Bombadil creates more Buzz

Bombadil has come a long way. And I don't mean from Bolivia, as their vivid use of charangos and zamponas might suggest. Nor do I mean from Middle Earth, despite the eerie connection the band shares with their weirdly magnetic Tolkien character. Since graduating from Duke in 2006 as just another college band, the group is scheduled to release their first full length album, A Buzz, A Buzz, in addition to performing at this summer's Bonnaroo Music Festival in Tennessee.

"We can now devote more time [to the band] then we could ever devote before," said guitarist Bryan Rahija. "You don't reach a point where you've made it. You have to keep churning out stuff, keep improving, keep playing and keep building interest."

Long before Duke University Union and Small Town Records began to nurture the university music scene, Bombadil emerged after guitarist Bryan Rahija and bassist Daniel Michalak studied abroad with Duke in the Andes. They returned from this life-changing trip to become pioneers in the Duke music scene.

Now two years removed from life at Duke, the suspenders-clad foursome has endured growing pains (the drummer has changed twice) to emerge and imprint their whimsical melodies onto a Southern culture with an established folk tradition. The band's grassroots approach of touring local venues resulted in an appearance alongside folk icons the Avett Brothers, a performance which led to their signing with Ramseur Records. Yet, despite their recent success, the band strives to stay true to their humble beginnings. With an approach to life atypical of Duke students, Bombadil's innate passion for music not-so-ironically imitates the carefree nature of their namesake, Tom Bombadil.

"The whole industry is built around hype these days with blogs, Pitchfork and the Internet," Rahija said. "It's just this race to instantaneous fame. We are trying to build something long-term."

Truly masters of stage presence, Bombadil, donned in the attire of old Bolivian men, engages their audience and displays a vaudevillian type of flair, bouncing back and forth between obscure instruments learned from an elementary school in South America.

With the upcoming release of their first full-length album, Rahija described the challenge of translating their unique stomp-grass sound and creating media that merges the living room and the rock club. In A Buzz, A Buzz, Bombadil combines their typical cacophonous, folk-tastic orchestral arrangements with several tracks that dial down the quirky, offering nothing more than bare vocals over the piano.

"You take that energy and that volume and you play something really hard in the studio, then you listen back to what you recorded and go, 'Huh?'" Rahija added, referring to their raucous stage sound. "We are still looking to figure out how to translate that energy into tape."