David Barbe

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David Barbe (September 30, 1963) is an American musician and producer/engineer from Athens, Georgia. He is chief of Chase Park Transduction studio in Athens. Barbe is known for his work as a songwriter, singer, guitarist, and bass guitarist in Sugar, Mercyland, and Buzz Hungry, as well as "solo". Also, he has produced every album by the popular country-rock band Drive-by Truckers, and has worked as producer and engineer with Son Volt. He has an all-star solo band in Athens sometimes called the Quick Hooks who play early on Mondays sometimes outside the Caledonia Lounge in the autumn. He performed at AthFest 2007 with Jack Logan.

Biography

David was musically influenced by his parents - "Time Lady" Jane Barbe and composer John Barbe - who were both big band musicians.

Barbe has three children - daughter Annabelle and sons Winston and Henry. He is also the President of the Athens-Clarke County Little League baseball league and has managed his sons' all-star teams to several city championships.

Music career

As a young adult he moved to Athens, Georgia to attend the University of Georgia. In Athens, he played occasional guitar with punk favorites Bar-B-Que Killers. He later formed his own group, Mercyland in 1985 and acted as the main songwriter, bassist, and co-lead singer. After Mercyland disbanded in 1991, he fronted Buzz Hungry.

It was shortly after this that two key things came up that influenced the course of his career. One was John Keane offering to tutor him in music production and engineering, and one was Bob Mould asking him to join Sugar. Barbe initially turned Mould down, feeling that he should stay home and look after his family. But his wife, Amy, encouraged him to accept. The band was Mould's show; Barbe placed only one track, "Company Book," on a proper Sugar full album release. However, he did contribute a number of songs, some from Buzz Hungry and some original, that were performed live and/or released as B-sides, such as 'Where Diamonds are Halos' which was also recorded as part of a BBC radio session. In 1994, with his family now including three children, he decided he needed to leave Sugar. [1] He has gone on to produce artists such as Son Volt, Kelly Hogan, Drive-By Truckers, as well as releasing a solo album, Comet of the Season, on the Backburner Records imprint.

He now works as an engineer at Chase Park Transduction, a local studio he co-owns with several other area local musicians/producers/engineers. Barbe recently produced a charity track for R.E.M. with the original lineup. Barbe performed in a wide variety of "one-off" bands such as Christa McAuliffe and the Challengers and helped create or contribute to many cassette and vinyl compilation records around Athens and Atlanta such as Proud o' Me Gluttony and Some.

Barbe and Mould had a brief reunion on March 18 2008 in Atlanta, Ga. as Barbe joined Mould's touring band for a killer rendition of Divide & Conquer (even more interesting that this is a Husker Du song, not a Sugar song). Mould didn't even sing as bassist Jason Narducy acted as front-man with Mould and Barbe backing him. Barbe also joined Mould for a full gig on October 18, 2009 at the Treasure Island Music Festival--Barbe flew out to play the show after Narducy's wife went into labor. The set consisted of a mix of Husker Du and Sugar songs.

External links

• Allmusic Biography
• Mercyland Biography