A distinctly uneasy listen, but a thought-provoking signpost for the second quarter of the 21st century.
Carolyn Kendrick is a Los Angeles-based singer-songwriter, fiddler, guitarist, and producer. She’s one of the many musicians who has stepped forward from writing and playing for others to claim her own place in the sun.
Like many people the Pandemic forced a career change, in Kendrick’s case supplementing her music career with journalistic work as a docu-series producer, researcher, and writer. And that led her to researching Satanic subject matter for a project. With that done she took her learning and with collaborator, Isa Burke, “decided to record an album of traditional and original folk songs that felt energetically connected to the subject matter I had been researching.” ‘Devil’s Nine Questions’ is a traditional Virginia folk song, recorded first by Alan Lomax in 1942. She has combined lyrics from a couple of versions and mapped those onto a song with accordion, bells, and guitars to produce something dark and gothic.
The brief ‘In the Beginning’ which follows reflects her clear ambivalence to her research matter, as it consists of the reading from the Book of Genesis as Apollo 8 orbited the moon on Christmas Eve 1968. Willy Schwarz’ ‘Leela’ is a song she learned from a version by Jody Stecher. She shares lead vocals with Isa Burke who was clearly pivotal to the project, and perhaps deserved a billing. The words, sung over an Appalachian-sounding tune, are another part of the reaction to the satanism she immersed herself in. “And where is the man who in his heart can really feel it. Can he feel it in himself and then can he reveal it. Then let him sit and sing and let his heart grow gladder. Chant to god until the masquerade no longer matters.”
Some songs from here on are preceded by a piece of found sound that illustrates the subject matter. The next theme being Wicca, with a version of ‘Sumer is Icumen in’ sung as a traditional round, with a Timpani and bells being the only musical backing. This was perhaps an inevitable song due to its inclusion on the film ‘The Wicker Man.’
‘Are You Washed In The Blood’ is played as a straight acoustic folk song through the first part. The second mixes in samples from Ronald Reagan’s “Evil Empire” speech, and Russell Conway’s “Acres of Diamonds” speech, “widely regarded as an influential text for the rise of the American prosperity gospel, a conservative theological movement that touts believers’ abilities to overcome poverty and severe illness through sheer faith.” These are an interesting mix and worth considering as a reflection of America’s attitude to faith.
The album takes its title from a reading of the 18th ‘Sonnet to Orpheus’ by Rainer Maria Rilke. She says, “this poem inspired the creation and completion of this album and has been a source of strength for myself while contending with our many daily systemic difficulties, as well as the many Faustian bargains modernity sends our way. May we all have the strength to bend each machine we are obligated toward and mold them into our better angels of collectivism, progress, and love.”
Her time researching some of the darker aspects of religion and society clearly left its mark, and the songs chosen for the album, as well as the other sounds used to illustrate them. ‘Sugar And Spice’ combines a speech about the end of Roe v Wade with comments from leaders of “The Satanic Panic” of the 1970s. In many ways these interludes are the key sections of the album that help us understand why Kendrick has recorded it.
‘Wind and Rain’ also known as ‘The Two Sisters’ is a 17th-century murder ballad played in a contemporary folk style, with chiming electric guitar and fiddle taken at a jaunty clip.
She also has other concerns ‘When You Had the Chance’ is a recording of United Nations Secretary General António Guterres at the opening ceremony of the Climate Implementation Summit at COP27 commemorating the 8 billionth baby. ‘Cool Of The Day,’ a Kentucky folk song which follows reminds us to take care of each other and the planet.
The lyrics of ‘A Perfect World’ which closes the album are an interpretation of ‘Because the Devil Is In Me,’ a poem by David Keig. Simply played on guitar and piano it is the ideal conclusion.
This is far from an easy listen, but clearly it wasn’t meant to be. Her journalistic experience clearly made Kendrick think deeply about the subjects she covers here, and she has turned this into a thought-provoking album which asks questions of the listeners about their own acceptance of good and evil in our lives.
