At Java City, we are always looking for a way to spotlight local talent and present new and unique music.  One band from Bowling Green was both local and certainly unique.  They were the grandfather and grandson duet of Jim and Wes Buchanan.  Seated on chairs they spun a web of intense emotional darkness into the otherwise sunny afternoon.  People stopped as if spellbound as Jim spoke his brutal and often angry poetry as grandson Wes slashed though a river of heavy metal guitar.  I was fascinated to hear they had formed a band and wanted to interview them so, I recently spoke with Jim.  

You guys are a new band but you have played at Java City as a duo. What made you want to start a band?

Well, Wes my grandson, wanted to play the drums instead of the guitar, so he taught his friend Josh London all the guitar parts that he had written and we found a used drum set in Indiana and purchased it.  They asked their canoeing and camping mechanic friend Patrick Slater whom they all hang out with, if he would play the bass and he agreed, so since I am the writer of the lyrics and a singer, all of a sudden we have formed a band, where everyone has a role to play.

Where did you get your name Danse Macabre?

The name means the dance of death. While studying art, I was inspired by Kaspar Meglingers’ paintings “Lucernes’ Spreur bridge’ and a poem called “Danse Macabre” 1626-1635, which I chose to use as a theme to write an entire music album based on death. I am the love and death messenger, the after-life nemesis.

What kind of music did you play?

The music comes from another dimension other than the three dimensions of space and the other of time. It comes from the dimension where the laws of magic dwell; somewhere in space time between the dark and the light, where the souls go. At first I thought it was a gift from the universe, and the Holy Ghost. But I was tricked; it was from the greatest trickster of them all, the Devil himself. It’s just plain ole Devil worship music.

Who are your musical or artistic influences?

We are inspired by Charles Baudelaire’s’ morbid poetry; Beethoven’s; the Holocene extinction event and the destruction of the biosphere. We are greatly influenced by American defiance and escapist fantasy and the lifestyle of endless consumption. We walk the razors edge between order and chaos.

I notice that you employ the spoken word over singing in your music. Can you explain why?

The voice was sampled from the internet, and is a voice from the other side.

Do you write your own material?

We hopefully write professional lyrics based on poetry theory. We are constantly looking for the right words to fit the mood of the music.  The world is made of words. If you choose the right words the world is made of you can make magic and realize your dreams.

I know you have not played a lot of gigs yet but what sorts of gigs do you want to play? Clubs? H.S. Dances? Festivals?

Performing arts centers and stages and anywhere people seek entertainment.

Do you want to go on tour?

Would like to tour the United Stated and the world.

Will you ever make a record?

We have a recording studio in our home, and we have been constantly writing and recording music since the 1960’s. We have recorded over 20 original CDs.

Thanks so much for taking time to talk… Anything else to add?

As a band through our collective creativity we celebrate the beauty of the earth. We honor the dead and we sometimes poke fun at death. We just want people to express their heart, so let’s live now.  Come to the dance of death with us!  What we would like to add is that we are all about power and love. We know that power without love is reckless and abusive just as love without power is sentimental and anemic. Power and love are good values to have. We are finding our own voice to tell our own story about the landscape we live in. The music we create expresses our time and our concerns and we are at the mercy of inspiration, creation, and destruction.

Jack Montgomery is a librarian, author and associate professor at Western Kentucky University where he handles bookings for musical acts in University Libraries, Java City coffeehouse. Jack has also been a professional musician since 1969 and performs with a celtic quartet called Watersprite.