Buddy & The Huddle basically is a 2-piece band and a cast of revolving characters based in the South of
Germany. Their debut album “Suttree” was a soundtrack for a movie that never happened and their latest work “Take A Ride Into The Life Of Thomas Alva Edison” ended up being a project involving over 30 musicians and putting the life of the genius inventor and weird human being to music.
Now Buddy & The Huddle are returning with another ambitious project, again they are choosing a cult novel and compose music around the story. This time it is Tristan Egolf’s “The Lord Of The Barnyard”, an unsparing view of life in a town where inbred Appalachia and Middle America overlap and intermingle. John Kaltenbrunner, an only child, is born on the heels of his father's death. At an unusually early age, the boy shows a flair for farming and a desire to be left alone, two things that make people pick on him in increasingly vicious ways. John's life
plan is to drop out of school when he hits 16 and mind his own business. But he loses everything, alienates everyone, and through a series of increasingly outrageous mishaps winds up serving three years work-release felony time on a river barge. When he comes home to Baker, no one recognizes him:
John had expected, maybe even hoped for, a little something more to herald his arrival - some burning crosses or lynch mobs on the lawn, a coven of Methodists to picket his re-entry, a banner-wielding committee from the school board, anything at all. But to his disbelief, he found the streets quiet and empty.
The streets don't stay that way for long as the tale truly turns on the garbage strike organized by John and his gang of fellow misfits. As a result, Baker comes apart at the seams and all the citizenry reveal their true natures.
There is plenty of room in these pages to admire a wild and imaginative look at a slice of life cut from the
underbelly of Middle America.
This is the story that has been put to music using a wide range of instruments, all kinds of Americana influences and arrangement skills that would make Tom Waits proud.
The book is a hilarious masterpiece (Uncut), the record a wonderful interpretation.