The Comedy of Errors appendices: The Oblivion Seekers - There’s No Depression in Heaven (22 May 1992)

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With capos wrapped around their Rickenbackers and with a dose of The Mono Men coursing through their veins, Oregon’s Oblivion Seekers provide a fabulously enjoyable update on the soporific though influential 1936 Carter Family original which was enjoying a renaissance circa 1990 thanks to covers like this one and Uncle Tupelo’s.  I haven’t carried out extensive field research among the many, many versions of the song, but for me it sounds so much more exciting and persuasive in its entreaties to set aside concerns over material possessions and give oneself to God during a Depression, when it’s set to electrics and drum kits rather than acoustics and fiddles.  The lyric is astonishingly durable and resonates as much now as it did when first written 84 years ago, especially given how the term “depression” has mutated over that time.  Though even then, A.P. Carter was singing an advanced tribute to the near 40,000 deaths by suicide that would be recorded in America over 1937/38.

 As the notes from 22/5/92 show, John Peel was similarly exhilarated by this treatment of the song and playing it allowed him to do something which was extremely important to his self-esteem - impress Andy Kershaw, who it’s a fair bet to say probably had every version ever recorded of There’s No Depression in Heaven in 1992 and many more in the years since.

Video courtesy of Dean Fletcher