Scared Music

Kindling: Scared Music

Kindling has announced it's latest album, Black & Bluegrass: A Tribute to Ozzy Osbourne.

Thanks to MTV, Ozzy Osbourne and his family are household names - sort of a Beverly Hillbillies for the 21st century. Kindling could not agree more. Trading Ozzy's anguished vocals for high-lonesome harmonies, and screaming guitars for lightning-quick banjos, this collection gives the music of heavy metal's founding father the bluegrass treatment. Performed by Kindling and featuring such classics as "Crazy Train," "Paranoid," and "Flying High Again." Black and Bluegrass cooks up a tribute as good as mama's cornbread - with a side of dove heads.

Black & Bluegrass: A Tribute to Ozzy Osbourne is the kind of record that should probably never be made. It is a cynical pairing of two completely divergent streams of culture that is obviously only in existence to bilk people out of their money. Still, that being said, it is actually a pretty good record. Bluegrass is a surprisingly elastic form of music that can easily transform a heavy metal anthem like "Crazy Train" into something that sounds like it was written by Bill Monroe. Well, almost. The band doing the transforming of both solo Ozzy and Black Sabbath classics is called Kindling, and the four performers in the band are very proficient musicians and singers who sound like they are in on the joke. Their take on "Paranoid" is especially fun with plenty of lightning-fast pickin' and a suitable hellfire-and-brimstone vocal. They also do weird things with "Sabbath Bloody Sabbath" and "Shot in the Dark" that almost defy nature. Most likely bluegrass fans will shun this like the plague, and Ozzy fans, should they stumble across it, will find the concept pretty hokey. It's their loss because Black & Bluegrass is a barrel of fun.

Lee Krähenbühl states, "There are plenty of innate differences in the styles that make a fusion difficult — the concept of melody being one. This album pinpoints the fact that in their original versions, these songs contain precious little melody, especially in the vocals, and we had to work hard to extract that and create harmonies behind the Shawn's lead"

Shawn Kirchner added, "Ozzy's songs are about alienation, an important issue for today's church. The church should be not be for just one type of music"

Peg Lehman indicated that the reason that Kindling made this album was, "we've run out of music for the autoharp".

Steve Kinzie was happy that none of the lyrics were attributed to Nelson Mandela.

Kindling premiered many of the numbers off their new CD at a concert hosted by the Tonoloway Primitive Baptist Church located in Hancock, Md.

Joseph Helfrich, not to be out done, will be releasing Fade to Bluegrass; The Bluegrass Tribute to Metallica, and donating the proceeds to a Suicide Prevention Hot-line.

Guest Review

Artist: Kindling
Album Title: Spark the fire
Rating: **
Genre: Folk
Styles: Contemporary Folk, Gospel, & Sadcore
Time: 57:01

For the dedicated Kindling fans (I guess I should call them Match Heads, since they follow this group like Dead Heads follow the Greatful Dead), it has been a long wait for their sophomore production "Spark the Fire". Get the clever title? Do you remember when Andy and Terry Murray stopped singing about Grandma's feather bed, and started singing songs that were nothing more than sermons put to Guitar? That is the feeling that this latest album has left me with.

Some think that Kindling is the Brethren answer to the Weavers. Good old fashion folk music with a message. Where the Weavers got black listed for having communist friends, Kindling is banned from Brethren gatherings. Like NYC - Right Shawn? This album has the prettiest music for the most depressing topics. Songs about discrimination, Auschwitz, Columbine, the killing of Mathew Shepard, middle age angst, Apartheid, and death. Throw in a couple of songs based on the writings of some dead Saints and you have a real party album for 2002.

Oh how I long for the anthems of their first album that would get the whole crowd singing. I guess you can't go home (or to Cincinnati) again.

Tracks
1. Where Everything is Music 5:31
2. Wade On In 6:27
3. Separate Rooms 5:03
4. Kaddish 3:04
5. Rain Come Down 4:43
6. Chains of Hate 4:55
7. New Ways to Praise 4:47
8. Living in the Between 4:36
9. Hand of the Artist 4:00
10. Child of God 4:20
11. Christ Has No Body But Yours 3:10
12. All That Remains is the Love 6:35

Credits
Steve Kinzie vocals, banjo, guitar
Shawn Kirchner: vocals, piano, melodica
Lee Krahenbuhl: vocals, guitar, bouzouki
Peg Lehman: vocals, mountain dulcimer

Contact peglehman@foxvalley.net to order your copy.