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Re: otr at my wedding?

On Thu, 27 Sep 2001, Black Draver wrote:
> Little Genius sounds familiar, but I can't find it on any of my CD's.

'Little Genius' is one of my all-time favorite OTR tunes.  It's one of the
instrumental tracks on _Patience_.

And now I feel a trip down memory lane coming on ...

I got my copy of _Patience_ when I was at the Greenbelt festival in
England in late August 1994.  I had never heard of Over the Rhine before,
and when I passed by the merchandise stands and saw the T-shirts and other
items with the clock and the old man's face, I figured they must be some
sort of artsy European band.  (I don't believe the band itself was there,
though.)  Then, before one of the shows at the main stage, the festival
people began to throw various trinkets into the crowd; _Patience_ hit the
ground a few feet away from me, and the jewel case fell apart, and the
disc itself rolled over and hit me in the foot.  Another guy grabbed the
case, but when he saw that I had the disc, he handed the case to me.

I don't think I had a chance to listen to the album until I came home to
Canada a week or so later.  I *do* remember going through the liner notes
and noticing that Owen Brock was credited with their design.  Brock was
one of the lead writers and musicians with Servant, the first Christian
band I ever listened to that wasn't just a hand-me-down from my parents'
record collection, but Servant hadn't put out an album in six, seven,
eight years -- so seeing Brock's name in the notes was interesting.

Then, when I got home, I listened to the album itself, and I definitely
liked it.  Bits of it reminded me, for some reason, of Maureen McElheron's
soundtrack to the Bill Plympton cartoon _The Tune_ (which I had just
acquired before going to England), and I loved the fact that 'How Does It
Feel to Be on My Mind', which I thought was an interesting idea lyrically,
was performed twice in a row, and in such different musical styles.  But
the one track I really, really, *really* liked was 'Little Genius'.

Somehow, years went by, and I heard about OTR every now and then, and a
friend made me a mixed tape which included a few songs from _Good Dog Bad
Dog_, and another friend sent me bootleg mp3s while I tried to figure out
just how mp3 players worked anyway, but I didn't pick up any other albums
of theirs ... until I decided I would have to go to Cornerstone 2000 to
see my all-time favorite band, Daniel Amos.  Looking at the Cornerstone
line-up, I marked OTR as one of the bands I would have to check out.  And
then I came across the band's web site and discovered the top ten mp3s.

So by the time I was at Cornerstone itself, I was ready to dive in, take
the plunge and buy all the albums I didn't already have.

The fact it was Linford himself manning the band's booth when I showed up
was, in retrospect, icing on the cake.  I say "in retrospect" because I
didn't have a clue who he was, and thank God he didn't hold my ignorance
against me, when I said to him, "Oh, are you in the band?"  Instead, he
gave me a volume discount on all their non-_Patience_ CDs.  :)

--- Peter T. Chattaway --------------------------- peter at chattaway_com ---
 "I detected one misprint, but to torture you I will not tell you where."
      Winston Churchill to T.E. Lawrence, re Seven Pillars of Wisdom

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