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Sixteen Horsepower
Things you might find in the closet of Sixteen Horsepower frontman
David Eugene Edwards:
* The family Bible passed down from his Nazarene preacher
grandfather, folded open to Daniel 9:3: "So I set my face to the Lord
God to seek Him by prayer and supplications with fasting, sackcloth
and ashes." The verse is repeated in the liner notes of the Denver
trio's debut.
* Laudatory press clips: The scribes attempt to pin down the music
but only come up with heavily hyphenated names like
"country-goth-rock" and "country-punk-Cajun-hillbilly" and gratuitous
allusions to roots music, Leonard Cohen, Bob Dylan, Joy Division,
Nick Cave, Hank Williams, and a countrified Echo & the Bunnymen.
* A dogeared copy of William Faulkner's As I Lay Dying with Dewey
Dell's "I believe in God, God. God, I believe in God" double-scored.
* Edwards' notes on 1920s and '30s mountain and Cajun musics, dug
up at the public library.
* Instruments: A metal slide aching to find the steel strings of a
vintage 1930 guitar; a turn-of-the-century bandoneon, a
small-buttoned tango accordion; Kevin Soll's handcrafted flat-top
bass; Jean Yves Tola's brushes and sticks, scarred from keeping time
with snare rim clacks.
* Handwritten lyrics to "Black Soul Choir": "O I will forgive your
wrongs/ Yes I am able/ An' for my own I feel great shame/ I would
offer up a brick to the back of your head, boy/ If I were Cain."
* The battered stool Edwards mounted during his band's opening
slots on tours with Shane McGowan, Innocence Mission, and Violent
Femmes. From his throne, he rolls back his deep-socketed eyes and
wails with spooky intensity.
* A burlap sack of A&M tchotchkes: wooden postcards, copper
trinkets, and fliers scripted with Old West wanted-poster fonts.
Publicity kits, written by record company hacks repeating the phrase
"fire & brimstone" as many times as a one-page bio will allow.
* A future, as in the band's seven-record contract with A&M.
   
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