Wednesday, November 15, 2006

O’death, deliver us from evil

I had been familiar with “Dueling Banjos” far before I was able to associate it with the horror that Deliverance introduced me to. But after seeing the film, it is impossible for me not to conjure up my deepest darkest fears of getting lost in the forest and captured by the vilest of snaggletoothed hillbillies.

Yet in listening to O’death, it is easy for me to imagine that the life back there beyond the woods, where the yellow teeth grow crooked and the women beard up like Sam Beam, ain’t all that horrible. I can only imagine that O’death is back there, deep in a forgotten Appalachian cabin playing to a group of savaged hearts as they dance and prance and bang their whiskey glasses together and throw their woman out open windows. Avoiding such terms as gothic country, O’death howl and tear through songs that could translate as the biographical lyrics of a ghost from beyond the grave as well as a mere drunken, communal gathering of love. From stories of their live performances, the latter seems to be the case.

[mp3]
O’deathDown To Rest
[mp3] O’deathOnly Daughter

BONUS [mp3] Ralph StanleyO’Death (from the O’ Brother, Where Art Thou? OST)
BONUS [mp3] Eric WeissbergDueling Banjos (from the Deliverance OST)

Four more tracks from O’death’s Head Home are available for download at the band’s website. Purchase Head Home at Insound for 15% off (coupon code: odeath15).


Check out an interview with O’death over at Gothamist.

3 Comments:

Blogger Mike said...

Interesting... walks the line of monotony at times, but still pretty good.

4:09 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Give me a break.... Your perceptions of Appalchian culture are apparently limited to a fictional movie. Pointing to a band from NEW YORK CITY as representation of such culture is equally rediculous.
Quite the contrary, there are very few actual Appalchian musical tendancies in this band's music. Yes, they use a banjo, but so does Shania Twain.
Stylistically, particulary in the melodic area, the music lacks few disticnt Appalchian qualities.

3:32 PM  
Anonymous Anonymous said...

Ouch! Just because I made reference to a fictional cabin in a fictional area of an actual moutain range with a band playing in front of a fictional type of people it doesn't necessarily mean that the scene that I tried to describe actually exists or is in some way an actual representation of the goings on in that area. Sorry if I offended you but the "life back there beyond the woods" just happened to fall into the nearest possible mountain area in reference to New York City that a west-coaster knows about.

With most of the music that I present here on the blog, I try to describe my initial reactions to it by a story of some type that represents the feeling that I get from the sound. This was just my initial reaction to o'death and what it made me think about and feel. Of course it is imaginatory.

Also...hmmm...I don't really feel like explaining myself to some anonymous character that is never going to read this response.

3:05 AM  

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