The Afghan Whigs

The Afghan Whigs are an American rock band from Cincinnati, Ohio. They were active from 1986 to 2001, reformed briefly in 2006 and again from 2011 to present.The early core members were Greg Dulli (vocals, rhythm guitar), Rick McCollum (lead guitar), and John Curley (bass). The band rose up around the grunge movement, evolving from a garage band in the vein of the Replacements to incorporate more R&B and soul influences into their sound and image. They released their first album independently in 1988. The band then signed to the Seattle-based independent label Sub Pop. Their fourth album, Gentlemen in 1993, was their major label debut, released on Elektra Records. Pitchfork described them as "one of the few alt-bands to flourish on a major label" in the 1990s.Dulli frequently claimed in interviews that the band would never get back together following their dissolution in 2001; however the group reunited in 2012.Greg Dulli (vocals, rhythm guitar), Rick McCollum (lead guitar), John Curley (bass), and Steve Earle (drums) formed the band in Cincinnati late in 1986. The Afghan Whigs had evolved out of Dulli's previous band, the Black Republicans, a band that Curley later joined. Curley attended a number of Black Republicans shows and approached Dulli and "made it a point to tell the vocalist he was a better bassist than the one in the Black Republicans". Curley would introduce Dulli to McCollum, a frequent jam partner who was famed on the local Cincinnati scene for his innovative use of effects pedals. McCollum and Dulli would bond over their shared love of R&B, in fact the first song the Afghan Whigs ever rehearsed was a cover of the Temptations' "Psychedelic Shack". Dulli later described the intent behind the Afghan Whigs was to exist as "a cross between the Band, the Temptations, and Neil Young playing with Crazy Horse". The name the Afghan Whigs was coined by Curley "as a play on the Black Republicans".In the wake of the Black Republicans' breakup Dulli had decamped to Arizona, where he composed half the material for what would become the Afghan Whigs' debut album Big Top Halloween (1988), self-released on the band's own Ultrasuede label. "We were running through what were the first songs I'd ever written to do some demos, so we were playing really loose," Dulli recalls. "And then all of a sudden, I found out John was having covers made." While only a thousand copies of Big Top Halloween would be pressed initially, one of them managed to capture the attention of Jonathan Poneman, the co-founder of influential Seattle-based indie label Sub Pop, which signed the Afghan Whigs in 1989. Initially Sub Pop planned for the Whigs to release only a one-off single, but that soon led to a full-blown record contract with the label.

Biography summary from English Wikipedia, photograph via Wikimedia Commons.