At the Drive In
Acrobatic Tenement

I take the record from the shelf and dive in. A dive into the past. I remember that the cover always disgusted me, that all the artwork always disgusted me. I recall an interview where they said that in 1996 they toured without ever being paid, and when I think back to those words, I always remember the same thing: "Okay, they stole the gasoline, but they're lucky there are no toll booths in America. Those you can't dodge? Wait, but are there toll booths in America?" It's a bad habit to end thoughts with a question.

Everything live, dirty sounds and so much attitude that they could take down a rhinoceros at the first shot. They come from El Paso - a big toilet of a city, they say, and I don't doubt it - and the At the Drive-In of 1996 can be imagined as simple twenty-somethings without the ridiculous hair they sport around today and who, intent on connecting instruments to amplifiers, thoroughly ignoring refined recording techniques, harps, pianos, trumpets, and whatnot, limit themselves to playing loud and fast, quickly saying what they have to say, and removing themselves, just as quickly, from the scene.

The At the Drive-In of 1996 played a post-Hardcore mixed with what many insist on calling Emo-core - a term they never really liked when referring to their music. A successful and personal blend of Fugazi and Cap'n Jazz, taking the rhythms of the former and the melodies and that sense of emotional assault from the latter.

Acrobatic Tenement, released by Flipside, tells of the spontaneous and genuine At the Drive-In, devoid of the guitar intricacies that would characterize their later albums - Rodriguez had arrived too recently to assert himself -, caught between solitary catharsis and the desire to see if anyone else might care about them. I imagine them crammed into a white van, Cedric leaning against the bass drum for hours and hours.

It was 2001 or 2002. I went to school crossing two kilometers of weed-filled fields to avoid at least another two of asphalt. I went with my Walkman strapped to my belt, Relationship of Command, dubbed from the CD, spinning and spinning, wrapping around itself. At the Drive-In were already disbanded. Coffee always disgusted me; there are many ways to wake up.