Track Listing:
- Dove into my heart
- A knife I can't wait to hold
- Our cruel demise
- Her heart, the Queen
- My thoughts have gone through the ceiling
- The garden is gone
- Spider me well
- The parting glass
- Flowers for your heart
- Melt into the bed
Our Cruel Demise
The Minstrels
In a town where I once lived there was a regular busker who was a little different. Instead of the usual Coldplay covers he sat on a crate with a carpenter's saw between his legs. Then with the use of a violin bow he could coax out a quivering melody that would swoop ad hover up and down the street. To avoid any mishaps he wore heavy black workman's gloves. I can't help going back to this image when playing this CD. Not only because it has a saw featured on it but there was something about those gloves....
I don't know what it's like around Rochester, New York but The Minstrels have dedicated themselves to using the back roads since 1998. Nothing's particularly well lit in this world and the outlook is bleak. Kind of like being stuck on the set of The Wicker Man with only Nick Cave and a copy of the Old Testament for company. Hopes aren't raised by the picture on the cover of the poor chap swathed in bandages.
Each song on 'Our Cruel Demise' their debut commences with a smattering of notes which then form little whirlpools of momentum. We're then guided through these sinister landscapes by harpsichord like guitar passages, accordion, keyboards, percussion more suited to a slave galleon and the dreaded saw. The riffs have crossed the Atlantic so many times you'd be hard pressed to pin down their origins but they match the macabre mood just fine.
Jeff Curtin, The Minstrels principal songwriter, possess a singular talent. Anyone finding lyrics for these dusky ditties must have. Delivered in a rich baritone queens are ensconced in castles on 'Her Heart The Queen.' Arachniphobes best beware on 'Spider Me Well.' Then to top it all off amongst the mayhem on 'My thoughts have gone through the ceiling' we're informed 'skin will peel away, skins will melt away.'
Not pysch, not wyrd. Nu-Medieval? Who knows. If a little overwrought at times The Minstrels can be forgiven as they've discovered a land where emotional exhaustion is a fundamental requirement.
Dave Kushar