Gloves with holes in the finger tips, a $15 guitar, and dirty duct tape around the donation jar. Street musicians can learn a lot from Douglas Erekson. Image is everything, even if it is an anti-image.

Erekson doesn't live on the street, but is close to it. He lives within manageable-poverty. He rents a tiny studio apartment in downtown Salt Lake City and stocks-up on Wheaties when they go on sale for two-fifty a box. With an odd assortment of song writing, gigs, and music lessons he keeps himself about $50 above the bills every month. Well-liked by a multitude of friends he often receives movie passes and coupons for dining and entertainment.

But Erekson has entertainment of his own to offer. He once co-wrote a screenplay with movie legend Robert McKee. Unfortunately, industry politics killed the project. Last Christmas his parody on the Santa/Satan myth (Symphony for Santa) was a nation-wide hit thanks to the internet and public radio. Most recently, he has released his first CD, "Back Porch Believer", a collection of old Christian hymns set to Kentucky Blue Grass. "It's Rocky Mountain Bluegrass," bristles Erekson, who insists, "There's nothing authentically Kentucky in my style." Still, it offers sweet and smoky slide guitar, banjo, mandolin, and fiddle that has a striking resemblance to the hit sound track, "O Brother, Where Art Thou?"

"Back Porch Believer" delivers new arrangements of some old Lutheran, Baptist, Methodist, and Mormon hymns, as well as new ones offered by Erekson. The project has been well received by Bluegrass fans but not LDS distributors. Erekson has to rethink his marketing strategies. "It's not as easy as you think. You'd think anything this LDS in its content would be an easy sell, but it's not." In one case Erekson called one distributor to ask if they had listened to his demo. Their warehouse staff had been listening to it all week, saying, 'We just love it.' But the buyer still said no. In spite of everything, Erekson remains hopeful. Erekson believes his audience is latent, almost a little rebellious, and he is determined to find them. He sold most of his first 200 copies in only a few weeks just by word of mouth.

His rendition of "Sweet Hour of Prayer" is set to swamp-banjo, jazz-fiddle, and jazz-vocal harmony. Those familiar with the hymn might find it a little shocking when hearing it for the first time. A conservative ear might consider it heretical. Regardless of your taste, it's still a fun, toe-tapping, tune that stays in your head. "I was surprised to discover myself singing the hymns under my breath while shopping at the store, and I realized, devotion doesn't have to be solemn all the time, or only at church." says Mark Hansen, music critic, and producer at Bait the Hook Records. You'll never hear it in an LDS church meeting, but, you'll find it in the car stereo in the church parking lot.

Back Porch Believer, a fresh and exciting gospel-bluegrass CD just released by maverick musician Douglas Erekson might best be described as a string of traditional hymns re-made ala “O Brother, Where Art Thou”. Erekson's unique approach expresses deep-spirituality in a lively Appalachian style while avoiding the common pitfall of taking himself too seriously.

Back Porch Believer offers innovative, toe-tapping arrangements of old-time gospel favorites from various Christian faiths. The result is a surprisingly fresh and creative excursion through traditional songs like "Sweet Hour of Prayer" and "Jesus, Lover of My Soul.” Alongside Erekson's originals like "On a Mountain Top", the CD becomes a new experience in gospel-music, all of it tinged with the plaintive nostalgia and joy known to mountain musical traditions. Other highlights include “There is Sunshine in My Soul Today”, and “Who’s on the Lord’s Side”, as well as a bluesy instrumental of “What a Friend We Have in Jesus ( Israel , Israel God is Calling)”.

If you enjoyed the hit CD soundtrack to “O Brother...”, then you won't be disappointed with its newest cousin, Back Porch Believer. Arranger and vocalist Douglas Erekson wipes the dust off traditional interpretations of hymns, as well as traditional bluegrass conventions, and re-invents the hymns with a delightfully witty and direct treatment. Featuring smoking instrumentals, the 14-cut CD combines bluegrass with a touch of jazz-vocal harmony, echoes of a tent-show revival, a trace of the blues, an offering of African choir harmony, as well as sounds so traditional you would swear they were coming from an old RCA Victor radio.

"Rarely will you find three generations able to rock to the same disc at the same time.” says Tim Holmes, composer and recording artist for MLBC, “Back Porch Believer is piety with a big smile.”

“The song that struck me the hardest was, ‘I Know That My Redeemer Lives’. This hymn has been solemnized and revered for more than a century, but until now, I’ve never heard any one sing it with the jubilation that the ‘sweet sentence’ truly gives.”