Music / The Chariot

The Chariot was a Hardcore Punk/Mathcore band from Douglasville, Georgia, active from 2003 to 2013. Self described as "heavy punk rock", it was formed by lead vocalist and only constant member, Josh Scogin, after infamously leaving metalcore band Norma Jean. Outside of that, they are most known for leaning heavily into the "core" side of mathcore, including heavy Christian undertones in many of their lyrics, and being a Revolving Door Band.

They started off as Scogin with a variety of local musicians from the Douglasville area: Lead guitarist, additional singer, and drummer Keller Harbin, guitarist Tony Medina, and bassist Joshua Beiser. Before recording their first album, Harbin left the drum kit to Jeff Carter, and they recorded and released their first album, Everything Is Alive, Everything Is Breathing, Nothing Is Dead and Nothing Is Breathing in 2004 through Solid State. The album was recorded live, to analog tape, and produced by Matt Goldman, who would produce all of their releases in the future. Afterwards, Carter left to form Deus Invictus, and Jake Ryan joined as drummer. Medina left shortly afterwards, before the recording of Unsung EP, released in 2005.

Harbin and Beiser were fired because, allegedly, Scogin told them that "God said it was [their] time", and were replaced by guitarists Jon Terrey and Dan Eaton, leaving Scogin as the only original member before even recording their second album. Eaton was also bassist for a while, before Jon "KC Wolf" Kindler joined. They recorded and released their second album The Fiancée in 2007.

In 2008, Eaton, Terrey, and Ryan all left at the same time, and were replaced by Bryan Russel Taylor, Dan Vokey (from I Hate Sally), and David Kennedy. They recorded their third album Wars and Rumors of Wars in 2009 with this lineup, but before it was released, Vokey left and Stephen Harrison joined. Jon Terrey rejoined the band, replacing Taylor, in 2010, prior to recording their forth album. Long Live was released through Good Fight instead of Solid State. Terrey re-left straight afterwards, and Brandon Henderson was brought in.

Before recording their fifth album, Kindler left to return to college, leaving Henderson and Harrison to record both guitar and bass on the new album, and use bass amps and octave pedals to fill up the space live. One Wing was released in 2012 through Good Fight and Entertainment One. On August 16th 2013, they announced their breakup through a video on their Youtube channel, titled All's Well That Ends Well. Their farewell tour spanned October 10th to November 16, and finished at The Masquerade, Atlanta.

After the breakup, Scogin went on to form his guitar-and-drums duo '68. Keller Harbin formed The Glass Ocean with Joshua Beiser in 2006, and is also in Holy+Gold with ex-members of Norma Jean. Bryan Russel Taylor records under the name Slowriter, and him, David Kennedy, and Jon Terrey formed The Threats in 2017. Terrey is also a solo musician, performs guitar in Listener, and is the vocalist in Parants. Harrison was a member of the supergroup The Fever 333, formed by letlive. vocalist Jason Aalon Butler, before leaving in October 2022.

Releases:

• Everything Is Alive, Everything Is Breathing, Nothing Is Dead and Nothing Is Breathing (2004)
• Unsung EP (2005, EP)
• The Finacée (2007)
• Wars and Rumors of Wars (2009)
• Long Live (2010)
• Before There Was (2011, compilation) ^note Consists of Everything Is Alive..., The Fiancée, and Wars and Rumors of Wars.
• One Wing (2012)

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Release the tropes!:

• Added Alliterative Appeal: Long Live, "Robert Rios".
• Arc Words: The word "unsung" appears in the lyrics of "Before There Was Atlanta, There Was Douglasville" and "The Audience", as well as being the title of an EP.
• Attack of the 50-Foot Whatever: The video for "Daggers" shows the band destroying, and being destroyed by, a cartoon city.
• Bilingual Bonus: "Yellow Dress: Locked Knees" includes some Spanish:
  ¿Puedes desirme si este mundo estoy cambiando?^note Can you tell me if this world is changing?
  ¿Esta es la realidad que tu quieres que yo viva?^note This is the reality that you want me to live in?
  Jesus, yo quiero que este mundo te conosca.^note Jesus, I want this world to know you.
  Regosigate, favoresete con este humilde sirviente.^note Rejoice, favor yourself with this humble servant.
• Breather Episode:
  • On The Fiancée, after 26 minutes of some of the heaviest mathcore on record, the final track, "The Trumpet", is a recording of a gospel song.
  • "Your" from One Wing is a 1 minute hymn with female vocals and an organ.
• Broken Record: "Evan Perks" goes as far as to directly repeat an sample of the band playing.
• The Cameo:
  • Hayley Williams of Paramore sings backing vocals on "Then Came to Kill".
  • On "Forgive Me Nashville", Aaron Weiss from mewithoutYou performs the harmonica.
  • On "David De La Hoz", Dan Smith aka Listener has a guest spot.
  • Josh Scogin himself has appeared as a guest, performing on "The Fox and the Wolf" by Bring Me the Horizon, "From the Mouth of Gath Comes Terror" by The Showdown, and "All This and War" by Every Time I Die.
• Continuity Nod: The "David De La Hoz" video includes a statue of a all-black figure holding an umbrella, in reference to the Everything Is Alive... cover art.
• Design Student's Orgasm: The cover of One Wing, especially the full painting◊.
• Idiosyncratic Episode Naming:
  • The main song titles on Unsung EP are mangled versions of celebrities' and famous characters' names (e.g. "Phil Cosby", "Vin Affleck").
  • The first 8 song titles on The Fiancée are lines from a nonsense poem.
  • The first and last letters of the song titles on Wars and Rumors of Wars spell out "The end is nigh and so am I." Additionally, certain song titles have extraneous punctuation marks at the end (e.g. "Teach:", "Need:", "Abandon.").
  • The odd numbered tracks on Long Live are named after contest winners. Along with the even numbered tracks, they can also be combined with the album title to form a tribute (e.g. Long Live the Audience, Long Live Andy Sundwall).
  • The track titles on One Wing are a message:
  Forget not your first love. Speak in tongues and cheek.
• Intentionally Awkward Title: Everything Is Alive, Everything Is Breathing, Nothing Is Dead and Nothing Is Bleeding may be this length-wise, but it was intended as a subversion of the types of sub-Cannibal Corpse album titles that bands that The Chariot ended up touring with in their early days had.
• Longest Song Goes Last: On their last three albums, the final tracks ("Mrs. Montgomery Alabama iii.", "The King", and "Cheek.") are the longest on their respective albums, as well as their whole discography.
• Minimalistic Cover Art:
  • Unsung EP has no booklet. The 'front' consists of a sticker with the name, track titles, and barcode in a black box on the top, and the lyrics to "Yanni Depp" and "Kenny Gibler (Play the Piano Like a Disease)" underneath it, on a transparent portion so that the CD and the inlay can be seen through the sticker.
  • Wars and Rumors of Wars' cover art is the album title in white, Xeroxed looking Impact font on a black background, with the artist name in black in a white box underneath it.
• Miniscule Rocking: "Oversea" (0:44), "Your" (1:08), "Back to Back" (1:33), "Evan Perks" (1:36), "Need:" (1:55), "Sargeant Savage" (1:56), "Someday, in the Event..." (1:58), "Yellow Dress: Locked Knees" (1:59), "They Faced Each Other" (2:01), "Speak" (2:11), "Dialogue with a Question Mark" (2:11), "The Heavens" (2:12), "Impress." (2:12), "Phil Cosby" (2:13), "In" (2:13), "Calvin Makenzie" (2:14) "The Audience" (2:15), and "Before There Was Atlanta, There Was Douglasville" (2:15).
  • "Oversea" deserves special mention, because the song reverses itself halfway through, making the actual song recording 22 seconds long.
• Non-Appearing Title: Almost every song they recorded. The only actual title drops are in "Love." and "Speak" from One Wing. "Impress." comes close, including the word "impressed", and a couple other songs from One Wing also include the track titles in the lyrics, though this may be unintentional.
• One-Word Title: Every song except for "Never I" and "Mrs. Montgomery Alabama iii." on Wars and Rumors of Wars, and every song on One Wing.
• The Oner: The music video for "David De La Hoz" was not only filmed in one take, but was also a live performance of the song.
• Overly Long Name: The full name of the second song from Everything Is Alive... is "Someday, in the Event That Mankind Actually Figures Out What It Is That This World Revolves Around, Thousands of People Are Going to Be Shocked and Perplexed to Find Out That It Was Not Them. Sometimes This Includes Me". Apparently, it's the thirteenth longest song title of all time.
• Production Foreshadowing:
  • "Mrs. Mongomery Alabama iii." starts with a shout of "Long live!" and includes the lyric "Long live the king", which is the title of the following album and the last track from it.
  • "Andy Sunwall" has the lyric "What good is just one wing?", namedropping the next and final album.
• Rearrange the Song: "Before There Was Atlanta, There Was Douglasville", "Good Night My Lady, and a Forever Farewell", "Die Interviewer (I Am Only Speaking in German)", and "The Company, the Comfort, the Grave" from Everything Is Alive... were rerecorded for Unsung EP.
  • One of the orignal songs from that EP, "Kenny Gibler (Play the Piano Like a Disease)", was itself rerecorded for the following album, The Fiancée, as "Then Came to Kill".
• Recycled Lyrics: A line from "They Faced Each Other" was reused as the lyrics for "Your".
• Revolving Door Band: See above.
• Sampling: Charlie Chaplin's speech from The Great Dictator takes up most of the runtime of "Cheek.".
• Shout-Out:
  • Being a "Christian band", it would make sense that they would reference The Bible plenty of times:
    • Their name comes from the story of Elijah and the chariot of fire.
    • The title of Wars and Rumors of Wars is a direct quote from Matthew 24:6:
      And ye shall hear of wars and rumours of wars: see that ye be not troubled: for all these things must come to pass, but the end is not yet.
    • "Love." makes reference to Samson:
      A heart-shaped enemy
      Never underestimate
      Samson was impressed as well
  • Outside of the Bible:
    • The main track titles from Unsung EP are references to celebrities' or fictional characters' names: "Yanni Depp", "Phil Cosby", "Vin Affleck", "Kenny Gibler", "Sargeant Savage", and "Donnie Cash".
    • "The Two Dead Boys" includes the line "We built this city on rock and roll".
    • "The City" references Henry Wadsworth Longfellow's "Paul Revere's Ride", quoting the line "One if by land, two if by sea".
    • "First" includes a Western style portion, in tribute to Ennio Morricone.
    • The "David De La Hoz" video includes people playing Nintendo games while the band performs, namely, Super Smash Bros. Brawl, Punch-Out!!, and Mario Kart 64.
• Singer Namedrop: In "Yellow Dress: Locked Knees":
  Life: make mine clean, and swing wide, sweet chariot.
  • "The Trumpet" is a pre-existing Sacred Harp song that starts with the band's name repeated twice.
• Spoken Word in Music: Dan Smith's verse in "David De La Hoz".
• Textless Album Cover: The Fiancée.

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Long live.