Catholic Joy From Innocence Mission

A few less knowledgeable spectators at the Innocence Mission’s Club Lingerie show on Saturday were speculating over the origin of singer-songwriter Karen Peris’ soft-spoken accent, which, like the band’s warm and moody sound, is elusive. Best guesses: European and otherworldly.

In fact, she, her guitarist husband Don Peris and their definitively middle class-looking rhythm section are all from not-so-far-off Lancaster, Pa., whose green hills apparently helped impart some of the same down-to-earth mysticism that Ireland inspired in Van Morrison. In concert and on record, Karen Peris’ words roll off that ethereal tongue with almost complete unintelligibility, but the lyrics read like fine, wholly comprehensible Romantic poetry.

For anyone in need of respite from Madonna’s Catholic guilt, the Innocence Mission offers the rarer, intriguing tonic of Catholic joy. And though Peris is indisputably shy and reserved behind her synthesizer, she was also, surprisingly, a delight to watch--just your average cheerful, beautiful, thin-boned girl next door who wants to be Joan of Arc and who sings in the lovely tones and tongues of angels, but who isn’t so ethereal she can’t spin some very funny, worldly stories.