Album Notes

It could be a modern incarnation of the old blues scenario: A man sits in his single-wide mobile home with a primitive guitar (made from a cigar box, stick and 3 guitar strings) and belts out mean murder ballads and dark spirituals thruough a rusty harmonica mic. But it's not a "scenario." This is the real deal. Speal was living in the middle of a Pennsylvania trailer park. He plays a cigar box guitar. And he recorded this album on a simple 4-track cassette recorder.

“ Stealing the Fire” features stark homemade recordings of Speal performing the works of Timothy Renner on a primitive cigar box guitar. It was a simple premis in the beginning. Speal just wanted to know what Renner's dark folk music would sound like if were soaked in Delta blues.

"You shouldn't ever perform Blind Willie Johnson songs until you realize those damning lyrics could send one of the audience members to hell," says Speal, the self-proclaimed King of the Cigar Box Guitar. "In the same regard, you don't dare attempt Timothy Renner's music unless you first realize that you may be sending yourself through hell."

Speal covers Renner's work from Stone Breath, Spectral Light and Moonshine Firefly Jamboree and other recordings, along with Tara VanFlower's "Whore" and an original piece, "The Claw."

Hand-printed cardstock covers may vary from the image shown here.