As summer weather hits and the walls of my office seem to shrink from the cold blast of ac above my head, my mind wanders away from my computer screen and I daydream of a time before responsibility and a concrete and cubicle filled existence in Manhattan. It seeds in me the desire to want to return to Ohio, run through the fields, and sit around bonfires with good friends. I want the freedom of a beautiful outdoors and the idealism of childhood. And yet, I sadly know that sort of innocence no longer exists, begging the question of whether it is because it no longer exists inside of me or that it simply no longer exists in the world. This sentiment has been searching for an outlet of understanding and release, along with a much needed dose of realistic optimism, for some time now and has finally, thankfully, manifest itself in audible form via the incredible music of the Bowerbirds.
Made up of Phil Moore, Beth Tactular and Mark Paulson, this folksy North Carolina-based band brings simple Appalachian sounding melodies of leafy lullaby goodness, underplayed by the dark mysteries of nature and a balanced acknowledgment of the realties that ground them. The group came together organically, with Moore and Paulson moving from Iowa together. Tacular met Moore at the grocery store they were both working at and eventually the two fell in love, moving in together in an air stream trailer. Together they took to the road in a minivan playing coffee shops, street corners, and small clubs, with Paulson occasionally joining them. Their upcoming E.P. Hymns for a Dark Horse, put out by Burly Time Records, is due out on July 10 and is their second release following August 2006’s Danger At Sea. It is dedicated to “what still remains wild, on the earth, and inside us.”
Brimming with harmonicas, accordions, violins, and acoustic guitar, each track flows from one to the next, blending together seamlessly and creating a distinctive style full of slow melodies disturbed by broken, jangular incongruent sounds. Their MySpace page describes their sound as “tiny pebbles being dropped into a fish tank,” and however odd that sounds, that pretty much nails its essence dead-on. Brad Cook and Phil Cook join them, playing upright bass and banjo respectively.
Moore sings most of the songs with Tacular joining him in the choruses. The lyrics focus on all things living, all creatures great and small, as nature is personified and humans are one with the earth, Loons and snails speak words of existential wisdom, leopard frogs sing sweetly and people are likened to kindling and bur oak trees.
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