The Invaders
Earth Libraries set to reissue the first and only EP by legendary Birmingham-based New Wave punks The Invaders on May 2nd.
As one of the very first punk-inspired New Wave bands in Alabama, The Invaders were the type of group who didn’t quite fit in with the status quo. Formed in Birmingham in late-1978, and with a sound that was just as inspired by trashy garage rock as it was the Ramones, there were few acts among their contemporaries on the local music scene that could match their spunky attitude and guitar-driven fun when they were fully dialed in. Decidedly ahead of the curve when it came to incorporating the new sounds and feel of the era, although the band barely made it outside of their home state and only lasted a handful of years before unceremoniously folding in 1982, they did manage to make a minor splash on the surrounding sonic landscape during their all too brief tenure in their hometown.
Having been featured in a Trouser Press article in 1981 about “redneck punk” music in the Magic City entitled “Sweet Home Alabama: New Wave Meets Southern Hospitality,” alongside their dear friends Jim Bob & The Leisure Suits, the group was one of the few bands of their kind to show life beyond the typical Southern rock and bar band fodder that still ruled local clubs during the early-1980s. As Trouser Press’s Allen Barra reported out at the time, “The Birmingham music scene, dominated by middle-aged Bill Murray-type lounge crooners and monotonous quasi-authentic bluegrass bands, is astonishingly vapid even by urban American standards. The country music is quite good, but the rock scene is deadly; in four years of college there I never once heard a rock band cross the boundaries of innocuousness.” That is, except for bands like The Invaders and Leisure Suits.
Loose and jittery, with a vibe that could have easily fit in at CBGB’s next to bands like Mumps and The Fast, it was at small rock clubs like the Wooden Nickel (aka- The Nick) and Old Town Music Hall that The Invaders would relentlessly hone their songs and chops while also dishing out a bevy of covers. Mixing up tracks by The Cars, Kinks, Elvis Costello, ? Mark & The Mysterians and Talking Heads, next to newly-penned tunes like “She’s A Heartbreaker” and “Under Submission,” the group was both a fun party band and hard-charging rock and roll combo that could keep a crowd going until the wee hours of the night. Like a wiry, Dixie-fried version of Boston’s Lyres, the four piece would throw all of their influences and musical touchstones into a blender, cranked the amps up to 11, and let the energy of the band in the live setting do the rest. Consisting initially of Ed Reynolds on guitar and vocals, Martin Buchanan [originally under the last name Ross] on bass and vocals, Bill Crow on guitar and vocals, and Mark Reynolds on drums, the group would prove to be a bright spot on an otherwise staid and boring musical underground at the time, and one that served as a through-line between their favorite songs of the 60’s and the newer music they were all digging into at the dawn of the 1980’s.
As Buchanan recalls, “We were formed in that exciting period of music when the industry of the late-70’s had reached a turning point, and that point was New Wave. We had grown up listening to 60’s radio hits, and local garage bands were the aesthetic of a lot of great songs, like ‘Wooly Bully,’ ’96 Tears’ and ‘Louie Louie,’ to name a few. We noticed a similarity to the stripped-down sound of New Wave bands, which was a reaction to the overproduced late-70’s commercial output of the industry, and the old 60’s sounds. Our musical mission was to draw a correlation between the two and then write songs that fit that description as well.”
And correlate they did. Throwing in crunchy guitar licks and Farfisa-fueled tunes next to short and punchy adrenalized rave-ups worthy of a scrappy Southern-bred Nuggets comp, the band’s two principal songwriters, Martin and Ed, would strike a not-so-delicate balance between radio friendly unit shifters and the type of music you might hear emanating out of Max’s Kansas City during its mid-1970s heyday. And all while fighting the prevailing winds of a local music scene that was not quite ready for what they had to offer.
According to Buchanan, “Birmingham had a fairly good music scene at the time, but most of it was bands doing Southern rock and FM radio hits. Bands like Telluride made good money being really good musicians with a commercial product that could fill a club. We were not in that scene. We were in a burgeoning New Wave scene along with bands like Jim Bob, The Colas, and The Mortals.” Adding, “But we got out there and did our thing, even though venues that wanted what we did were few and far between. The Wooden Nickel was the authentic venue that gave us a shot, even while booking touring acts. We would play Thursday, Friday and Saturday nights in a row— a three night stand. Crowds were sparse at first, but we built an audience over time. It kinda reminded me of what it must have felt like for The Beatles in Hamburg, just a grind as you find your way.”
As Bill Crow recalls, even their name was a statement of intent: “We— I for sure— thought that breaking into the music scene in Birmingham would be difficult. Challenging at the very least. The band name, The Invaders, emerged as we felt we were going to have to push or fight our way into some level of local acceptance, ‘invading’ what might be a fairly closed and insular scene. Soon enough the dominoes seemed to be falling in our favor.”
With only a few likeminded acts around the city and state to play shows with, it would be fan favorites Jim Bob & The Leisure Suits who would prove to be the most influential on not just the new music scene, but on The Invaders as well. “I would say our main peer band was Jim Bob,” says Crow. “We were jointly billed with them for our Old Town Music Hall gigs. They, like us, had their finger on the pulse of a newer sound— something newer and different.”
More than just simpatico rivals, the Leisure Suits would go on to provide The Invaders with an opportunity to get some of their songs on wax for the first and only time, by signing them to their independent label imprint, Polyester Records. Recording a four-song EP called Designer Genes in 1980 at the home studio of local producer Mark Harrelson from Kudzu Productions, upon its release later that same year, the 7-inch would provide one of the few documents from the era— alongside Jim Bob’s own material— that offered some proof that the New Wave had, in fact, reached the shore of the Yellowhammer State during the late-1970s and early-1980s. If only for a brief moment in time.
“I give credit to Polyester Records for making that EP happen,” says Buchanan. “Mots Roden was in Jim Bob, but also hung with us sometimes and played cool riffs onstage on the Farfisa compact organ that Ed had purchased for the band. Mots ‘signed’ us to make an EP, just as they had done, and put it out on the label Polyester Records, which was his band’s label. They had done their first recording with Mark Harrelson, and so we followed suit. Mark’s studio was his basement, but it was set up like an actual studio should be with a console in a room that is separated by glass from the booth the band plays in. We went in and laid down the four songs we thought were our best, probably based on a combination of our level of proficiency and crowd reactions. The process was fun and painless. Mark was a good producer but also just let us play it the way we played it. There wasn’t much additional production added to the songs.”
“Polyester Records was formed by Jim Bob, probably through the expertise of Craig Izard, Jim Bob’s main guitar player, who was an attorney,” adds Bill. “We went into Mark Harrelson’s studio and recorded the main tracks pretty quickly. There might have been some overdubs or a second session later. Things moved pretty quickly. We were paying for the time. After the recording was done I took the tape to a recording studio in Nashville that Polyester/Jim Bob had their connections with. We were told to work with this studio to master the tape and they would handle the pressing of the records. When we got the records back to my ear they definitely didn’t have the punch I expected.”
Although the record didn’t exactly replicate what they had originally heard and recorded in the studio, or how they sounded live, the band decided to release it anyway, to little fanfare, as a local curio to be bought at shows and record shops in towns they played in around Alabama. Featuring a stylized black and white cover centered around photos of what looked like a rather jaded and aloof rock band— half in sunglasses and the other half mildly dazed— and combined with the torn design aesthetics of punk and a Roy Lichtenstein pop art sensibility, it was a unique piece of local art that stood out like a sore thumb amongst other fare at the time, be it with traditional string bands, blues artists, or more modern country and rock.
“The name of the record at the time felt clever,” says Crow. “I had a company that did all sort of pre-washing, stone-washing, and acid-washing, etc., for major jean companies. Many of them were ‘designer jeans’— brand names meant to imply exclusivity and uniqueness. I came up with an idea that, at the time, sounded very modern or futuristic with a play on words: Designer Genes. Even otherworldly. It was just a little wordplay in my mind. The actual idea of genetic manipulation was at the time unheard of. But the idea was unique. The name was unique. We bandied about a number of names for the EP record but ultimately Designer Genes was agreed upon as the EP’s name.”
“I personally designed the record cover and the label and prepared the art files to get them ready for printing,” says Buchanan. “I worked in an ad agency as an art director and had designed the band’s logo. I knew a local professional photographer that I worked a lot with, Erik Hansen, and he shot the band photos that we used for the cover. As far as the reception, I guess there was some interest in it, but distribution was non-existent and only a couple of local stores even carried it. Polyester Records did not have a promotion budget.”
Barely making it out of the Birmingham market, except for a few college towns like Tuscaloosa and Auburn, the four blasts of hopped up garage rock became something of lost gems among record collectors in town, and have never been re-released in any form. That is, until now.
Finally seeing the light of day again after 45 years on the shelf, this digital-only EP will hopefully allow American punk and New Wave aficionados a chance to see what was brewing in the back alleys of Alabama in the late-1970s and early-1980s, and offer a glimpse into a small but tight-knit scene that served as Birmingham’s musical vanguard during a time when the rest of the state was still trying to catch up with the sounds of the modern world. And although you can still find copies of the original EP online, and at occasional thrift and record stores, they are few and far between, and go for a decent price these days. Having only pressed a few hundred copies to begin with, they usually go fast, or have been hoarded by others.
“They can now be purchased as a rarity on eBay for $60+,” says Buchanan. “A black market I regretfully helped create when a dubious fan, who was a friend of my daughter in Florida, asked if I had a copy of the record. I gifted him my remaining box of EPs, probably about 20 or so.”
A collector’s item that’s almost as valuable for its historical significance as it is for the actual music it contains, Designer Genes is a calling card for anyone that ever thought that music from the Magic City was always a few steps behind larger trends in underground culture from around the country. And with the band having suffered the untimely passing of both Ed and Mark Reynolds, this is as good a time as ever to reintroduce The Invaders to the world outside of Alabama, and hopefully find them a home among other fun pop-punk bands of the era, wherever they might be from. They deserve it, and a wider audience, and perhaps a bit of notoriety for being among the first in their state to ride the New Wave into the sunset before anyone ever really knew what happened to them.
And now you can ride the wave with them.