Remembering the cross woman

My Aunt Mary got her name “the cross woman” from my cousin Noreen’s small tykes.

To her, Mary was the old aunt from America who wouldn’t tolerate little boys horsing around the house. With one look and a curt “knock it off” spit through grit teeth, they were put in their place.

I knew that look well. She had the ability to pierce through steel with that gaze when we acted up as kids.

She would cock an eyebrow and glare at you like a falcon inspecting a baby rabbit with a broken foot. It was a look that displayed both her impatience and disbelief that such an unwashed heathen had dropped from her family tree.

I am envious of her. As a parent, I have tried unsuccessfully to perfect that withering glance, and my kids ride all over me no matter how coldly I gaze in their direction.

We were gathered as a family last Sunday at the 9 a.m. Mass in Aunt Mary’s parish to honor her on the fifth anniversary of her passing. You could almost feel her in the pew with us, the no nonsense Irish matriarch whose direct, fair, and loving influence was so strong that she kept all of us on the straight and narrow half a decade following her sudden death.

Her best friend Bernadette came to the house for tea after Mass. I introduced myself to her as Mary’s nephew, to which she replied, “Why wouldn’t I know you? Sure, I read ye every week in the Irish Voice and mind yeh, there are some weeks that I don’t care for yeh at all.”

No wonder Mary got along so well with this woman. Like Bernadette, Mary called it as she saw it without thinking of how it might land over there because the filter between her brain and mouth was either non-existent or hopelessly clogged. Children of Irish mothers know well what I mean here.

I was a bit nervous about putting her in the same room as my wife’s grandmother on our wedding day. Baba, as she was called, loved to tell the tale of red-headed boys throwing rocks at the only Jewish girl in Kansas.
“Two things I can’t stand are prejudiced people and the Irish,” Baba would say. You could imagine how my courtship with my Jewish wife went.

Anyway, I winced as Mary and Baba chatted at the perimeter of the dance floor because I was a nervous wreck overall at my wedding over the prospect of this uneasy Catholic/Jewish family connection, but was terrified by the notion that these two matriarchs might cross swords.

Mary soon returned to “our side” of the room, sat in her chair, and tucked the slip under her red dress before nodding in Baba’s direction.

“That’s a woman who speaks her mind,” she declared. “Sure, there’s not enough of us in the world  anymore.”

With that, the ice melted between the Irish and Jews as we found a common ground in our servitude to straight-talking elder stateswomen. In subsequent family gatherings, the pair was inseparable.

Mary was actually quite kind and selfless, a model servant of the Lord whose faith sustained her in the best and worst of times. She was not cross, but you could see how a kid could think that way about her.

No, Mary was just an extremely practical woman who thought it was ridiculous to cater on every whim of a child that should be seen and not heard.

There are hilarious home videos of my cousin Robert opening up the same fire truck under the Christmas tree year after year; he was so overwhelmed with the bounty that he never missed it. “Sure, how much can a kid really play with before they become overloaded?” she said with a huff once in her defense while we joked around her about the shameless “re-gifting.”

I can remember vividly a time when she threw cousin Rob’s hockey equipment out of his third floor bedroom and onto the concrete patio below in another lesson of no-bull parenting.

“What are you doing?!” Rob screamed. “You could have broken these things! They are worth hundreds of dollars!”

“Are they?” she shouted, horsing the hockey sticks out the window as she spoke.

“How was I to know that? They were just lying around the floor after I told you five times to pick them up and care for them. You treated this stuff like junk, so I assumed it was.”

I can’t remember ever seeing the hockey gear laying around ever again, proving that this cross woman was someone you’d never want to cross!

Don't bet against 'Spider Man'

OH, look at those clothes.
Now look at that face, it's so old.
And such a video!
Well, it's really laughable. Ha, ha, ha …

Those words come from the song “We Hate it When our Friends Become Successful,” and the pen of Stephen Patrick Morrissey, or Morrissey as he is more commonly called.

It kinda sums up the Irish condition I detect running in the background on the press coverage of the Broadway show Spider Man: Turn Off the Dark.

As we know, Bono and The Edge wrote the music for the show, which has been plagued by what Amy Andrews of IrishCentral.com describes as a curse.

With a producer dying in The Edge’s apartment in 2005 just as he was signing up to pay for the production and the costly delays and injuries, my colleague produces a perfectly rational argument for damnation.

But I can’t help but think in articles like hers and others in the Irish press that there is an underlying delight that the show is failing.

For centuries, the Irish have loathed success in our fellow countrymen because we don’t want them getting too big for their britches, nor do we want attention drawn to our own inaction of our lives.

This Irish reasoning goes something like this -- with global success, the launching of the Red brand for charity, and Nobel Prize nominations for his work in debt relief, isn’t this the great opportunity to put a little humility into that guy Bono? Just in case he gets carried away with himself?

Well, here is one journalist not buying any of it. The snippets of music I have heard for the show are thrilling – disco beats, show tune drama, string orchestrations that would make a hardened spinster like Eleanor Rigby shed a tear, all anchored by The Edge’s spiraling guitar riffs? Sign me up for that!

As a diehard fan of both comic books and U2, all I want for Christmas is for this show to succeed.

“If you don’t have fear, you’re not taking a chance at life. Nothing is created without risk,” said director Julie Taymor of the show on 60 Minutes. She’s the Broadway genius behind The Lion King who is the other creative force behind the show.

“This is one of the most playful times in our creative life,” says Bono. “And if people come through the door after all this melodrama as we think they will, this will be a great success.”

Think about this -- what would Ireland be like if the country’s minister of ginance came to work with that attitude? Like the Republic of Ireland, Bono, The Edge and Julie Taymor stand in the jaws of crippling debt, overwhelming odds and the world betting against them.

If Irish journalists like my friend John Spain and other Irish approached their equally dire situation with the same creativity and hope, the OTHER pervasive headline on places like IrishCentral and this paper wouldn’t be such a depressing read.

Hopefully, 2011 will have journalists spinning differently on the web. I’m just sayin’.

Find This Lost Boy!

I am kicking myself that I missed this. I met this guy James Hannon in a bar (Irish writers in a bar---shocking, I know) at a writer’s function and he slipped me this book Lost Boys of the Bronx – The Oral History of the Ducky Boys Gang.

I didn’t crack it open until after his event and I got totally hooked on the story and how Hannon laid it out. He tells the street tale in interview style in many parts, making it read like a police report on gang warfare from another place and time. Genius!

I was surprised to learn that one Ducky Boy hid his face in greasepaint and became famous in the 1970s as Ace Frehley of the rock band KISS! Here I thought I knew everything about one of my favorite bands!

If you’re looking for a last minute stocking stuffer that would benefit a budding Irish American writer (Lord knows we all could use the help nowadays with the book business in the toilet), pick up Lost Boys of the Bronx – The Oral History of the Ducky Boys Gang, published by AuthorHouse books.

Orla Fallon’s merry Celtic Christmas & Susan Boyle’s Gift is worth giving

Fallon’s Merry Celtic Christmas

Orla Fallon has sung in front of popes and presidents in the five years since she joined Celtic Woman and launched a successful solo career. The singer/harpist from the village of Knockananna in Co. Wicklow makes another bold play for the national spotlight with her American public television holiday special Órla Fallon’s Celtic Christmas.

It made its debut last week, and Fallon is following that up with a series of dates this week.

The show features Fallon and includes special duets with her former Celtic Woman band mate Méav, American Idol’s David Archuleta, the original Riverdance choir Anúna, and country singer Mark Wills.
Shot in Nashville’s Polk Theatre in the Country Music Hall of Fame, Vince Gill makes a special appearance on the CD for a duet of “Little Drummer Boy” with Fallon, and the result is spine-tingling.

Like Moya Brennan (Clannad) and Enya, Fallon possesses that ethereal ghost-like quality in her voice that is simultaneously modern and as ancient as the Celts. She easily manipulates that chill on your spine with masterful performances of Christmas classics that routinely brings the audience to their feet for one standing ovation after another during this performance.

The show is produced by bandmate and friend Dan Shea, who wisely unclutters the holiday arrangements so that Fallon’s supple voice shines. Like Phil Coulter, another brilliant arranger for big shows like Celtic Thunder, Shea knows when to lay on the atmospherics and when to make silence sound deafening.

Though she is clearly comfortable in her own skin to give up the spotlight to the other stars on the bill -- it’s fun to see the young girls squeal in their seats when Archuleta comes from the side of the stage for his “Silent Night” duet -- but Fallon owns the stage with her supple harp solo that ushered him onstage in the first place.

Fallon is a vision in a golden ball gown whose sparkle is only matched by her smile and overjoyed expression during the show. On record, the joy shines through just as loudly. She is an engaging storyteller, delighting her audience with tales of an Irish Christmas and holding them in the palm of her hand.

Fallon is not only stepping out during the 2010 holiday season, but 2011 will see her star in yet another public television special in March. My Land – Starring Órla Fallon is an Irish music, geographical and cultural celebration featuring the legendary Dubliners, Tommy Fleming, Damien Dempsey and the Dublin Gospel Choir. The show was shot on location throughout Ireland and Northern Ireland, with a full length concert taped in Dublin this past September.

If her Celtic Christmas is any indication, the pastures are indeed green for My Land!

Boyle’s Gift Is Worth Giving

Susan Boyle dropped her latest album on us a few weeks ago, and I know readers here expect me to be the guy first on the scene to review things like this.

Well, sue me if I didn’t open The Gift, Susan’s brand new holiday album, until now. I’m the type of guy who can’t bear to hear Christmas music so soon after Halloween, but I am apparently a minority.

The Gift debuted at number one atop the Billboard chart with over 317,895 copies sold in its first week, so there are plenty of people around that want to get a jumpstart on the mistletoe season!

None other than Simon Cowell, on the occasion of her top spot on both U.S. and U.K. charts, said, “I’m thrilled for Susan, she has once again defied the odds. She is my superwoman.”

So, is the album a gift as the label would imply? The answer is a tentative yes.

I’ve always thought Christmas albums were produced by artists desperate for ideas. They have had breakthrough success and a great run of albums, but they are long-in-the-tooth in the minds of record buyers. Some A&R guy at a record label convinces them that they can revive their career by “owning” a holiday chestnut like “Silent Night,” and the star would shine bright once again.

So, based on that theory, I was not thinking “if” this gal was going to drop a Christmas disc. It was always “when.” I just didn’t think it would land in our stockings so soon!

But now that it’s here, I can report that it is a balance of threadbare standards and interesting deviations.

As you would expect, the soaring voice of this lioness produces chills when she unleashes on a tune like “O Holy Night.” She is appropriately reverent as the orchestra sets a somber tone for the first 33 seconds of “Make Me a Channel of Your Peace.”

According to Boyle’s online press release, this album is an expression of her deep faith, and she puts you in the front pew with this fantastic interpretation. I can’t remember the last Christmas album I bought with this hymn on it, and I applaud the creative song choice!

I am typing this on my feet in standing ovation for the inclusion of the Crowded House eighties chestnut “Don’t Dream It’s Over,” a tune not normally associated with the holidays that transforms into a Christmas carol of hope and optimism for the New Year. A brilliant choice that confounded my expectations of a lame Christmas album.

There are a few sour notes on The Gift that make you regret you opened the packaging and crumpled the receipt. Boyle’s read through of Leonard Cohen’s “Hallelujah” is pointless, especially when put up against Jeff Buckley or k.d. lang’s versions.

While “O Come All Ye Faithful” is an interesting a capella arrangement that pairs SuBo with a choir, this listener would have loved to see her do battle with a full-on orchestra.

On “The First Noel,” she seems to sing without any regard for the pace the bare acoustic guitar and piano arrangement sets behind her. Her timing becomes unhinged by a half beat just as the choir comes in, leaving the listener wondering how the producer didn’t catch this.

As we all know, Boyle is a former country girl with the unibrow who became a YouTube sensation with a jaw-dropping performance of “I Dreamed a Dream” that led to a monster Grammy-nominated album. This is the woman who had the audacity to take away a classic rock ballad like “Wild Horses” from Mick Jagger, so I’m wondering why she chose to play it safe with a holiday album at this point in her young career.

Boyle’s is a success story that seduced the planet, and it is inhumane to wish against this woman. I’m not trying to do this here and on balance, I think The Gift is a present for the holiday season.

Let’s leave it at that. Who wants to risk being put on Santa’s naughty list? Not me....

The Best Music of 2010

When I took this job 13 years ago, my father assured me that I would run out of music to write about within six months. Here I am again, assuring you that the last 12 months were the best that this little scene of ours has produced in a long while. Does Off the Record sound like a broken record? Perhap. Yet each year, the sounds made by Irish and Irish American artists continues to inspire and tantalize music fans on both sides of the Atlantic.

I am blessed to have a front row seat to the show. My best to you and yours for a great holiday and if you are looking at spending some Itunes gift cards this holiday season, any one of the albums from my “best of” list below would delight you and keep this scene green!

Various Artists’ Welcome Home: The Music of Ireland: Moya Brennan was approached by a production company to host a documentary consisting of interviews with some of Ireland’s greatest musicians. The First Lady of Celtic Music and leader of Clannad, Brennan had access to the likes of Bono and Sinead. When the camera turned off, she added her ethereal vocals to songs by those artists. She weaves a spell with Celtic Woman Orla Fallon on the electro-pop of “Forgotten” before joining The Chieftans in the mournful “Lullaby to the Dead.” Andrea Corr’s “Oh Brother” is a welcome dose of maturity for the pop star and Liam Clancy sings a mournful “Parting Glass” weeks before his death and that is worth the price of admission alone.

Orla Fallon’s Celtic Christmas: recorded in Nashville, Fallon shares the stage with Vince Gill on “Little Drummer Boy” and “Silent Night with American Idol’s David Archuleta but it is the former Celtic Woman singer and harpist that emerges as a star brighter than any in the Bethlehem sky. Producer Dan Shea wisely steers the arrangements from any sluggish holiday sugar in favor of arrangements as crisp and cool as a winter’s breeze. A stunning performance that needs to be part of your holiday mix from now on!

Luka Bloom’s Dreams in America: Christy Moore’s kid brother is actually one of the most gifted singer songwriters working in Ireland today. Armed with nothing more than a guitar, Bloom casts a spell on audiences with overpowering charisma. Though he has recorded these songs before, the bare bones approach is applied to each song and re-imagines the melody in the process.

“There is an angel I would like to know/I sing and dream her face/ Lying on my pillow/I kissed her one day in the cool of Brigid's well/my heart beat crystal clear like a church bell,” Bloom sings over a cheery chord structure on “Ciara,” a live favorite.

Guggenheim Grotto The Universe is Laughing “I’m throwing myself at the world like a lunatic,” and “if we don’t break, we’re not trying hard enough” are lines from the reflective “Wings and Feathers,” words that Kevin May says encapsulates the fierce effort on this folk duo’s part to find their audience. They have toured relentlessly for their albums, choosing to set up residencies this time around in Boston, New York, and Philadelphia. When Dublin alt-folk songwriters Kevin May and Mick Lynch of The Guggenheim Grotto first appeared on the U.S. scene in 2006, comparisons to Simon and Garfunkel dominated the critical landscape and they landed on Itunes playlists and TV show soundtracks ever since. With their two-part harmonies, folk-acoustic stylings and earnest pop songwriting, the combined effect make for gorgeous compositions laced with highly literate poetry.

Black 47’s Bankers and Gangsters: the band’s latest CD opens majestically with “Long Hot Summer Comin’ On,” a rock and roll novella about the CBGB scene in the eighties where Kirwan had a ringside seat. It is a character-driven ditty with characters like arsonist Gasoline Gomez, “whose got kerosene in his soul.”

The record is the first since IRAQ, the band’s politically charged disc that offered scathing criticism of the war and heartbreaking accounts from fans fighting on the front lines. Kirwan was obsessed with getting that story straight so he could tell other tales.

“When IRAQ was done, it gave me the freedom to go wherever I wanted to,” he says. “There are a lot more pipes and brass in this album on purpose because musically, I wanted to focus on the strengths of this great band I have working behind me. You are playing with these great musicians and I wanted to have them shine.”

The band flexes their formidable musical muscles throughout the disc, most notably on “Izzy’s Irish Rose,” a hilarious tale of interfaith temptations that finds the band juggling both Irish reels with snippets of “Hava Nagila” without missing a beat. They are entering into their third decade as a band and Black 47 is only getting better with age!

 Album of the Year:
Barleyjuice’s Skulduggery Street: a collection of gloriously scruffy musicians from Philadelphia conjure up a ragged collection of sweet and salty songs that tell the story of a fictional neighborhood populated by bars and brothels. Leader Kyf Brewer’s throat has been roughed up in a pub fight as he croaks that have developed a legendary fan base by whipping up frantic crowds at Irish festivals. Fiddles, flutes, mandolins, and pipes come out of the dark corners for the musical equivalent of a knife fight---a distinct possibility on the rowdy lane known as Skulduggery Street.

“Prettiest Girl At the Fair,” time is a hobo with dirt on his face/you can dress him in tails but you can’t take him anywhere,” Brewer sings, his voice scurrying in the darkness before the sun comes up after a long night of partying. By the time the chorus tun round and there she was/drifting on air she was/with ribbons and braids on her hair she was/the prettiest girl at the fair,” you wish you had your mates at the bar singing along with you. Barleyjuice takes you back into the corner of the pub with “The Postman Always Jigs Twice,” a stellar traditional workout that showcase the band’s nimble musical chops.

Just when you didn’t think your eardrums couldn’t take more of a pounding, the band closes the set with the gorgeous “Generations,” a wistful look back at the Irish roots that found fertile American soil. The St. Patrick’s Day parade is marching down Skulduggery Street and you should be on the route because this is the best music I heard all year!

Irish American Writers banding together for Mexican writers

Celtic Cross

Irish American Writers and Artists Association (IAW&A) will host a night of Celtic and Mexican music on December 8 from 7-11 p.m. at Manhattan’s Klub 45 in Times Square (above Connolly’s).


Chicano and Irish poets, along with Irish and Mexican beer will all be on tap in support of the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ), which is working to bring attention to and provide legal assistance for Mexican journalists who are being killed, intimated and forced to seek asylum in the U.S. for the reporting they are doing on the narco war in Mexico.


Pete Hamill, Rubén Blades, Celtic Cross, Frontera Bugalú, Larry Kirwan of Black 47, Joe Hurley's Rogues March, Ashley Davis, Malachy McCourt, host T.J. English, and other special guests will turn out for a night of entertainment in support of journalists' rights in Mexico.


"This will be a unique and special event," says journalist and author T.J. English, a co-founder of IAW&A who is hosting the event.


"The issues of freedom of the press, freedom of expression and the ability to do your job as a reporter or photographer without the threat of intimidation and death is of the utmost importance to all artists. We will rally around this cause while also having a fantastic night of music, poetry and cross-cultural interchange."


"Just as we did during the Haitian earthquake relief night at Connolly's, we hope to integrate the Celtic and Latino musics on December 8,” says Black 47’s Larry Kirwan.


“Ruben Blades did it with his album, Primogenio; the Chieftains did it with their San Patricio CD, and Black 47 did it with their song San Patricio Brigade. There will be many great improvisers present so be prepared for musical fireworks."


Celtic Cross joins Black 47 on the bill after a busy season as festival favorites ever since their release Shores of America won them critical acclaim (including album of the year in these pages). Now that the festivals are done, Kathleen Fee reports the group is laying low and concentrating on doing new songs.


“I think playing the festivals help you focus more on your performance and original material,” Fee reports. “We have been trying some new songs, one called ‘Irish Girl’ that are really going well. I think in a bar, they want to here the traditional Irish stuff and you have to bow to that more than when you are on a festival stage.

“This gig is obviously unique and we are looking forward to playing it. I just love what the Irish American Writers stand for, a community of artists and writers supporting our culture. I was only happy to say yes to it and was intrigued by this as well.


“The Mexican writers are seeking freedom from censorship. Our ancestors struggled with this as well, so you can really identify what they are going through and it’s a great cause to support.”


Suggested donation for the night is $30.

The Irish Tenors are excited about holiday tour

The Irish Tenors line-up of Finbar Wright, Anthony Kearns, and Ronan Tynan is reunited for an exclusive 12-date tour this coming Christmas holiday season. This is the Irish Tenor combination that mesmerized audiences with their highly successful PBS specials, including the groundbreaking Ellis Island Project that sold a million CDs and DVDs.

“It will be exciting to hear the three voices live together again -- it is a unique sound which will undoubtedly recreate the magic that has made the Irish Tenors special from the very beginning,” says Wright.

For the Irish Tenors, this upcoming string of dates is not just an opportunity to visit their fans for the holidays. They consider this Christmas tour an escape from the doom and gloom that has hit both sides of the Atlantic.
“We have here in Ireland a desperate situation; it really does effect people,” laments tenor Anthony Kearns during an interview with the Irish Voice.

“Everyone is talking about the same thing, how this is going to be so bad with no end in sight,” he says. “It starts to wear on people. I know I am sick of it as well.

“The one thing that is surprising is that 80,000 in tickets for the next Slane show just sold out over here in 40 minutes. The Take That reunion sold two shows instantly. There are 250,000 tickets sold for shows in the next three weeks in Ireland.

“It’s quite depressing here, and yet the fact that these tickets sold like that shows you that there is good tonic in a concert. Just kick up your legs, have a laugh and escape the news for the night. Lord knows it will be there in the morning anyway!”

Kearns, Wright and Tynan, the original lineup of Irish Tenors, will be harmonizing on a Christmas show for the first time in many moons. Noticeably absent is Karl Scully, the tenor who replaced Tynan when he went out on his own a few years back. Kearns is cagey about the future of the group and Scully’s association with it.

“We are going to see how this goes and see if we can nail the big man (Tynan) down for a minute to see what he wants to do moving forward,” says Kearns.

“Scully will join us here and there on this show. He is a fantastic young talent and we have no plans to roll on without him at the moment. I’m sure we will always work with him in some way, shape, or form.”

Kearns admits there is a certain chemistry with the original lineup that he is looking forward to being a part of on this Christmas tour.

“There’s something about it, I don’t know what it is, that works,” he says. “There is respect and there’s also a brotherhood that loves doing this. We have good fun; they love the camaraderie and the challenge of brotherly competition. ‘You’re going for the high note, big fella, I am right behind you.’ A
“Audiences see that competition and love to witness it. We have great, wonderful arrangements from a talented band.”

When I spoke with Kearns, he was knee-deep in rehearsals, where he described the experience of digging deep and doing a few runs around the piano. With all the tour activity, is there any time to do the shopping here in the U.S.?

“I do it all in one day,” he says. “I am not one for the shopping. I hit the ground running and the last bits and pieces I get on Christmas Eve.

“When you hit the ground running you don’t have much time to yourself on the Christmas tour. At one stage, you have five shows in a row. You go to sleep around 1 a.m. and then you run on the road again. You jump on a bunk and get some sleep in a while. You have to stand on the back legs and deliver.”

The Irish Tenors will be at the Beacon Theater in New York on Thursday, December 16. Tour dates also include the Landmark Theater in Richmond, Virginia on the 8th, and the Scranton Cultural Center on the 11th. For more information, visit theirishtenors.com.

Mick Flannery's 'White Lies' to go a long way

Mick Flannery

Mick Flannery is a promising young singer songwriter on our shores this month, including a stop art the Rockwood Music Hall in Manhattan, in support of his CD, White Lies.

The album is a delicate blend of heartfelt prose, pensive piano-based arrangements laced with shards of broken love stories. If you just broke up with a guy, he downs a bottle of sleeping pills in his despair and then he calls you before his last slumber, it might sound like “Safety Rope,” the first track from White Lies.

“Cause I loved you long before the day I told you,” he mumbles as a lone piano tinkles a lullaby in the background.

“All the love you gave me I took for myself,” he laments on the acoustic guitar-driven “California.” Things pick up on “Tomorrow’s Paper,” a scratchy blues-folk romp that shows a remarkable depth for a 25-year-old stone mason who was brought up on a farm outside Blarney, Co. Cork.

His first real connection to music was watching an unplugged Nirvana covering Bowie’s “The Man Who Sold the World.” You can hear that unplugged Seattle influence throughout White Lies,

After a stint in a music college in Cork, Flannery traveled to the U.S. where he “wandered around for a time,” according to his biography. While here, he entered the U.S. Songwriting Competition in Nashville and, to his surprise, won two top awards for his compositions.

Nothing surprising there. White Lies is a strong album that hints at a long, strong career!

The deluxe edition of the album on iTunes includes a series of acoustic live renditions of some tracks from a show he did in the Cork Opera House.

For more information and to follow his tour dates, log onto mickflannery.com.

The new me, dieting and beardless

So, I am happy to announce that some of the better columns you have been reading here have been picked up by a publisher and will be made into a book that I’ll be calling This Is Your Brain on Shamrocks sometime in February!

In reading over some of the edited essays, I was troubled by how many words were devoted to my poor self-image.

That’s it! Your lard arse is going to the gym once and for all, I thought to myself. 

Since then, I have been a dervish of activity in the cause of my own health!  All egg whites and portion controlled proteins and greens for me, thank you very much!

I squeezed every drop out of the Indian summer we had over the weekend.  I suited up the sneakers and even got myself to a gym most days. Twelve pounds have come off in a short period of time, but it isn’t fast enough for my liking.

To speed the process up some and to capitalize on this self-loathing, I did the unthinkable: I took a blade to my chin and shaved off the goatee I have been wearing for the last 13 years. It was hiding an inauthenticity about the bib o’chub, and I literally couldn’t stare it in the face any longer!

But that wasn’t even the most radical thing I did!  I loaded a yoga mat into the back trunk and joined my wife for a class in an attempt to tone up for the book tour.

After an hour of pretzel contortions while mechanical birds chirped in the loudspeaker, I put in a workout more severe than anything a drill sergeant could dish out. Hey, if it worked for Sting, it would work for me!

So, I set off on a brilliantly sunny day last Friday to do publicity shots and book jacket photos because the artwork was due on Monday. I posted the pictures on my Facebook account and even took the before and after shots to the pub for the lads to help decide which look to go with.

Remind me to never do that again, please!

“It’s f***in’ facial hair, for the love of God,” said one paddy, rolling his eyes to the heavens as his short block fingers teased his widow’s peak.

He placed the pictures on the bar, careful to dip them into the ring of moisture left by his pint glass, and motioned to the bartender.

“’Can you get ‘Michele’ over here a whiskey please? She’s a bit parched after going to her yoga class. Put some Pogues on the jukebox while yer at it -- her poor head is probably still ringing with that Enya nonsense.”

“Yeh better make that a pint of water,”  shouted Seamus as he grabbed the pictures. “Yeh might as well put a tinkle of vinegar into the glass as well, in case yer man over here needs a douche!”

I didn’t take a bit of notice of this and took it for what it was: -- a jealous, curt comment from a friend of mine who hides a desire to be a comedian and actor behind the brick walls he builds around Tarrytown.

With his bleached long hair, translucent eyes and bushy eyebrows that seem to brush in any hint of mayhem into his thick skull, this native Dubliner just might hit the stage sooner rather than later!

“Yerra, I’m still not sure I like the clean-shaven look,” he sighed dramatically. “Why did you cut it off again?”
“I was tired of hiding behind it,” says I. “I realized the goatee was hiding the double chins and all of the bad health and poor lifestyle choices that went with it over the years, and I am turning over a new leaf.”

“Good onya, boyo,” he replied, rubbing my shoulders with ham hands and a vice grip.  “Mind yeh, I think the whole goatee of yours was like puttin’ a f***ing rosebush in front of a wall of graffiti -- I mean, who we kiddin’ here?”

American Idol contestants have it easy compared to the judges I have to put up with in my watering hole. Perhaps I might want to hang with my yoga gals a bit more; they’re too kind to judge me, even in my spandex.

Namaste!

Barleyjuice tells the story of life on Skulduggery Street in an exclusive interview

Barleyjuice is a rowdy collection of gloriously scruffy musicians from Philadelphia that have developed a legendary fan base by whipping up frantic crowds at Irish festivals. Kyf Brewer (lead vocals, guitar, accordion, mouth organ, bagpipes, piano), Keith Swanson (lead vocals, mandolin, bouzouki, bagpipes, whistle), Billy Dominick (fiddle), Carbomb (whistle, banjo), Eric Worthington (bass, backing vocals) and Greg Shroeder (drums) play their instruments with the urgency of a knife fight---a distinct possibility on the rowdy lane known as Skulduggery Street. Over 14 songs, the band tells the story of life on their disc Skulduggery Street, a piece of real estate that demands frequent visits.

The collection starts up with “Prettiest Girl At the Fair,” time is a hobo with dirt on his face/you can dress him in tails but you can’t take him anywhere,” Brewer sings, his voice scurrying in the darkness before the sun comes up after a long night of partying. By the time the chorus tun round and there she was/drifting on air she was/with ribbons and braids on her hair she was/the prettiest girl at the fair,” you wish you had your mates at the bar singing along with you.


Barleyjuice takes you back into the corner of the pub with “The Postman Always Jigs Twice,” a stellar traditional workout that showcase the band’s nimble musical chops.

The band two-steps through “Get Your Irish On,” a union of thundering rock drums and hayseed riffs. “A man takes a wife/teaches her to whistle/and he picks up a fiddle in the wild/and the people come around and they bang in the house/singing songs of the devil in sky,” Brewer sings over sassy fiddling. “Drunk Sailor” starts out with a jittery harmonica and a Johnny Cash coke-fueled boxcar beat that beats the Irish fiddle into a country outlaw.

Just when you didn’t think your eardrums couldn’t take more of a pounding, the band closes the set with the gorgeous “Generations,” a wistful look back at the Irish roots that found fertile American soil.

Brewer brings his experience acting in such cult films as Serial Mom and Fahrenheit 911, as well as playing a cop in NBC's Homicide and a sleazy photographer in CBS' Hack, to bring a certain dramatic flair to Skulduggery Street. I spoke with Brewer about how he created the best thing I’ve heard all year and asked the proud dad about Raining Hearts, the band of his daughters that sometimes warm the crowd up before Barleyjuice hit the stage. Here’s how it went.

How would you describe the Barleyjuice sound to someone who has never heard of you? 

Well, the easiest way is to start with The Pogues and work forward. By that I mean, if they've heard The Pogues and like them, I know they'll understand us. Then I describe it as original acoustically played rock songs with stolen traditional melodies. After that, they just need to listen for themselves!

How would you describe this album to a die-hard Barleyjuice fan who might not have heard this yet?

I wanted the songs to bleed together and create a story, to take the listener away to Skulduggery Street and make it like a play or a film.

I hear alt-country and blues on this...."Get your Irish On" has it all in one song. What were you listening to at the time when you wrote the album?

Probably everything, nothing in particular. I grew up playing blues harmonica and singing blues licks. The alt country comes from bands like the Rolling Stones or The Faces, who came over here and tried to copy our country artists. They were sloppy and beautiful, and it's always been my favorite sound.

What was the best part of recording? What was the biggest drag? 

The best part was gettin' it down! Also the biggest drag because it took over a year. Everybody was busy, whether it was with trying to make a buck, or just plain casualties of life, but it took forever. The studio was at my place and sometimes I would get up with all good intentions to carve something and just say f**k it for today. i didn't push it. There was a lot going on in my life and I just sorta fed off of it and used it as an outlet.

How are the fans responding to this? What are the biggest surprises about their reaction?

Our biggest fans love it. It's controversial; there are some real different comments online due to the fact that this is more of a rock album than our other ones. If you watch our Facebook page you read some funny and critical stuff. There was a big discussion about me using the f word in the hook of “Pour That Whiskey,” and how if I'd just used an "e" instead of a "u" everything would have been fine.

How did you react to that criticism? 

That cracked me up. Listen, that's the way I talk---and other Irish as well.

"Whiskey Maid" has that great 69-71 Stones country-rock vibe to it, which I really love. How did that come about? 

That was exactly what I heard when I came up with the first line and the rest just poured out, staying within those nice honky parameters. The song's about two years old, but it seemed to fit here.

"Pour that Whiskey" sounds like you broke into Charlie Daniels' tour bus in the middle of the night and stole it. Love it! Explain how this came about.

In the early days when we needed to take up some time we used to let Billy's bluegrass roots loose on a Vassar Clements tune called “Lonesome Fiddle Blues.” We renamed “Billy D's Goat” or something. I always wanted to include that jam in an album because that's bill's forte and he plays great stuff. Kay and I wrote a hard-drinking song around it to give it a bed.


I love the tender and the terrorizing vibe. "Generations" and "Prettiest Girl at the Fair" are very sweet in the middle of the hard driving drinking/rebel songs. What was your rationale in mixing these songs? 

“Generations” was a tune I knew the sentimentalists and the fans of the lovely Irish ballads would fall in love with. I decided to place it at the end because it sorta felt right there, nestled down after the overload of everything else. I picture “Generations” as the old folks bar down at the end of Skulduggery Street, where Molly goes when she wants to get away from the noise of the Fox and Crown and hear her family tune played by a local minstrel on the low whistle.

“Prettiest Girl” is a tip of the hat to what was and would could never be again, a sort of hard edged glimpse of fleeting youth. Ivan blurts out this tune one afternoon from his barside throne to a sparse afternoon gathering of souls on the dole and brings them to waltz around him. I'm having visions of Oliver all grown up meets My Fair Lady before the transformation, and they go a different path.


How do you feel when you see Raining Hearts play as their dad? What are the band's plans?

I'm still fascinated that we created three musicians. Had they gone into sports, I'd have been lost to offer them much of any guidance. We're very proud of them, naturally, and each time one of them plays or sings something amazing the tears come. I'm on a little tour of the Netherlands with Scotlyn as we speak, watching my 16 year old blow the audience away night after night, city after city. As far as their plans for the future, it changes every day, as it did when you and I were teens. They're all about music, but they wanna do it all - not just Celtic. it has to come full circle.

Skulduggery Street is available online at Itunes. Barleyjuice has organized a Skulduggery Street Tour of Ireland, March 4-11, 2011. Those interested in joining the band can find out more can go on HammondTours.com or visit the band at barleyjuice.com.

Helping hands for fire damaged Blackthorne Resort of East Durham

You always hear plenty of stories about Irish grit and determination, but you don’t actually feel it until you rub your hands through the ash of the main hall of the Blackthorne Resort of East Durham. The Handel family has been running the place for a couple of decades before a fire consumed one of their main buildings last month.
When I caught up with Dale Handel, a stained glass manufacturer by trade, he was fashioning the red hand of Ulster into a glass piece to go into the bar he plans on replacing.

He will be getting help this weekend as a number of Irish musicians stage a reunion concert at Blackthorne to help the family get on its feet. Black 47, Kilrush, MacCana, the Kitty Kelly Band, Brother Moon, Jimmy Gallagher, Peter McKiernan and more will lend their support to the cause. The pavilion out by the swimming pool has already been converted into a temporary dining hall/restaurant/bar/performing space.

“Black 47 has played every Memorial Day/Labor Day weekend in the Blackthorne for the last 15 or 16 years -- no one remembers exactly,” jokes Larry Kirwan, the principal organizer of the event.

“That's part of the charm of the East Durham area. I've been going up there since the 1970s and have always treasured the 33rd County. There's a certain ‘do whatever the hell you like -- just look out for your neighbors’ attitude up there.

“And that leaks over to the Handel family and their attitude to music. I don't recall them ever making a suggestion as to what we -- or any other band -- should play. The only unwritten rule is that you keep it exciting.”

“Of all the bad that has come of this, there have been some fantastic, wonderful people that stepped up to bat for us,” says Dale Handel during an interview with the Irish Voice.

“In a real time of misery, which has been beyond terrible, this has been heartbreaking. Guys like Peter Walsh from the Gobshites and Larry Kirwan have seen it, know what we have been doing for the last 19 years, know what we’re about. We are trying to get the building up to keep this scene alive here.

“People are up for the holidays and want to let their hair down, so the music should reflect that. The area has hit some hard times and the Blackthorne -- along with some of the other resorts such as Gavins, and too many others to be named -- is part of the revival and are putting on innovative shows. 38 Special were playing in the festival area as the Blackthorne was burning -- and the show went on. That's the spirit up there.”

Handel is heartbroken over the wonderful heirlooms that his customers have entrusted him with that hung behind the old bar that have now been lost. Though in pain, his customers are fueling his resolve to rebuild the legendary Tara Bar in this resort.

“We will make the Tara Bar greater than ever,” Handel says. “Although we will be renaming the place the Phoenix because it will rise from these ashes.”

To Handel and many others, a lot more than a structure was lost. For a generation of Irish Americans like myself, weekends in the Catskills were a welcome respite from the sweaty streets of the city.

Memories can never burn away, which is a sentiment that Handel is reminded of every time someone drove up to survey the damage in the first few weeks after the fire.

“I met my wife there, proposed to her there and married her there,” Handel says. “I have had a thousand people come up to me with stories of their memories there. You take it for granted living in the building every day.

“I bartended here every day and I really loved that bar. I had some of the coolest stuff in there over the years. Pat Roper played his first gig in America here and this was where his last gig was, and we had pictures of both gigs. All those pictures are lost.

“My brother and I took on second jobs this summer to make sure we can reopen for these people as soon as possible. We are going to rebuild and make it real nice. We want everyone to know we are not going away.”

Unfortunately, reservation books and computer files containing mailing lists of over 6,000 people were also lost in the fire. If you want to reserve for the weekend, you are encouraged to call 518-634-2541.

Even if you can’t make it up on such short notice, you are encouraged to call the number anyway and put yourself on the mailing list if your plans call for a trip to the green Irish Catskills this summer.
One thing that you won’t be asked for when you call is a donation.

“I’m not so much looking for donations; we’d rather earn it,” Handel says. “So, if people want to help, we’d rather they support us once we reopen. Come up this fall or in the spring and see us. We will have something beautiful when you get there.”

When you do go up there, have a drink at the Phoenix, which will be rising from the ashes thanks to good old-fashioned Irish determination!

"Phoenix From the Flames" Blackthorne t-shirts will be available. Contact info@blackthorneresort.com or 518-634-2541.

Two Door Cinema Club

If you remember a time in the eighties when day-glow passion for music consisted of taut bass lines, caffeinated beats and addictive guitar hooks, then Two Door Cinema Club is right up your alley. The band of young-uns hails from Bangor and Donaghadee, Northern Ireland.

They have been hard at work amassing new fans in Ireland and the U.K. with a string of EPs and tours. Alex Trimble (lead vocals, guitars, synth beats), Sam Halliday (guitar) and Kevin Baird (bass) make pleasing pop that straddles two decades -- the eighties and today. You can hear elements of Talking Heads and Vampire Weekend, often in the same song.

The tinny, echoed guitar riff might remind you of U2’s early aggression, but the sped up drums sound crisp and modern on “Cigarettes in the Theatre,” the track that they did on Jimmy Kimmel’s late night talk show not long ago.

Though the beats sound manufactured by a computer, Trimble’s voice is earnest and appealing, giving the music a tension that exists between the man and the machine. Their debut album, Tourist History, is a sugar rush of riffs and catchy choruses that is worth a spin!

Two Door Cinema Club will play Webster Hall in New York on Thursday, October 21, and Washington, D.C.’s Black Cat the following night.

The Script
Be prepared for a second read of the Script! The lads from Dublin have readied a new single, “For the First Time,” which recently debuted on AOL Music.

Danny O'Donoghue described the meaning the song to AOL. "We got home (from tour) and realized there's a stark reality out there, the recession has hit, people are losing their jobs and their valuable things," he said. "We thought, this almost pales in comparison to our news."

Upon first listen, “For the First Time,” which premiered at the top of the Irish charts, is a heart-wrenching song. The first lines read, "She's all laid up in bed with a broken heart / While I'm drinking Jack all alone in my local bar." O'Donoghue's emotional vocals further lend to the song's sad and serious manner.

But this is the Script, who ruled the charts last year with a catchy blend of pop and soul that can be heard on their amazing hit “Break Even.”

Although the song has a somber essence, the Script delivers a message of hope in the anthematic single.
"The Irish are being stripped of all these things we used to have and we’re realizing what's really important," O'Donoghue explained.

"It's all about going back to basics, drinking cheap wine, eating your dinner off the floor. That's when you meet each other for the first time, when you have nothing."

If you want to escape economic turmoil, why not join the band along with Lifehouse, Colbie Caillat and more for the VH1 Best Cruise Ever this spring! From April 28 to May 2, the boys will be on board and sailing from Tampa, Florida to Cozumel, Mexico on the Carnival Inspiration.

Visit www.vh1.com for more information.

The sun shines for Pierce Turner in New York City

On an Indian Summer day in Manhattan over the weekend, I hooked up with Pierce Turner and talked about the summer sun.

“It was a very good summer in Wexford, with weather astoundingly good,” he says of his time in Ireland (he splits his time between New York and the auld sod). “You rarely get perfection; summer days with sunshine are like myths.”

He played the Kilkenny Arts Festival and produced a musical group of Wexford natives.

“You always learn these things, even though it is so time consuming and it deviates you from your own stuff. It’s not an easy job. You have to tell people the lyrics are no good or they are singing off key,” Turner said.

“I definitely learned that art isn’t always produced from a happy environment. It was also interesting that since technology makes it so easy for anyone to make music, most people skip producers.

“Perhaps some musicians that produce themselves like me should bring in some outside musicians once in a while to help make decisions on what is good and what is not.”

For American audiences who missed Pierce, they had to settle for seeing him on the big screen. He was in the pivotal scene in The Other Guys, the blockbuster summer flick with Will Farrell and Mark Wahlberg. He sung on a song in a bar scene called "Ugly Sunday" which was an hilarious send up of the cliché Irish tragedy song about British occupation and the cruel treatment thereof.

“There were these amazingly powerful Irish Americans in the room who were definitely in touch with their culture,” says Turner.

“I was thinking that if Ireland did a better job at playing its cultural connections to these people, they might be able to pump money into the economy and get out of the mess they’re in. Ireland only needs $5 billion to get out of their trouble. Irish schools never supported arts, and I think the Irish government have no idea how much money our culture brings in.

“It was a great atmosphere,” Turner says of the movie. “When I got the call, I thought this was a contrived shamrock-y thing. But I got a new appreciation for Irish culture in doing it.”

Turner spent the summer looking behind and looking forward. He recently performed his classic 3 Minute World in its entirety in Ireland while in Wexford, and he was pleasantly surprised at how well it went down. He has been recording an audio book of stories he’s told in between songs over the years, and has been working on a new album but is hesitant in getting it out.

“I’m not sure what to do with a record nowadays,” he said.

“I read an interesting article about the Grateful Dead, and everyone thinks they were these aimless drug addicts. They actually operated at the time the way musicians have to operate now. They only sold 50,000 records with Warner, and what they did was put club meetings together with fans and formed this cooperative with fans that made them much bigger as a live act.

“They almost ignored the music industry, and I think that’s where we’re all at now. A record company will no longer build a turnpike for your record, so you have to dig your own path.”

You’ll be able to see Turner dig his path on October 23, when he returns to the stage of Joe’s Pub in New York. He’ll show up at 7 p.m. with the Scorchio String Quartet behind him.

“I sometimes grow weary of string quartets, because it was limiting,” he says. “I worked with this group at the Tibet House benefit at Carnegie Hall. I used them for ‘Wicklow Hills’ that night at Carnegie and it was great.
“I did Joe’s Pub with them last time and they were tight. They really loved my songs because they are cutting edge and liked fitting their instruments into pop and rock.

“Classical musicians can be snobby and jaded, but not this crew. It’s expensive and risky to bring them onstage, but it’s worth it. You have to do these risky things in your own artistic pursuits.”

I have seen Turner with a string quartet before, and it is stuff of legend indeed. For more information, log onto PierceTurner.com or contact the Joe’s Pub box office (425 Lafayette Street; 212-539-8777).

Luka Bloom dreams about the past

Blink and you miss him!

Luka Bloom is just wrapping up a tour behind his newest release Dreams in America. Because life is so busy on the road, he and I weren’t able to connect until this tour was over.

Bloom is one of the most gifted singer songwriters in Ireland today, with a confessional, passionate delivery that is a thrill to see live.

Armed with nothing more than a guitar, Bloom casts a spell on audiences with overpowering charisma. Though he has recorded these songs before, the bare bones approach is applied to each song from Dreams in America, re-imagines the tunes in the process.

Instead of revisiting the finest moments from his two-decades-plus catalog in a run-of-the-mill anthology of old album cuts, Bloom has cut vibrant new versions of songs from his previous releases.

“There is an angel I would like to know/I sing and dream her face/ Lying on my pillow/I kissed her one day in the cool of Brigid's well/my heart beat crystal clear like a church bell,” Bloom sings over a cheery chord structure on “Ciara,” a live favorite.

“Love Is a Monsoon” is another show highlight, a sensual track originally from Between the Mountain and the Moon. “Goosebumps all around my skin/whenever you come into the room/fresh wild smell of jasmine/love is a monsoon,” he sings.

For a fan like me, who owns almost everything the man has ever recorded, this collection does little in swaying my opinion of Bloom one way or another.

Some songs, like “Cold Comfort” from Turf, are almost indistinguishable from the original version. In other tracks, like “The Acoustic Motorbike,” he successfully transforms the song into something new by stripping the melody down to its most elemental level.

Those rabid followers may have hurt feelings that some of their favorites were left off this collection (mine is “Sonny Sailor Boy” and it appears as a live version at the end), but what makes a collection like this so interesting is that you get the artist’s choice of his favorite work, not just the hits or most obvious choices.
For some that are less familiar with Bloom’s musical charms, Dreams in America is a great primer to what is sure to be an audio love affair.

We emailed back and forth with one another over the last week or so; here are the best bits in interview format.

For more information or to hear samples of Bloom’s work, log onto www.lukabloom.com. He might even have a few more shows on his itinerary that you can check out, so make sure you click on the "live dates" section while you are there.

What prompted you to re-record these songs?

The 20th anniversary of the release of Riverside in 1990 caused me to reflect on a magical time in my life spent in America, especially New York. I decided to revisit songs from that time and since, rerecord them at home, and send them out as a thank you to all the people who plugged in then and since.

There were some songs like “Acoustic Motorbike” which I don't remember you playing live in the last few tours (I never heard it live yet). How was it revisiting some of those lesser known/played songs?

I love singing “Acoustic Motorbike” again, and revisiting these songs brings about renewed friendship.

Did you think they held up well?


They are holding up just fine, thanks.

What did you learn from updating them?

I learned that certain songs are indeed timeless, that it’s okay to give songs a break, but it is great to resume the relationship.

How have audience responded to the CD and hearing some old friends in the setlist? Anything surprised you on the response?

The record has just been released, but the shows are telling me that those who know me are very happy to hear these songs again.

Lookin’ to Pimp My Ride

"LADIES, my Mercedes Hold fo' in the back, two if it's fat Keep a gat, for cats that try to test me, don't know what you heard about me." 

That Notorious B.I.G. He’s a sage.

Isn’t there something so cool about being a “playa”? We want to be deep and dark, but most Irish guys can only dream of the ghetto pimpin’ life that is in stark contrast with our cheery pub cherub realities.

I know. A pudgy 44-year-old Irish guy doesn’t have the swagger or the big hand to “slap any ‘ho’ in line,” but Michael Keaton was one of the most memorable agents of the flesh in 1982’s Night Shift, so there you go. It gives us Celtic aspiring pimps some hope.

I don’t know if I will ever have what it takes, but I do know that one of the downstream effects of having to drive your broke rear end in second hand American cars over the years is that you do spend a bit more on nicer rides once you have a few nickels to rub together. Uh-huh. Pimp cars.

This morning I am contemplating my next mack daddy ride because the lease of my Cadillac CTS is up. In the same way you call an Irishman to find the best bar to abuse your liver in Manhattan, I called one of my close African American friends from Bedford Stuyvesant to get his advice on my next ghetto-fab pimp-mobile. Steve is actually a hero of mine, a renaissance man who rose from dire circumstances to create a thriving digital advertising firm. We both have island relatives; mine are from Ireland and his are from Barbados. It was in some dimly lit Irish bar that he acknowledged our connection and christened himself Dark Pint.

“So, I have been looking at some pimp-able cars,” I said.  “We got us a list of rides I can afford and I’ve done some online research. Can I run some by you?”

“Go ahead,” came Dark Pint’s reply.

The BMW 328xi. “That is a pimp car,” he said. “But it’s like a soccer mom pimp, the kind of housewife that runs her stable out of the gals in her carpool. It’s for the pimp who’s packing a feminine napkin instead of a gat, if you catch my drift.”

I nodded my head and smiled knowingly. Clearly, I came to the right place for advice. The Volvo XC60? “That’s a bit better, but not by much,” he declared with not a small measure of authority. “The pimp with this ride is socially conscious. He’s gonna smack his girl around a bit, just like everyone else, but when he’s done, he’ll extend his hand, lift her up, and dust her off. Hell, he might even crawl on the floor and help her look for the missing tooth in the carpet.”

The Mercedes GLK350? “Now we’re talkin’,” Dark Pint replied enthusiastically. “This says, ‘I know I’m a pimp, you know I’m a pimp, but some cracker that writes for an Irish newspaper doesn’t quite know the extent of my pimpness.’ Any Mercedes model is gonna say that.

“I think it’s a lot more pimpin’ than that poseur Cadillac CTS you’re drivin’ now. I mean, that’s like the green garbage they sell at Irish festivals. It’s just this cartoon crap that passes off as Irish. Am I understood?”

I understand. I also understand the love of a Cadillac that is in my genes. It’s an immigrant’s way to show the world he made it in this new land. I remember my father’s first Caddy. As memory serves, it was a white 1965 Coupe Deville, with aerodynamic fins at the tail end of a trunk that was the size of a one bedroom apartment. The front of the car got to your destination a full 10 seconds before you did, or at least that’s the way it seemed to the eight-year-old in the back seat. Of course, we didn’t get the car until 1974, nine years after it rolled off the assembly line.

It was on its last legs by the time my dad held the title, but I remember his pride of ownership. He lined the family in front of it one morning, snapped a picture, and sent it home to his mother in Ballyglunin. Mind you, he did this not to be boastful, because “Herself” back on the Irish farm would not tolerate it. Rather, he mailed the photo as assurance that her son was surviving and thriving in America, and she could stop worrying and wringing her bony hands by the turf fire. It was proof positive that thanks to hard work and overtime pay, her son was keeping his Athenry playa hand strong in Jersey City.

I’m told by people in the Irish Voice offices that Irish construction workers home from England on the weekend back in the eighties would make sure they rented the most expensive car at Shannon Airport before driving to their little village. A week’s wage would be blown on the show, but everyone at the pub would think he was a playa. I’m guessing that my family tree is not the only one with a flashy car parked under it.

After all’s said and done, I will probably either get the Mercedes GLK or buy the Caddy lease out.

I guess Method Man got it right: “This pimpin’ that I got in my blood, it came from a family tree. My granddaddy was a pimp, my great great GREAT granddaddy was a pimp!”

Now all I need are dice hanging off the rearview mirror and fur on the steering wheel and my ride will be complete!

Praise Be to Kearns’ New DVD

IRISH tenor Anthony Kearns owns one of the most powerful voices produced on Irish soil, and he’s lending his majestic, classically trained voice to a new project called Hallelujah Broadway.

As Kearns says on the DVD, “The most uplifting songs ever produced within musical theater, and each song was picked based on its spiritual resonance and simple message.”

Kearns looks regal in a lavender shirt and tie, his eyes dancing in the joy of worship throughout the evening. He is joined by Alfreda Burke and Rodrick Dixon (3 Mo’ Tenors), two African American singers who wear their love for God on their sleeves as they wring every drop of soul from the melodies.

Burke’s “Oh, What a Beautiful Morning” from Oklahoma finds the singer praising a higher power for the gift of another day. Dixon’s medley from Joseph and the Amazing Technicolor Dream Coat, in particular “Any Dream Will Do,” is resplendent.

Elegantly produced with a church set ablaze with deep purple and red mood lighting as the back drop, the singers weave a spiritual spell that is so captivating that you wonder aloud if watching this DVD would absolve you from missing Mass this weekend.

Kearns raises the inspiration quotient to new heights with his soaring voice on songs like “Love Never Dies.” Musical director Gavin Murphy, the “FilmHarmonic Orchestra” and the Choir of Prague provide a luxurious backdrop that coaxes the best out of these talented vocalists. 

I know what you’re thinking -- why is a rock and roll writer singing the praises of Hallelujah Broadway?

Simply put, it’s an amazing artistic triumph of music that moved me. Grown men onstage and in the audience are seen wiping their eyes throughout the broadcast.  Let’s just say that I’m glad there was no Skyping going on as I typed this as the trio tacked Godspell’s “Day by Day” in the background.

Saturday night might be all right for fighting, but Sunday is the day to thank your maker for your life and heal thyself from last night’s sin. Redemption never sounded as good as Hallelujah Broadway!

The DVD was part of the PBS fundraising drive over the summer, and while I am sorry this gem inexplicably fell to the bottom of my mail bag during that time, I encourage you to buy the DVD and CD through your local PBS channel. It is also available at finer book stores or on Amazon.com.

How to spice up an Irish festival

I kinda thought last week’s column that took festival organizers and Irish merchandisers to task for peddling the same old green drivel each year and then wondering why attendance is plummeting would cause a stir.

I was right. A spy tells me that the article was the talk of a book signing at the Glucksman Ireland House at New York University, and there have been a number of emails praising me and damning me in equal measure.

“Yeh can really be a vicious, mad dog when yeh set your mind to it,” my dad (and sharpest critic) said on the day the Irish Voice landed in his mailbox. We were walking around last week’s Jersey Shore Irish Festival when he warned, “I’d lay real low around here if I were you.”

Well, nothing ever got done by just complaining about it; you have to propose solutions to the problem in order to create real transformation.

With that in mind, I would like to offer helpful hints to the music roster for next season’s festivals that might spice up your entertainment offering and paint a more accurate picture of our culture.
I am also mindful of our need to keep younger audiences engaged, and the attendance records of the last few years indicate that we have to change up the tired parade of bands out there.

Now, I’m not suggesting something radical here by going with new, unproven talent. That would be suicide.

Since this is the wedding season, I would like to propose something old, something new, something borrowed and something blue to festival owners eager to bring blockbuster attendance back to their events.

Think now about employing the Facebook and MySpace fans of these bands to further your own fortunes and other ways to think differently this year. And for God’s sake, verify my theories below with some online research about what your market needs. So here’s my list:

Something old: Derek Warfield and the new Young Wolfe Tones. The copyright infringement battles about who owns the Wolfe Tones name are now legendary in Irish music circles, and there are some that think Derek has put together a “scab band” in a desperate attempt to hang onto his legacy.

I say nothing could be further from the truth.

As the name would imply, the Young Wolfe Tones bring a youthful energy to songs like “Some Say the Devil Is Dead” and “Get out Ye Black and Tans.” Warfield was the head cheerleader of Irish culture, waving his hands and encouraging a spirited sing-along through the rebel songs in our culture.

I happened to be in the audience with my parents and two daughters who liken Irish music to Chinese water torture. Everyone enjoyed themselves, and it is a rare feat indeed to keep three generations of Irish people engaged.

Some say this devil is dead, but I say he would be a welcome addition to your festival. Check him out at www.derekwarfield.com.

Something new: I caught Raining Hearts at the sparsely populated Irish festival in Wildwood, New Jersey. They were the supporting act of Barley juice, the powerhouse led by musical madmen Kyf Brewer.

It turns out none of the girls in this band are over 16, and three (Scotlyn, CoCo, and drummer Claire) call Brewer Dad.

Their set was an appealing mixture of old (Bothy Band’s “Do You Love an Apple?”) with an emphasis on the new. Scotlyn led the band through a drowsy, smoky acoustic read of “Sunday Bloody Sunday” before hitting every note above the sonic firepower of the Cranberries’ “Zombie.”

They write some of their own stuff. “Pretty Sled Dogs” proves the girls have their dad’s knack for mixing power chords and storytelling.

It’s difficult to express into words the pride and thrill you get when you see kids this young handle instruments this well as they express their love for Irish culture. What a great example for your own kids!

Irish rock can be cool, and you’re never too young to pick up an instrument and join the fun!
Since Mom and Dad have to drive the girls to the gig, you might as well book Barleyjuice while you’re at it. They were painfully shy during our interview backstage, suggesting that this band of tough young girls are letting the music do the talking.

“I think I like them better than you,” I whispered in Kyf Brewer’s ear as we watched Raining Hearts from the merchandise table.

“So do I,” he quipped.

You can download tracks from their debut CD by logging onto http://store.itsaboutmusic.com/raininghearts.html

Something borrowed: A painter friend of mine described the artistic process thusly: “Nothing is original any more. Creating art is like stealing a bunch of bicycles. You take them down to a chop shop, put pieces together, paint the steel frame purple, and ride around town and call it your own.”

It’s no coincidence that Seanchai and the Unity Squad operates out of Rocky Sullivan’s in the Red Hook section of Brooklyn, where the chop shop industry is a brisk business indeed. You can hear it in their music.

In one set, Black 47 founding member (and former New York City cop) Chris Byrne will hanker down on his prized uilleann pipes for a wicked solo as the band nicks Sly and the Family Stone’s “Thank You (Falettinme Be Mice Elf Agin).”

They cool things off with a quaint set of traditional reels before they raid Bob Marley’s rhythm for “Miss Eire,” a run-through of Irish rebel history set to a reggae beat.

Like a gun to the temple, Byrne unleashes a punk rock ethos on “Irish Catholic Boy,” the title track from the band’s last album. He does borrow a number of Black 47 fans that have remained loyal to him, which could result in a boost of attendance if promoted the right way.

Something blue: Irish music fans became aware of Eileen Ivers’ famous blue fiddle during her stint as the Riverdance band leader, where she thrilled audiences with Jimi Hendrix-like solos.

In recent years she has been backed by Immigrant Soul, a band of musicians that match her talent and stretch this Irish fiddler into new global terrain. “Afro Gig” and “Paddy Goes to Zululand” from their 2003 album showcase the band’s ability to mix it up with strong African percussion.

I’ve seen the band plenty of times and they never fail to thrill. Ivers’ face radiates fun as the band challenges her to new musical heights, and the audience members that might have been wary of the mixture of traditional fiddling and global beats are soon hopelessly under her spell.
For more information, log onto www.eileenivers.com.

A letter to festival organizers and merchandisers

Hey Guys:

This summer sure flew by for me. Where the heck did August go, for chrissakes?

For you, I bet the summer can’t move on quick enough. I can’t remember a worse year for the Irish festival.

Like the next Mel Gibson romantic comedy, you have yourself an attendance problem.

Sure, you can blame the hot weather, the World Cup, the change in venue and the economy. But the sad fact is, fewer people are buying what you’re selling.

I just came in from the one in Wildwood, New Jersey last weekend. It was run by a group of great people with the best intentions of promoting a culture, just like yourselves.

They had a great lineup of artists and a built-in crowd in this seaside summer vacation spot, yet they only attracted a couple of hundred people into their event.

The vendors were angrier than BP shareholders at an investor conference, meeting one another in the aisles to bemoan the lack of foot traffic. I’m not sure how well or poorly the event was promoted, but based on the low attendance in other parts of Jersey and last weekend’s festival in Bennington, Vermont, perhaps both Irish merchandisers and festival organizers alike are responsible for this sad state of affairs.

You see 'em out dancing with their flat caps on
Wavin' their banners and tippin' their drum
And the blood runs deep
When the booze is cheap
Long as you ain't got an agenda to keep
You can be a Weekend Irish, hey!
Aye, aye, we're the Weekend Irish.

These are lines I got from Kyf Brewer of Barleyjuice, from his song “Weekend Irish.” He played it at the Wildwood show. He is singing about a class of people these vendors are clearly catering to that leaves the rest of us feeling cold.

What’s up with a certain sector of Irish Americans and their addiction to kelly green clownery that is available at these shows? Do you ever see a real Irishman walking down Grafton Street wearing that loud crap?

The drunks you see lining the curb on any given St. Patrick’s Day parade, with their shamrock sunglasses, plastic green beer necklaces and emerald colored feather boas, look less like Irish people and more like the love children of Adam Lambert and the Jolly Green Giant. Ho, ho, no!

Look around any Irish shop here in the U.S. and you see the same fare. “Kiss Me I’m Irish” buttons and green shirts made in China? Check. The flat caps with patchwork designs? Check.
The Aran sweaters that went out of style when the Clancys played Carnegie Hall in the sixties? Check. The smattering of Guinness merchandise for the special alcoholic on your naughty list? Check, check, check!

Is this is what our national soul has been reduced to?

I have had a front row seat on Irish culture during my time at the Irish Voice these last dozen years. I have been in the snug of a pub with Frank McCourt, sipped tea with Bob Geldof at Fitzpatrick’s Hotel, and watched the nervous and bitten hands of Sinead O’Connor poke the air for emphasis during an interview.

In all my time as a reporter, none of these artists ever came to the interview wearing a shamrock brooch or a plaid pair of pants. So where did this cartoonish depiction of the Irish come from?

I have a good mind to gather all Irish merchandisers together on one school bus and drive them over to New Hope, Pennsylvania. It is there that the vibrant, innovative self-expression that I know in our artistic community is on full display at the Celt-Iberia Traders.

The store is an eclectic and unique gallery inspired by the rich and culturally distinctive art and craft works of Ireland and Spain that are rarely, if ever, presented in the U.S. The owners just moved to a bigger space, indicating that business is good.

It sounds weird mixing Irish and Spanish together, right? It’s like serving soda bread with paella.
Actually, there is a Galicia region in Spain that was populated by Irish and Scottish settlers. They blended with the local folk to create an offshoot of music and art that is every bit as Irish as a shamrock, but most Irish vendors are either too lazy or too scared to “mix Irish blood” to offer Galicia art to the summer Irish festival attendees. That is a shame.

In that shop that you’ll be introduced to the works of Sharon McDaid, who works in textiles and mixed media in her studio on the Malin Road outside Carndonagh, on the way to Ireland’s most northerly point, Malin Head. Her stuff is brilliant.

Sadly, Irish shops like the one I found in New Hope are few and far between, and I applaud the likes of Mary Foley Reilly of the Irish Centre in Spring Lake, New Jersey.

Sure, she stocks her store with some of the same green nonsense that everyone else does, but she also uses her showroom floor to promote the art of lesser known glass blowers, artisans, writers, and musicians that Irish Americans might not know in the hopes that a customer will slide a new cultural artifact into the bag along with their Claddagh sweater. Fair play to her, and we need more festival merchandisers thinking that way.

I actually tried to do something about this a few years back by joining one of the festival committees nearby. It was stocked with folks a good deal older than me. They held their meetings in the back room of the bar, with most participants rolling dry tongues and licking their parched lips with one eye to the bar outside during the critical planning stages.

I remember broaching the subject of bringing Black 47 onto the roster, but the universal consensus was that they were “too edgy.”

Now, there certainly was a time when the concept of mixing fiddles, political sentiment, and power chords was considered too dangerous in the early nineties, which was when Larry Kirwan and the lads first came together. But the scene is now so crammed with bands that are in that genre, like Barleyjuice and the Prodigals, that the mixture of traditional and rock is now mainstream.

Black 47, though still an immensely enjoyable rock act that is playing its best shows right now, is about as edgy as a butter knife 20 years on.

Instead, the organizers that year played it safe with a roster of folkies and the traddies that seem to share the same set list. “Fields of Athenry.” “Irish Rover.” “My Lagan Love.”

No, nay, never again, please!

The face of Ireland has changed forever, and it is no longer an odd sight to see a Polish or African musician join a traditional seisiun back on the auld sod.

Even on this side of the Atlantic, artists like Susan McKeown are mixing it up with Yiddish musicians on her new Saints and Tzadiks album and tour, yet she was curiously absent from most festival lineups this year. With so many Irish people marrying Jews here in the States (as I have), one would think that a little out-of-the-box marketing to Jewish communities would bring in more paying customers to our events.

You may be thinking to yourself that the Irish Voice has some nerve bringing this up, especially after you advertised here in the paper. Understand my concern comes from self-preservation, and I am not trying to bite the hand that feeds us.

I derive my living as a culture vulture, commenting on the state of Irish and Irish American rock. If this scene goes away, so do I. I know after reading this you might think that would be a good thing, but we both know better.

The time is right for us to capture the imagination of a broader audience once more by embracing the changing face of Ireland instead of sticking to this dated vision that appears to be trapped in a time when Maureen O’Hara was still of childbearing age and had real red hair.

What you’re selling at Irish festivals might go down well to an older generation, but they are dying off and the attendance records prove that.

To resume blockbuster attendance at these Irish festivals, I propose we put our heads together, maybe do some market research or online surveying, and use the viral attributes of Facebook and IrishCentral.com to get a sense of attitudes, tolerance for ticket prices, promotion, etc.

Any sales and marketing textbook tells you to find out what your audience needs and deliver it to them. Online technology makes that much easier and cheaper to do nowadays.

I’m not looking for a fight here, but I do think picking at a scab is the best way to heal the wounds of your balance sheet. If you need my help, drop me a line here at the office.

Still friends?

Mike