A Show Not To Miss: Over the Rhine at Kuumbwa Saturday

"I have five senses, I need thousands more, at least," Over the Rhine's Karin Bergquist sings on The World Can Wait, a song that may be about passionate love, or love of life as it's ending.

It's a lyric that crystallizes the group's music for me. It's so good, I want to experience each note with more than the limited senses I have.

OTR is one of those bands whose followers are fiercely devoted and constantly mystified about why this duo, who have been playing more than 20 years, aren't huge. The songs are epically strong, the musicianship skilled and varied, the singing, divine. They've been compared to U2, 10,000 Maniacs, Cowboy Junkies, and, if she hailed from the Midwest instead of the deep South, Lucinda Williams.

Williams chose Over the Rhine to open for her on several tours, jamming with Bergquist and recording a song with them on OTR's latest disc, The Long Surrender. That alone should give them the cred to be bigger than they are.

But maybe the fact that they've chosen to stay in their Midwestern base, Cincinnati, has kept them from some accolades. It's not exactly a hotbed for the record industry, but for fans, that's also what's kept them pure and true to their roots.

"It remains kind of a mystery to us too," says Linford Detweiler, the other half of the couple central to OTR (sometimes they play as a duo; other times with a strong backing band.)

"We've been blessed to see our audience grow steadily over the years. We've found a very interested audience that tunes in on a deep level. We see them as a ragged extended musical family. Somehow we found each other and we are sticking together."

The duo has made that easy by framing each of their dozen studio albums differently enough to keep fans guessing and growing.

Films for Radio, released in 2001, is my favorite not just because it was my introduction to the band, but because of its elaborate synthesizers, moaning slide guitars and movie-like scope. In fact, it's on my desert island list of 10 albums I'd take with me forever. I've played it at least once a week since it came out.

However, 1996's stripped down, largely acoustic, Good Dog Bad Dog is just as appealing because of Berquist's voice, which is soulfully strong and rings like crystal, but sounds a bit vulnerable, like it could shatter if struck too hard.

The songwriting is also instantly memorable on songs like "All I Need is Everything," sort of the lovechild of U2's "I Still Haven't Found What I'm Looking For."

The group has another similarity with U2 in taking on big questions of spirituality and religion. Asking the big questions and  yearning for answers is a common theme.

"We grew up listening to a lot of gospel music," says Detweiler. "It's like Bruce Springsteen said in that talk last week (at South By Southwest), there's an element of prayer that seeps into songwriting.

"We're asking questions that sometimes really can't be answered. We're inviting people into a bigger conversation. To me, that's very spiritual."

The latest work, The Long Surrender, takes listeners on some streets with no names. I had to check the listed writers on the rocker Rave On because I thought they might have been covering some rock classic I'd missed from Heart, or something maybe Elliot Smith had written. Nope, it's an original.

The album, released in 2011, is produced by Joe Henry, who aside from being Madonna's brother-in-law, is an eclectic artist and producer who gets some great work from his proteges, who have included the Tom T. Hall, Shivaree and Kristin Hersch.

They recorded it at his house in LA in a week, a change from their own living room, which has been the studio for a number of their own songs.

There are early American rootsy songs, sure to please a KPIG crowd, gospel-soaked ballads, and rum-soaked moments that recall Tom Waits. In other words it's a perfect and perfectly eclectic album.

The group is named for a neighborhood that is thought to be the French Quarter of Cincinatti, where they spent their eary years.

Bergquist and Detweiler share writing duties and have been married for the last 15 of their 21 years playing together.

"A lot of people look at us with envy," says Detweiler. "Some of our friends say if I was with my spouse as much as you are, we'd kill each other in a week. It's not for the faint of heart. It's like tending two separate gardens. You have to take care of both."

Catch Over the Rhine at 7:15 p.m. Saturday at Kuumbwa. For tickets go to  www.snazzyproductions.com or by phone (831)  479-9421.