About
The Short Version:
Beltaine’s Fire is a five-piece Celtic Hip Hop Fusion project based in the San Francisco Bay area. The music blends melodies inspired by the music of the Irish and Scottish Diasporas with funk, rock, and hip hop elements to create a totally unique sound.
The Long version:
There is a place where protest ballads of the Celtic bards and conscious hip-hop music intersect. Beltaine’s Fire taps that fusion in a way that is deeply rooted in tradition and history while being completely original. Emerging from the fertile SF/Bay Area progressive music scene, Beltaine’s Fire has averaged 3 shows a month since 2007; performing all over northern and central California at everything from underground rock and hip hop shows to an anti-war rally, a benefit for Iraqi refugees, and a performance at the Livermore Scottish Highland Games. In August they will be heading to New York, New Jersey, and Philadelphia for their first East Coast tour and in September will be playing in front of thousands of people as one of the featured bands at the KVMR Celtic Festival.
Beltaine’s Fire is Lynx on lead vocals, Todd (Cozy T) on drums, Laura on Bass and backup vocals, Cellist & Mandolin player Kater (K8R), and John playing a custom-modified electric Banjo. Their influences are wide ranging and they incorporate everything from Appalachian music to traditional Irish and Scottish tunes, folk, rock, funk, and hip hop to create what Epitunes described as “unlike anything you’ve heard of before… Beltaine’s Fire has succeeded in creating a truly unique sound that is still instantly accessible.”
Liberty
Their second album, “Liberty”,was finished Aug. 11, 2008 and will be officially released Sept. 12 2008, the seventh anniversary of the US Govt’s current War on Freedom. Advance copies are available at shows and from this website. The album features Lynx on leaad vocals, Laura on bass & vocals, Cozy T on Drums, K8R on Cello & Mandolin, and John rockin’ a special custom-modified electric banjo. As expected, the new album keeps the same razor-sharp political slant that fans of the band have come to expect and love, but also mixes it up with uptempo tracks like ‘Reclaim the Streets’ and ‘Kilted’; a song about the reactions Lynx gets wearing his kilt around Oakland.
About the Name:
The name ‘Beltaine’s Fire’ is a reference to Beltaine, the Gaelic festival which marks the beginning of Summer and is a sacred time of rebirth and renewal. The festival is traditionally associated with the cleansing power of fire and flame, creation out of destruction.
Starting in the 1890’s, Beltaine was reborn as Mayday, aka International Workers Day. Mayday began during the worldwide campaign to stop the executions of the Haymarket Martyrs - Anarchist labor organizers who were framed and murdered by the state of Illinois for their involvement in the fight for the 8 hour day. Since then it has become a celebration of defiance by working class people all over the world against Capitalism and Authoritarianism; despite attempts by Marxists to appropriate it and turn it into a celebration of the authoritarianism that the Haymarket Martyr’s died to oppose.
