The Lantern (2002): Local music scene heats up in Columbus

Back in 2002 Ohio State's newspaper The Lantern ran an article on the local music scene, talking with people like Jack DeVoss of then CD101 and Joel Treadway of Cringe.com. Here is a bit of that:

Cringe was founded in 1994 as a poll to make fun of the polls local alternative papers took. Readers of the Live Shows calendar, which focuses on the Ohio State, Short North, Arena District and downtown areas, were asked to create a category and winner of their choice. The first issue was an e-mail, and a few months later the quarterly ‘zine’ moved to the Web. 

“The name Cringe is derived from the idea that if ‘grunge’ is the Seattle sound, the Columbus sound must be ‘cringe,’ ” Treadway said. “Yeah, ‘cringe’ is kind of a sarcastic, tongue-in-cheek name.” 

Exposure to local music is key to a thriving local music scene. After people are introduced to local music, they are more likely to seek it out on their own through the papers and Web sites like Cringe, Treadway said. 

“We get 1,000 to 1,400 visitors who view a total of 12,000 to 17,000 pages every day,” he said. 

Columbus’ music fans are as vast and diverse as the music they listen to. However, two distinct crowds exist – the cover band crowd and original band crowd.

DOA review of Famous Past Lives by Pretty Mighty Mighty

Back in 2000, if you were in Columbus there is a good chance you heard the song "Ski Instructor" blasting from then CD101 at the time off the second album Famous Past Lives by Pretty Mighty Mighty. Here's a bit from an album review back in 2000 by Jeff Marsh at Delusions of Adequacy:

Pretty Mighty Mighty are one of those bands that you feel like you should have heard of long ago. Their style of music is exactly what I was searching for a short time ago when the emo-rock/pop sound was new and fresh to me. (Now I search for all music.) Combining the melodic nature of emo from bands like Mineral and Cross My Heart with a more straight-ahead, blaring wall of guitar sound and some empathic, moving vocals, Pretty Mighty Mighty have crafted a fine rock album. The production is perfect, the songs are different and powerful, and the vocal style fits exactly.