genres. Carl believes this is because of the stigma people have of associating rock music with negative behaviors. While the scene has grown over the years, it still doesn’t get the same coverage as the rest of the music scene.

“Chattanooga is a tourism city,” Carl said. “The powers that be will keep it that way, and that means venues and events will be selective about what music is played in town.”

Subkonscious has outlived many other local rock groups that have come and gone over the years with it being one of the few bands with staying power. The band members believe a part of why it’s so hard for rock groups to make it in Chattanooga is the fact that many venues in the city aren’t willing to host them.

“There are so many places to play in Chattanooga if you get out there and look around, you’ll find something different on every block, but a true blue rock scene in town sees many bands that just don’t last.”

Carl and the rest of the band are not deterred by this though. They believe that music as a whole is on the verge of a rock resurgence and we are about to see a lot of new rock stars rise in the next decade. Subkonscious will undoubtedly be at the head of any rock movements that come to the Scenic City.

Subkonscious will be playing at JJ’s Bohemia on Jan. 19 and at Connect Live in Wood Stock, Georgia on Feb. 22 as well as at the Road to Nightfall competition in March. Make sure to go follow them with the Instagram handle below and to check out their music on Bandcamp with the link below.
@subkonscious423
Subkonscious.bandcamp.com - Nathan Tucker (Scenic Trend)

The criteria for designating “city size” is a little ambiguous and so by some metrics Chattanooga is a small city, by others it is a mid-size city. For our purposes, I tend to think of it as at the smaller end of the mid-size designation and in a city that size.
Particularly when you’ve been there for a couple of decades and made it a point to follow (and occasionally participate in) the music scene, it’s always a little surprising when you miss a band that’s been around for a bit. Still, sometimes things just line up that way and the upside is that whether other people have been grooving to it for a while or not, it’s “new to you” and it is always a pleasure to hear a good band for the first time.
I had heard the name Subkonscious, seen it in flyers, and it appears that a great many of my friends and contemporaries have been fans for some time now. Still, I hadn’t actually heard them until lead singer/guitarist Carl Foshay sent me a copy of the latest single, “Mask,” released a few weeks ago. I have plenty to say about that, but first, a little background.
Subkonscious is the brainchild of Foshay, founded by him in 2011 to bring something to the local music scene that he wasn’t seeing elsewhere. Since that time he has been the primary songwriter and driving force while various players have come and gone. Indeed, the group seems to go through more drummers than Spinal Tap, having had five different ones in as many years, but these days the nucleus of the band holds steady with Carl as guitarist/lead vocalist, Chris Hullander on bass, and Garrett Wright on drums.
The band has a healthy presence on bandcamp where, in addition to the latest single, their entire album Contagious is available, as well a couple of other singles including a collaboration/cover with Ryan Oyer. A perusal of the full-length album reveals a marriage of weird synth and vicious guitar that echoes the feel of much of Trent Reznor’s Nine Inch Nails. The parallels don’t end there. Foshay, like Reznor, is a multi-instrumentalist, a skill brought to bear on this new single where he does, in fact, play the entirety of the fairly complex tune solo.
So let’s talk about this latest entry in the collection of alt/industrial music that makes up the Subkonscious catalog. It is not entirely uncommon for an artist from one genre to release a version of a song that was a hit in another genre. A rock hit becomes a country hit, a pop tune becomes a lounge song (thank you, Richard Cheese) and so on.
The success of these songs can either be a hit (Toots and the Maytals version of “Country Roads”) or a miss, whose value, if any, is novelty (Pat Boone’s foray into heavy metal.) There exists, however, a kind of song, or rather a kind of songwriting, that is so rare as to seem almost mythical. Frankly, I can only think of a handful of songs that fit this category.
Simply put, “Mask” is a song that, exactly as written, could be a hit in almost any genre. It has a universal quality that is, again, incredibly rare. This, the canonical, original version, certainly keeps its feet planted in its industrial roots, but with only the slightest tweaking (and that being mainly a matter of instrumentation) this same song could easily be a top charting country tune, a funk jam, a soulful acoustic release…half a dozen giants in half a dozen genres could record this song and it would sound as though it had been custom written for each of them. As much as that says about the song, it says worlds more about the songwriter.
I don’t want this to be confused for hyperbole. With this new song, Carl Foshay (a talented man) displays a flash of talent that is so “next-level” that print cannot do it justice with any degree of credibility. You have to hear it to understand, which you can do now at the Subkonscious bandcamp page.
Better still, hear it live this Saturday at the Tattanooga Tattoo Expo at Camp Jordan where Subknscious will be performing alongside other local heavy hitters like Pains Chapel and Mighty Sideshow.
Foshay started this project out of a desire to do something crisp and original and he’s done that in spades. If you haven’t heard the music yet, the time to stand up and take notice is now. - Marc Michael (The Pulse)

When discussing the nature of progressive and hard rock music, there’s a tendency to linger on the generalities of extended guitar solos and vague, listless lyrics. And while there are some bands who use these musical crutches to cover some substantial inadequacies, there are just as many who see past these stereotypes and embrace the expansive environments that these genres afford musicians who possess the impulse to subvert these long-standing musical assumptions.
For Chattanooga band Subkonscious, the need to push past these meaningless labels is at the heart of their variant hard rock sound. Over the past few years, they’ve used an assortment of rhythms and approaches, resulting in a history that favors an eclectic experimentation over rote rock tropes. Volume and musical diversity aren’t mutually exclusive goals but ideas to be twisted into an adaptable aesthetic-one they will peddle at this year’s Riverbend Festival.
With their new song, “Paranoid Cage,” Carl Foshay takes the lead, handling all the musical aspects of the song and co-writing the lyrics with Jordan Huff. The band itself, much like the music produced under its name, is fluid and changes from moment to moment, with Foshay being the one constant in the lineup. And with this track, he brings out the guitars in full force, a barrage of riffs thrown skyward and melodies buried under dense waves of noise and fury.
But there is room for subtlety as well among the ruined and cratered landscape that the music inhabits. He’s quite successful at maneuvering intricate melodies within this volley of guitar rhythms-“Paranoid Cage” roars and stomps but allows for brief moments of refined creation, instances where his attuned creativity draws out the emotional volatility inherent to rock’s molten movements. With the sounds of serpentine guitars and thudding percussive explosions ringing in your ears, Foshay makes it that much harder to wait until we get a full record from the band. - Joshua Pickard

Chattanooga progressive rock outfit Subkonscious understands that there is a good deal of subtlety involved in crafting a relevant hard rock ruckus. If a band is just concerned with how loud they can get, there is always going to be quite a bit missing from their sound. Thankfully, that isn’t the case with Subkonscious, and they mete out their classic rock influences with a substantial measure of thought and planning-which isn’t to say that everything feels scripted. Their music just feels completely and thoroughly vetted in terms of its inspiration and production. The band doles out waves of unrelenting guitar noise and revels in its physical emotional resonance.
On their new EP, “maSK,” the band compiles a sizable collection of various rock rhythms and layers them in interesting and unexpected ways. There are some impressively dense licks but also a sense of melody that easily weaves its way throughout each track on the EP. Blending acoustic and electric sounds, the songs exhibit a relentless tenacity in their exploration of these occasionally disparate sounds, constructing a coherent musical vision from the band’s wide-ranging influences.
From the opening acoustic rhythms of “maSK” to the searing guitar theatrics of “Pain” and slow rock burn of “crooKed mirrorS,” the album lays out its musical lineage quite clearly and cleverly. There’s never a moment when the band seems to lack a clear direction in regards to their rock inclinations. It’s loud and brash, but also curiously nuanced in how they align the louder elements with the softer details, and the band carefully evokes rock’s expansive past across these tracks. Each song possesses a feral musical streak, giving them a wonderfully furious rhythmic temperament. This EP is elaborate but not disjointed and finds Subkonscious working through a handful of stylistic shifts that accentuate their inherent adaptability. - Joshua Pickard

Chattanooga rock band Subkonscious recalls the classic alternative rock of the mid-’90s but without sounding like they’re simply mimicking the best bands of those years. There is a sludge and churn to Subkonscious’ songs that keep them grounded in their influences while still allowing the band to maintain their own insular musical identity.
On their latest record, “Contagious,” the trio packs in enough guitar crunch and alterna-rock tendencies to make bands like Alice in Chains and Nine Inch Nails proud. And though the production does have a gritty, raw feel to it, there’s never a compromise between the aesthetic of the music and the band’s intense studio presence.
Composed of singer-guitarist CJ Foshay, bassist Austin Paul and drummer Chris Hullander, Subkonscious has built a dedicated following in Chattanooga based on their ferocious live shows. With Paul and Hullender’s chugging rhythm section mixing with Foshay’s aggressive vocals and searing riffs, the band has peeled the paint from more than one local venue recently.
If you’re feeling nostalgic for the scorching guitar leads and jackhammer drumming reminiscent of classic ’90s alternative music, Subkonscious has got just the thing for you. But don’t be tempted to write them off as simply mining a well-worn genre for its evocation of a very particular period in music; they’re also able to infuse these familiar rhythms and melodies with a blistering originality. And don’t be surprised when you find yourself with a sore neck from all the constant headbanging you’ll be doing after listening to “Contagious”-because that is exactly what will happen. - Joshua Pickard