Kindred Spirits: A Collection
On November 13, 2012, Rounder Records released a new compilation of Carrie Newcomer music entitled Kindred Spirits: A Collection. This generous collection of 19 songs draws from Newcomer’s catalogue of 12 Rounder Records releases. It also includes two previously unreleased songs, two songs from her special hunger benefit project (Everything is Everywhere) featuring Indian classical sarod masters Amjad Ali Khan, Ayaan and Amaan Ali Khan, as well as two currently unavailable live recordings.
The two new songs, “The Speed of Soul” and “A Long Christmas Dinner” were recorded and produced by Newcomer, Robert Meitus and David Weber at Airtime Studios. “The Speed of Soul” is a poignant exploration of a more deliberate relationship to time in an increasingly fast-paced culture. “A Long Christmas Dinner” creates a portrait of life and family as part of an ongoing continuum. In the songs “I Believe,” “Geodes” and “Holy as a Day is Spent,” Newcomer quietly and beautifully describes the presence of something extraordinary in the midst of our ordinary days. She sings, “God walks around in muddy boots, sometimes rags and that’s the truth” and “Folding sheets like folding hands, to pray as only laundry can.” “Before and After” explores the large and small experiences by which we mark our lives through a haunting duet with Mary Chapin Carpenter, resulting in a remarkable combination of two of acoustic music’s most rich and resonant females. “The Gathering of Spirits,” featuring Alison Krauss, is a clear voiced and crystalline celebration of this twinkling moment in time we call life. “Betty’s Diner” is a hymn to the human condition and the presence of grace in something as small as a shared meal or cup of coffee - “Here we are all in one place, the wants and wounds of the human race. . .let her fill your cup with something kind, eggs and toast like bread and wine.” Also included are the spiritual and tender “Sparrow” and the wry and raucous “Where You Been.” The sensual “I Do Not Know Its Name” describes poetically and lyrically the sacred we experience, but that which cannot be named. Reaching into her early work, “A Whole Lot of Hope,” “Bare to the Bone” and “My True Name” are beautiful snapshots of what has always been present in Newcomer’s songwriting and has only deepened and expanded with each recording.
The result is Kindred Spirits: A Collection - a resonant soundtrack for a world that is both sacred and ordinary, reflective and forward thinking.
Tracks
The Speed Of Soul
I Believe
Breathe In Breathe Out
There Is a Tree
Geodes
The Gathering of Spirits
Sparrow
I Do Not Know Its Name
Before and After
Betty’s Diner (remix)
Where You Been
Angels Unaward
Two Toasts
Holy as a Day is Spent
If Not Now
My True Name
A Whole Lot of Hope
A Long Christmas Dinner
Bare To The Bone
Digital
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