Charm School: Keeping Cool in Kentucky

Louisville, Kentucky’s Charm School is the latest band from local post-hardcore luminary Andrew Sellers.

The group, rounded out by Matt Filip, Drew English, Brian Vega and Jason Bemis Lawrence, first emerged in the summer of 2023 with their debut EP Finite Jest, introducing America to a 21st century update of those caustic Louisville sonics of the ‘80s and ‘90s when bands like Squirrel Bait, Crain, Rodan and Slint made the scene. Only Charm School incorporates their love for early B52s and PiL into the mix to give them their own distinctive spin.

For their first proper full-length, Debt Forever, Charm School offer a more diversified set of songs that truly let their collective talents reverberate with a sophistication that evolves the music itself.

A formidable crew of Midwestern luminaries worked behind the scenes to make Debt Forever happen.  It was tracked in Louisville by Cincinnati-based engineer John Hoffman (Beef, Corker, The Serfs, Vacation), mixed by Mike Bridavsky at Bloomington’s Russian Recording (Deerhoof, Built to Spill, WHY?), and mastered by Greg Obis (Stuck, Deeper, Wishy) at Chicago Mastering Service,  owned — of course — by Bob Weston of Shellac, a trio whose work no doubt informed the Charm boys as well.

Debt Forever is one of my favorite albums so far this year, one that gives me hope that loud underground guitar rock from Louisville still has a seat at the table.

Do yourself a favor and become one of the lucky 100 who get to own Debt Forever on vinyl. Dig this: Its pressed on money-colored green w/ specks of gold vinyl, and the packaging includes a special art-adorned $1 bill OR $100 bill (only one of the 100 pressed will include the $100 bill — it could be in a mail order copy or at any random record store.)

We spoke with the man now known as Andrew Charm about Debt Forever and the importance of punk in these tempestuous times.

 

What was it that inspired the concept of Debt Forever as an album?

The inspiration for the title and much of the thematic material came from just basically looking at our current reality. I wrote most of the songs in late 2023 and early 2024 and it seemed very clear to me then that we were heading towards more financial / psychological / spiritual uncertainty and obviously that has turned out to be true. For example, the song “Crime Time” came from a very obvious intuition that ppl are quite literally gonna have to start committing crimes in order to survive, and “Debt Forever” stems from the similarly obvious reality that most ppl who don’t have a high income earning job are going to be end up in debt, forever. So I suppose it’s a bit of a protest album.

 

What is it about the post-punk or post-hardcore sound that drew you in?

They’re both sounds I grew up with, so it’s always been in my musical DNA I suppose. But I have dug deeper in the last five years or so into some of the more off-the-beaten-path post-punk bands (like Section 25 & Swell Maps for example) and revisited all the No Wave stuff a lot and that’s been very inspiring in terms of how I’ve approached writing songs for Charm School.

You put together a helluva team to work behind the scenes on this album. How did it all come together? Did you always have these guys in mind?

Not necessarily, it all came together pretty organically. I was finding Cincinatti’s scene very inspiring at the time and that’s kinda how I connected with John Hoffman, and then Mike Bridavsky had recorded an earlier band of our bass player’s, and then I actually met Greg Obis while seeing his band Stuck perform in Cincinatti at a really cool DIY spot the guys from The Serfs help run and Greg and I had both lived in NYC so we traded a lot of stories and then I kinda fell in love with Stuck and then he mentioned he worked at Chicago Mastering Service so it just all came together. (Chicago and Louisville have a long history together musically).

 

What was it like releasing this album during the first week of Trump’s second term? What are your thoughts about what’s going on with the way this administration is approaching the government?

Oh God this would require a VERY long answer so I’ll try and keep this brief. It was in many ways my worst nightmare that he would be reelected but I suppose from an incredibly cynical self serving perspective it kind of makes this record more of a literal protest against the batshit insanity of what’s happening now not just here but in the world overall. To quote Refused (a post hardcore band that was very important to me growing up, ESPECIALLY The Shape of Punk To Come) and I’m sure their singer is quoting someone else “capitalism is indeed organized crime, and we are all the victims”. That’s basically my position. Capitalism as a system is set up to maximize profits at everything else’s expense, and in my view that means it is fundamentally flawed. It is not a system that works in the best interest of humanity. And that of course leads to all kind of other questions. For instance: are we really prioritizing humanity moving forward? I mean really, step back and ask that question. Because from the looks of it from my perspective that doesn’t seem to be the case. It seems to me that we are on a runaway train toward some kind of insane technologically-prioritized AI / non-human, i.e. humans subjugated and yoked by technology, future. Forgive me for going sci fi but it just doesn’t seem like we’re thinking about humanity or our ecosystem/the earth at all as we hurtle into an increasingly dystopian future.

 

Does this kind of music still manage to find its way to young people?

I’m curious to know how much aggressive post-punk or metal or any kind of loud rock still resonates with the youth. It seems like hip-hop is the sound du jour for most kids these days, which is great. But loud music is so associated with youth culture, I’m wondering if you’re noticing any cracks in the foundation.

I think it depends on what city you’re in and what that city’s scene is like. In Louisville where we’re from I would say our younger scene is dominated by punk/rock/hardcore and metal bands currently, which has surprised me and it’s been cool and refreshing to see. But I’m sure that varies city to city, and maybe the bigger cities have more hip hop leaning acts I’m not really sure. I’ve also been in punk and diy scenes so I guess wherever I end up I usually end up in those communities. It was the same when I was NYC and LA so yeah, I think punk music will go on forever.

 

VIDEO: Charm School “Crime Time”

How much does the current sociopolitical climate inform the Charm School sound?

I suppose it affects my songwriting and lyric writing more than anything else. But idk it does piss me off to wake up every day in an absolute hellscape so I guess that does tend to make me write louder, more aggressive songs musically, too.

 

What inspired the mellower moments of the album, “Without a Doubt” and “Figure 8”?

Those two songs just happened to come into existence at the same time I was writing the other songs, so I figured I might as well go with it.  I was especially convinced once the refrain of “Please don’t let me run out of money” came out while writing “Without A Doubt”.  Figure 8 is probably the biggest outlier — I was intrigued by the notion of cosplaying a kind of David Bowie-esque song amidst all the other very abrasive bangers.  And I figured there’d be some ppl who don’t really want abrasive bangers and so it’d be there for them, and wouldn’t you know it, I’ve definitely already gotten at least two of those exact reviews (haha).

 

I’d love to hear the story behind the album closer “Happiness is a Warm Sun.” It reminds me of Lou Reed a little. 

This song is another outlier I suppose.  My original demo and inspiration for this song was much closer to a mashup of Krautrock (Neu’s “Hallogallo” came to mind specifically) and a more typical Post-Punk type of vibe, something closer to the early Crack Cloud songs, but it kind of evolved into its own thing because of course that always happens. And then with the spoken lyrics I do get what you mean to mention Lou.  The Velvets are always there in the back of my mind so that DNA is definitely in there, and then it all just bleeds together to become whatever the hell it becomes.  It’s always interesting to set out with a sound or vibe in mind and then see what eventually happens in the end — it’s never what you thought or hoped it was gonna be, and of course that’s a good thing. The lyrics were fun because they came out pretty automatically, stream of consciousness style. They paint a pretty accurate picture, however abstract, of the very bizarre state of our current world, and they’ll be a fun time capsule to look back on.  Leave it to us slow boiling frogs to burn ourselves down.

 

VIDEO: Charm School “Debt Forever”

Tell me about the inclusion of the dollar bills in the packaging of Debt Forever? Did anyone buy the one with the hundred yet?

The LP with the hundred dollar bill has yet to turn up so it’s still out there! I just wanted to do something conceptual, and also I liked the idea of pseudo-defacing money because it’s something so abstract and arbitrary that rules over our lives. Like I love that scene at the end of Harmony Korine’s Beach Bum where he burned all that money. What a dream.

 

You recently wrapped a tour in February. What was it like and will there be more touring this year behind the album? What’s it like being a touring band in 2025?

It’s been fun cuz we mostly try to play weekenders and one off shows on weekend nights. Playing during the week can be rough so we don’t do much of it. We have a lot of shows through the rest of the year so we’ll def be out there grinding, mostly in the Midwest. We might go back to LA for a bit later in the year but obviously the fires have been very traumatic for so many people so we’re waiting several more months I think, just to give space to all that’s happened out there for awhile.

 

What are some of the takeaways you got from the NYC and LA DIY scenes that inform your moves in the present day?

I’ve just always been so inspired by the DIY ethos and energy, the semi anti-capitalist / people over profits aspect of it, so we really love playing those kinds of shows the best, even if we don’t make much money. There’s just a magic there that’s only there in diy spaces. And we just try and take that with us wherever we go. Music is made by people not corporations, so at the end of the day I’m always most excited to meet the people in the bands and who run diy venues and small labels etc… That’s the realest and most vital music community if u ask me.

 

How is music helping you during these hard times?

It keeps me sane and helps me find “room to dream,” as David Lynch would say. Making art is a spiritual practice and it helps me more than anything else in this life. Quite honestly I don’t know what I would do without it.