Last updated: 5 hours ago
Do you remember the days when the atom bomb was the sexiest thing around and Communists were hiding under every bed? Well, Arin Jessup, David Fry and Jane Archer are here to remind you of those times with “Great Atomic Power” on Booth Street Records. Written during the early stages of the Cold War, these songs preserve a sense of ambiguity: did the atomic age offer prosperity and hope or human extinction?
Jane Archer and the Reactionaries have a deep connection with bluegrass music, Jane having seen many of the greats at bluegrass festivals in the early 80s. Jane, her nephew David Fry and friend Arin Jessup revel in traditional bluegrass and bring that hard driving, high lonesome sound to this rarely heard repertoire.
Even today Cold War tensions echo through politics and nuclear arsenals still pose an existential threat to the world. The album’s artwork is taken from a pamphlet published in 1961 by the Government of Canada entitled Fallout on the Farm and offered practical advice about how to keep your family safe by building bomb shelters and how to hose radioactive dust off of your cattle.
The final track, “Old Man Atom,” exemplifies the humour and strange ironies at the heart of this album. The chorus is a haunting list of detonation sites while the verses are filled with a delirious humour “We hold these truths to be self-evident that all men may be cremated equal.” When faced with self-inflicted extinction should we laugh or cry? “Great Atomic Power” says both.
Jane Archer and the Reactionaries have a deep connection with bluegrass music, Jane having seen many of the greats at bluegrass festivals in the early 80s. Jane, her nephew David Fry and friend Arin Jessup revel in traditional bluegrass and bring that hard driving, high lonesome sound to this rarely heard repertoire.
Even today Cold War tensions echo through politics and nuclear arsenals still pose an existential threat to the world. The album’s artwork is taken from a pamphlet published in 1961 by the Government of Canada entitled Fallout on the Farm and offered practical advice about how to keep your family safe by building bomb shelters and how to hose radioactive dust off of your cattle.
The final track, “Old Man Atom,” exemplifies the humour and strange ironies at the heart of this album. The chorus is a haunting list of detonation sites while the verses are filled with a delirious humour “We hold these truths to be self-evident that all men may be cremated equal.” When faced with self-inflicted extinction should we laugh or cry? “Great Atomic Power” says both.
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