You can only stay drunk on the blood of Hank Williams for so long...
With this motto, Jet Black Factory formed in 1985, as a reaction to the rampant CowPunk groups that dominated the local Nashville music scene. The JBF sound was a blend of major and minor-key songs that emphasized moody, catchy melodies instead of hot musician chops, with intriguing lyrics that defied the standard clichés that the Music City is infamous for.
Following their live debut in summer 86, JBF soon developed a considerable local following and lots of local radio play, which they parlayed into studio time, which resulted in a 6-song EP, Days Like These, produced by local studio whiz Mike Poole and released on 391 Records in 1987, to very positive reviews. The following year, with a different line-up, they released another 6-song EP, Duality, again to very positive reviews and an encouraging amount of airplay on college stations across the nation, even breaking into the top 100 albums on the CMJ charts. 1990 saw the release of their first full-length album, House Blessing, also on CD, to positive reviews and another appearance in the top 100 on the CMJ charts. The following year saw the band signing to Core Records and re-releasing the CD with two new tracks as The Uncrossing.
Touring exposed the group to the bizarre underbelly of the Deep South and caused many fissures internally. While the core Willie-German-Dye axis remained constant up to the bands final show on Sept. 10 1992, other members came and went. Not all went quietly into the night: in 1991, as part of a plea-bargain to keep his ample rump out of the electric chair, former JBF second guitarist Roy Everett Anderson pleaded guilty to the second-degree murder of a Mobile, Alabama club owner (see newspaper clipping below). Even more ominously, in that very same year, the band's guitar roadie shot and killed his wife and turned the gun on himself at Starwood Amphitheater after a Judas Priest concert. Cue in the proscribed happy ending...
Happily the other ex-JBFers went on to much more productive pastimes. Dave Willie formed the Nashville lounge combo Nine Parts Devil and makes silk-screen art that is sold regionally all over the South, Robert German now lives in Germany, somewhat appropriately, where he writes pulp novels under the pen name of Walter von Wegen, and Jim Dye still drums for local combos and does studio session work. Give him a call--operators are waiting...