Guitarist Tonie Joy has always known how to choke out a seductive, gnarled riff ever since exploring a postpunk musical life after Moss Icon s early 90 s demise. And though it s been a few minutes or years since the last Convocation release, this new release shows that no matter how long the hiatus, the Convocation s tightly wound sound, equal parts hardcore needling and heavy-psych fumes, holds up well. This rhythm section these days co-founding drummer George France and bassist Jason Dale Stevens --- likes to find big grooves around Joy s thick riffs and then muscle through them with a lumbering gait, leaving room for Joy s eventual guitar workouts. If you took any one of Wayne Rogers Twisted Village guitar fireworks bands and slowed the pace down to a hot-knifed hashish burn, you d get something akin to the Convocation s brain massage. - Bret McCabe (Boston City Paper) They re in small pockets - a few stalwart kids in Athens, one house in Atlanta that I m aware of, a few sleepy rock towns in North Carolina - but the remnants of the scenes that screamed bloody murder in the "90s remain, however few and far between. Chrissakes is an example of the enduring tradition of bands that want it all: the scrape and grind of Chicago post-punk, the ominous lurch of metal, the white-knuckle effect of blown-out psych, and the uncomfortable personal touch of what was emo before it became what emo is called today. And the band members" status as aspiring torch-bearers is sort of funny when you consider that most of these kids are, well, a hell of a lot younger than they sound. And it s even funnier to consider the fact that despite their youth, they definitely bear the mark of scene vets : Drew Smith has done more than his share of time in the Athens house show scene in bands like Life Is a Fight and (in)famous libido-themed screamo band Love Potion Number Nine. After years behind the drums, he has effectively taken on the role of guitarist, as evidenced by the badass guitar solo on the MySpace jam Granby. (More recently, he s been surfing dronescape oceans with highly-recommended-enjoying-highly solo project Chartreuse.) Rob Thomason has been effectively sneaking into clubs in Athens since his high school days, and after a brief crash course in self-taught drum pummeling, is playing - to quote Cinemechanica s Mike Albanese - with authority. Bassist Helen Rhinehart has the kind of tone that sounds like everything on the amp turned completely to 10, but that s just because that s exactly what she does. Jeff Tobias (Flagpole)