The Sixty to Zero Blog, which has written on midwest "alt country" whatever that encompasses for over a decade wrote about Burn Barrel, Tim Eason, Beetkeepers, J.P. Olsen and more back in 2007.
Here's a bit of that:
Burnbarrel was the name of a 1999 release on the Heathen label, the original home of Tim Easton's "Special 20" album the year before. The "band" was Tim Easton, JP Olsen (lyricist for many of Tim's song and formerly of The Beetkeepers -- more on them in a sec), a coupla Haynes Boys and the bass player from Special 20. Burnbarrel was basically a showcase for Olsen -- he wrote all the songs and sings them, too. It's a fine album -- lots of strange songs and odd characters and, not surprisingly, it bears more than a passing sonic similarity to the mighty 1996 Haynes Boys album. For Easton fans it's significant cuz it features the original versions of two songs Tim would later cover (a stripped down "Far Rockaway"/"John Gilmartin" and a truly amazing version of "Bad Florida"). Anybody who's familiar with the Olsen songs that Easton has done over the years know that his lyrical skills are quite accomplished and rather distinctive -- his songs are often very literary and full of interesting, memorable characters (i find myself thinking of the likes of John Prine and Warren Zevon when i listen to his words -- pretty high praise i guess). Olsen has been in and out of the music biz over the last few decades, balancing a career in journalism with his songwriting. Burnbarrel are supposedly still a viable thing and were slated to have a new album out last year, but i don't remember hearing anything about it lately.
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