I guess I learned it's not hard to sell something that you poured your heart and soul into. My father was pretty passionate about strawberries. Come to think of it, if John Lennon hadn't written that one song, maybe I would have. We do a brisk business when we keep it close to home and hands-on. The trick has been figuring out how to take our music to the supermarket, the hypermarket.
Stuff tends to get packaged and homogenized, sanitized, pulverized.
People are looking for an instant cup of coffee or a tv dinner, and that's when we start feeling like misfits. But fresh, homegrown food does sometimes get noticed. There is a demand, and I think our time will come. We were a bit nervous about signing a record deal, but the Vice President at Virgin seemed to want to take the approach that Over the Rhine already had vibe and vision. We just needed some help spreading our music around.