Fun Facts
Introducing The Sighing Hours - The Floating Men's 2009 Americana-rock Opera
Jeff Holmes describes the work:
“As a multi-generational native of rural South Carolina, I grew up immersed in the natural and cultural history of my beloved home state and have found the two to be virtually inseparable. Some of my earliest memories are of my father, a gifted and passionate naturalist, conservationist and educator, holding my siblings and me rapt with tales of the great southern outdoors and the strange, ghostly history of family and our culture.
The opera, No Clocks, No Calendars, is part sex farce, part love story, and part supernatural chiller, set on a sea island off the coast of South Carolina, where a liberated, enlightened hippie enclave interacts warmly with the local culture, dominated by the Afro-Caribbean descendants of slaves.
The story centers on a handful of townies from Memorial Day weekend to Labor Day, the peak of the tourist season. It follows their loves, heartbreaks and personal struggles and ultimately, tragedy. It celebrates heritage and diversity, champions a strong attitude in favor of sexual liberties and explores the dark consequences when basic human rights are withheld.
As for the characters themselves, the Sand Man is based on a composite of the Hag and the Plat-eye, two of Gullah folklore's most evil spirits. The character of Dr. Love is loosely based on notorious real-life root doctors and conjurers such as Dr. Buzzard, a fixture in the 20th century Gullah community. The remaining characters are simply young people on the very top of their lives, wanting what the young want: love, acceptance and fun.
I have poured my passions into the nuances and details of Gullah traditions as well as the high-octane exploits of the late 60s/early 70s hippie underground amid the marshes, beaches, pine savannas and mosquitoes of the Low Country to form a complex stew of delightfully mingled flavors and overlapping ingredients. It was in this that I found the enduring truths of human dignity, respect for heritage and an abiding sense of place that built”
No Clocks, No Calendars. Thank you for listening.
Sampling of achievements and Awards:
1993 Chattanooga Music Awards:
• Best Album
• Best Song
• Best Rock Band
• Best Male Vocalist
1995 Chattanooga Music Awards
• Best Song
1995 Nashville Scene Readers Poll
• Best Rock Band
• Best Local Release (Independent Label)
1995 Nashville Music Awards (Nammies)
• Best Unsigned Act Nominee
1995: Vin Scelsa’s Idiot’s Delight
• The Floating Men invited for an unprecedented total of three appearances on the legendary New York radio show in less than five months
1999-2001: East Tennessee State University
• Jeff Holmes’ lyrics included in American Literature curriculum
2001: XM Satellite Radio, Alternative Country
• #1 Song (“Roll Down the Windows and Drive)
• #1 Album (“Heroes, Felons and Fiends”)
2002: Middle Tennessee State University
• Jeff Holmes accepts invitation as guest lecturer in American Literature classes
2002: XM Satellite Radio, Alternative Country
• Top 10 Album (“A Magnificent Man”)
2003: PCAS/ACAS (Pop Culture Association of the South/ American Culture Association of the South) Conference
• “Southern Gothicism and the Grotesque in the Lyrics of Jeff Holmes and the Floating Men.” (unpublished paper by Gwendolyn Hale, PhD., MTSU) among the topics of a scholarly panel discussion
2003: Middle Tennessee State University
• Jeff Holmes accepts return engagement as guest lecturer in American Literature classes
2004: XM Satellite Radio, Alternative Country
• Top 10 Album (“The Haunting”)
2008: “Pleasurado” is the band’s biggest radio success to date, heard on over 70 stations across North America and Europe
• Check out the 2008 interview with Jeff Holmes at PensEyeView.com
Discography:
Tall Shadows (Meridian Records, 1993);
Bootleg Snacks Volume 1 (live, Meridian Records, 1994);
Invoking Michelangelo (Meridian Records, 1995);
Bootleg Snacks Volume 2 (double live, Meridian Records, 1996);
The Song of the Wind in the Pines (Shade, 1998);
Lemon Pie (Shade, 2000);
Bootleg Snacks Volume 3: Pie Ingredients (live & outtakes, Shade, 2000);
Bootleg IV: Live at the Belcourt Theater (Shade, 2001);
Heroes, Felons, and Fiends (Shade, 2001);
Boot 5: Please Be Seated (live, Shade, 2002);
A Magnificent Man (Shade, 2002);
Bootleg 6: The Upper Room (live, Shade, 2003);
So Far So Good: The Best of The Floating Men (Shade, 2003),
The Haunting (Shade, 2004),
Pleasurado! (Shade 2007),
“The Sighing Hours Act I: No Clocks, No Calendars” (Shade 2009).
"The Sighing Hours Act II: Swimming with Gods" (Shade, 2009).
"The Ghost of a Thrill Ride" (2021 - recorded live 2003)
"Remembering Paradise" (2021 - recorded live 2002)