Treasures In Heaven: Burlap To Cashmere

Thursday, November 15, 2018



Some artists burst onto the scene, burn bright and then burn out. That was the case with Burlap To Cashmere. Almost.

Burlap To CashmereIt was early autumn 1998 in Atlanta when I met the band. They were performing at a Christian radio conference. Their debut major label release “Anybody Out There” was about to be released on A&M Records and the Christian label Squint Entertainment. I was walking through the lobby of the hotel and Michelle, their record label rep called to me, “Hang out with these guys will ya? I’m afraid nobody else here is gonna get them like you will.”

So we went outside and chatted. I’d left New York in the fall of 1995 and the band, cousins Steven Delopoulos and John Phillippidis along with Mike Ernest, Roby Guarnera, Josh Zandman, Scott Barksdale and Theodore Pagano were from Brooklyn. We talked New York food; pizza, bakeries, delis. We talked baseball. And we talked music and faith. The greater New York area has never been a hot bed of Christian music. You can count the number of successful Christian artists who call New York home on one hand. There’s Kathy Troccoli, Margaret Becker, John Elefante and his brother Dino jump to mind, but after that, I’m at a loss.

Anybody Out There Burlap To CashmereBurlap To Cashmere did three or four songs at that conference. It was one of the most electrifying live performances I’ve ever experienced. Raw energy, brilliant musicianship and catchy but thoughtful lyrics. The reaction from the tough-as-nails audience was mixed. The fact that one of the guys had stripped off his t-shirt during the performance didn’t endear them to the staid radio pros. You must remember that at the time the Christian radio charts were dominated by acts like Avalon, Point of Grace, Michael W. Smith and Steven Curtis Chapman. These New York boys didn’t sound like any of those other artists.

The album came out on October 13, 1998. That was quickly followed by a re-issue of the band’s first indie project, the EP “Live At The Bitter End.” “Anybody Out There” yielded 3 or 4 radio singles, including “Treasures In Heaven,” which was the #30 song on Christian radio for 1999. They were nominated for the Dove Award for New Artist of the Year, and lost to Jennifer Knapp, and for Rock Album of the Year and won.

Burlap To CashmereThe band toured extensively, across the US, South America and Europe. And we waited for another record, but it didn’t come. They took a break in 2001. In 2005, while working on a new record, John Phillippidis was beaten nearly to death in a road rage incident and spent a month in the hospital in a coma. The project they were working on was never completed.

In 2011, Phillipppidis fully recovered, the band released “Burlap To Cashmere,” to a good deal of critical acclaim, but little attention from radio. And in 2015 they released the digital only project “Freedom Souls.”

I go back and listen to “Anybody Out There” every once in a while. It still holds up. The band’s sound is a cross between folk and world music with lots of Greek and some Latin influences. I’ve shared a couple of videos, mostly from “Anybody Out There” and one from “Burlap To Cashmere” below.


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