CD Odyssey Disc 50: Indigo Girls

I am starting to notice that in the late eighties and early nineties I had more than a passing interest in folk music...

Disc 50 is...Strange Fire

Artist: Indigo Girls

Year of Release: This album was released on an indie label in 1987, but then re-released when they signed with Epic in 1989.

How I Came To Know It: I was at a University party at a friend's house back in 1989, and she put this album on. I really liked it, and went out and bought it that week (on tape!). Thus began a fairly lengthy relationship with the Indigo Girls.

How It Stacks Up: I have 6 Indigo Girls albums. I'd say this one is about #3 on that list.

Rating: 3 stars.

For those who don't know, Indigo Girls are a two woman act from Georgia that came on the folk scene in the late eighties.

I really dig the Indigo Girls, and I'm not ashamed to admit it. I still put them on from time to time - and it has been some time since I heard anyone else doing the same.

This particular album was originally an indie release, and it has a very raw quality to the production (similar to their more commercially successful self titled album).

The sparse production is actually a good compliment to their music, which is heavy on emotion and light on arrangement. Later on, they lose this a little and get too cutesy in the production room, but back in the day, Indigo Girls had a great energy.

Part of that energy is furious guitar strumming - in the folk guitar style. Folk guitar strumming is like the acoustic equivalent of punk rock's electric guitar strumming; both show very little in the way of musicianship, but they both sound great if the artist does it with gusto and puts their heart into it.

Indigo Girls definitely strum their guitars with authority - at times I think they are going to break their necks!...of their guitars.

A lot of the lyrics on this album are designed to appeal to English Lit students - like these from "Left Me a Fool"

Everybody loves you, and wants to know your story
You go riding out a mystery, concealed in all your glory
But when it comes to flesh and bone, you remind me of Shalott
Only made of shadows, even though you're not.

These might seem a bit schlocky unless you really dig references to Tennyson poetry. Fortunately, I'm an English Lit student (or was when I discovered the Indigo Girls). Also, I love Tennyson.

Strange Fire also features a remake of that 60s song "Get Together" that I've always liked. I once sang this song - disastrously - at Karaoke at the old Sherwood. Yikes. I remember the DJ trying to urge me to sing higher and hit the notes correctly. I'm not saying I hit the notes - but I'm sure everyone there agreed that my version had a "strange fire" all its own.

Besides, no matter how bad the entertainment got, the Sherwood featured sports trivia between songs. They'd read a sports question and the first person to guess correctly (out loud, so it was a bit of a crapshoot) won some gross eighties shooter, like a Prairie Fire or a Slippery Nipple or Sex On The Beach. It sounds lame now, but as a university student, it was like winning the lottery!

Anyway, getting back to the record, this album is not for everyone, but for folk-music loving English Lit types who like a well strummed guitar (we are legion!), it is for us. If you like that kind of thing, these two ladies do it very well.

Best tracks: Strange Fire, Left Me A Fool, Hey Jesus,