We Were Wood

Singer songwriter Barry Oreck releases his 5th album, "We Were Wood", on March 28th, 2025. "We Were Wood" includes ten new original songs, weaving together stories from history, searing social commentaries, and challenging matters of the heart. The songs reflect a range of musical styles and influences with complex instrumental interplay, tight vocal harmonies, and satisfying rhythmic grooves.

This is the 4th album with Oreck’s virtuosic Brooklyn band '& Friends', Jesse Miller on guitar, mandolin, vocals, Rima Fand on violin, marimba, vocals, Adam Armstrong, bass. Their last album, "Leap Year" in 2022 a collection of introspective and politically pointed songs written during the pandemic reached #6 on the US Folk charts in May 2022. It was described as “an album of hope and humanity that questions and answers, played and sung with a beguiling simplicity and a deep heart” by Mike Davies, at Fatea Magazine in the UK.

The songs on "We Were Wood" include 2 ballads based on historical events; both look at the nature of power and property in very different settings. "Build Me A City : The Ballad Of Robert Moses" recounts the reshaping of New York City by Robert Moses, an unelected tyrant who permanently altered the city for better and for worse. "The Norris Dam" tells a similar story of people in rural Tennessee who sacrificed their land and future to the Tennessee Valley Authority. "The Crabbit Wee Tailors Of Forfar" is a polyrhythmic, celtic inspired celebration of the Scots who, with thrift, skill and artistry provide a model for the kind of creative repair, reuse, and recycling desperately needed in our wasteful culture.

Driving folk rockers "Just Enough Pain" and "Snake Bones" comment on the challenging and confusing moment we are living in, as we experience the climate changing before our eyes, but seem unable to respond to it. 4 of the tunes examine the nature of intimate relationships. "Trust" follows a repeating cycle of disappointment, while "She Calms Me" offers a strong message to self about learning to listen and pause. "Ten Million Tears" and "She Was Supposed To Cry", both co-written with Rob Meador, recount opposite tales, someone who can’t get over a long lost relationship and someone who moved on instantly. The title track, "We Were Wood", celebrates trees and everything that comes from them.

The album also features brilliant musicians Bob Harris (Vassar Clements, Johnny Cash) on multiple instruments, Kevin Garcia, (Steel Wheels, The Duhks) on percussion, and Ben Farmer (Price Of My Pig, Gobble de Gook) on accordion.