On The Record »

• Dexys: one of those things

  May 17, 2012 @ 8:33 am | by Jim Carroll

  Let’s talk about the passion again. It will not have escaped the attention of those who study the music media for comings and goings that Kevin Rowland and Dexys have returned to the limelight with a new album “One Day I’m Going To Soar”. There have been a couple of interviews, a stomping set of five star live shows showcasing that new record and an appearance this week on Later With Jools. For those who know Dexys merely as the “Come On Eileen” band who soundtracked school discos, there is sure to be much frowning, shoulder-shrugging and so-whatery accompanied by comments about what the band are wearing (Dexys were always at the cutting edge of satorial elegance) rather than what the band are playing.

  But for those who have spent years going back time and time again to albums like “Don’t Stand Me Down”, “Searching for the Young Soul Rebels” and even the often overlooked Celtic Soul Brothers’ thump of “Too-Rye-Aye”, the prospect of “One Day I’m Going To Soar” is an exciting one. Aside from Rowland’s solo albums (the second of these, “My Beauty”, released by Alan McGee’s Creation), there hasn’t been an album of new music under the Dexys (nee Dexy’s Midnight Runners) moniker since 1985. There were reunion shows in 2003 and occasional sightings of Rowland as a DJ, but no work attempting to match or even better what was in the back-catalogue has arrived until now.

  It will be interesting to guage the reaction to the new material beyond the heartland of older music writers who grew up with Dexys myths playing out in their imagination. Oh, how we lapped them up: the team of hard-chaws exuding pugilist charm in On the Waterfront reefer jackets and caps that met in caffs and went running together, the band who went from Top of the Pops’ fixtures in dungarees, berets and stubble with “Eileen” to release “Don’t Stand Me Down” and confuse the hell out of everyone with a much different sound and preppy, classic Madison Avenue, pre-Mad Men advertising executive tailoring (the attire was always an important part of the Dexys’ story), the stories which emerged from Rowland’s infamous Reading Festival appearance in 1999, which he talks about here.

  But it was the music as much as everything else which fired up your imagination. 1980s’ “Searching for the Young Soul Rebels” wasn’t a debut album so much as a statement of intent, Rowland and his soul warriors channeling the spirit of veteran soul men like Otis Redding and Jackie Wilson, the romantic passion of Van Morrison and the brassy soul of deepest Birmingham into a set which burned brightly.

  Two years later, “Too-Rye-Aye’s” barrage of fiddles, brass and impassioned genius (that would be Rowland aiming for the stars and getting there) made for a wonderfully rough-house affair with Rowland’s fascination with Van Morrison back when Van was decent continuing to form a startling Caledonian soul album. Brave, bold and audacious, “Don’t Stand Me Down” was the high water mark of Rowland’s soulful odyssey. Surprisingly mellow and countryified in places, “Don’t Stand Me Down” was, oddly, badly received on its release in 1985, but is now regarded as something of a lost treasure. “One Day I’m Going To Soar”, then, has a lot to live up to.

  After the jump, you’ll find an interview I did with Rowland back in 2007 when he came to Dublin to do a spot of DJ-ing. He talked about etiquette, burlesque and, yes, Van the Man. He also talked about the new songs he had written and how important it was not to rest on his laurels.

  “It’s good to move on, it would be pointless to be singing about nothing or performing old songs that don’t mean anything to me. I’m someone who has to express exactly what I feel. Anything else just won’t do.”

  

  
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• Oh no, here come the purists!

  May 2, 2012 @ 8:29 am | by Jim Carroll

  We’ve had a few issues with purists of late, which may or may not have had something to do with the upcoming referendum. It began with the theatre lads, who arrived here last week with pitchforks, scarves and copies of “Dramaturgy for Beginners” to chastise us mere philistines for deigning to write about theatre. Over the last few days, the music mob have joined the party. We’ve seen a plague of purists descend on poor Nialler9′s gaff armed with fiddles and bodhrans after he had the temerity to write about traditional Irish music in the context of five acts he was recommending to his readers. Such an intervention, harumph the purists with a swish of their beards, will make the little numerically-obsessed bolloxhead think twice about writing positive things about Irish music again in a hurry.

  Ah, purists. There is nothing like them and their ways. They are the tribe who turn the joyful into the joyless. Obsessed about making sure that everyone knows their place – and, if they don’t, can be quickly reminded of it – the purists are capable of ruining everything they put their minds to. You can’t write about theatre, for example, unless you’ve spent two decades watching terribly produced Irish plays about alcoholic sons blaming their woes on distant fathers (I’m screwed on that score as I’ve only a decade under my belt). You can’t write about traditional music unless you’ve spent years soaking up the sessions in rundown, dusty pubs and are on first-name terms with various aul’ lads with fiddles and squeezboxes in distant Gaeltacht hamlets. Nialler9 fails on that score as he speaks more Mandarin Chinese than the Gaeilge.

  I had a belt of the garage rock purists’ leather jacket during SXSW when I tweeted excitedly about The Coathangers and was informed with a haughty sniff that the band had been around for years and I should have known better. That was me told, I can tell you. And let’s not even start with the Irish rock purists, the ones who believe there’s no such thing as a bad Irish rock record and are constantly on the lookout for the smallest infraction of the unwritten regulations to have a bit of a fume about (apparently, all the sheep must baah in the same way so it’s now a criminal offence to link to a different website to everyone else, even if it contains the same album). Them’s the rules and you risk the snobby ire, scorn and indignation (indigestion?) of the purists if you mess with these in any way.

  The purists came to mind the other night during a conversation with a musician friend of mine. This person has played music since they were a chisler and has been in various bands over the years. Their current resume includes spells playing Irish traditional music, post-rock, bluegrass, old-timey, indie, ambient rockabilly, electronica and other sounds lost to the mists of time. Like many musicians, this person can talk about, eulogise and deconstruct what they do and why they do it until the cows come home. There’s not a hint of the music purist because the natural curiosity about what happens when musicians from different backgrounds and genre make-ups come together and start to play trumps any rules.

  It makes sense because life isn’t perfect and the best things usually occur when people from different backgrounds come together and combine their talents. Musical purists, like Irish Catholicism back when everyone was kicking with the same foot, don’t want change or innovation. Whether it’s Irish traditional music or jazz or country and western, purists want things to remain the way they’ve always been. There is no room for anything else. Change and progression are verboten and anyone who messes with this state of affairs is subject to a barrage of slings and arrows. Innocent outsiders looking for kicks and thrills, who nonchalantly come on the scene with their hands in their pockets whistling a happy tune, are to be viewed with suspicion because they might upset the applecart. The state of affairs should remain how it has always been, with a chorus of tuts and sighs to reinforce the barriers.

  But to hell with the purists. Nothing good has ever came from sticking a set of rules and regulations around culture and arts. It should not be about maintaining how things have been since your father’s father’s time, but reflecting how the music works in the context of today. Keeping the music in cotton wool and bashing outsiders who mess with traditional tenets is protectionism at its worst. A bit of outside influence won’t do any harm.

• On the Record on the road in the U S of A: New York City (take two)

  April 13, 2012 @ 8:55 am | by Jim Carroll

  The final OTR on the road diary. Hope you’ve enjoyed the trip

  The voodoo took root in Brooklyn for Easter. New Orleans’ sage and free spirit Dr John is currently holding down a residency over three weekends at the Brooklyn Academy of Music (BAM). It began with Mac Rebennack doffing his cap to Louis Armstrong and will end with him and a bunch of other Nu Awlins’ champs onstage this weekend.

  But it’s the three shows in the middle of the run, with Rebennack playing his new album “Locked Down”, which caught our attention. Produced by Black Keys’ guitarist Dan Auerbach, “Locked Down” is an album influenced by the connections the producer heard between Dr John’s gris-gris and the Ethio-jazz plotted by Mulatu Astatke. It’s an intriguing prospect: can you really build a bridge between the soul-jazz high-life of Ethiopia in its Seventies’ pomp and the rolling gumbo of New Orleans’ most colourful cat?

  Within a few bars of the shimmering, snaking title track on Easter Saturday, though, it’s obvious that Auerbach was onto something with this transcontinental boogie. There’s a sprightly bounce and eerie glow to the sound, which behooves all to shift in their seats to get a little closer to the action. That punchy panache and fascinating vibe never lets up for the entire set as the musicians go at the songs with hammer and tongs.

  If Auerbach is the ringmaster who put all of this in place (and he’s stage left tonight to play guitar and subtly direct the traffic), Rebennack is the star turn. It’s been a long, strange, eventful trip for the onetime session player for Sonny & Cher who became Dr John the Night Tripper in the late 1960s after a brainstorming session with pals in Los Angeles.

  Since the release of the outstanding “Gris-Gris” debut album in 1968, Dr John has become the embodiment of a very individual freak scene which takes in New Orleans’ enigmas, psychedelic rock rhythms and a theatrical stage stance.

  Yet even those shenanigans can get a little stale after 40 odd years of playing “Mama Roux” every time you hit the stage (though his post-Katrina album “City that Care Forgot” bucked that trend), which is where Auerbach and “Locked Down” come into play. Like many vintage acts before him, Rebennack has benefited hugely already from the collaboration. “Locked Down” hasn’t reinvented the wheel, but it has pushed it in a different direction which gives Renennack new momentum and, perhaps, a new audience too.

  The bout of Saturday night fever evoked by the BAM performance is due to a few things. In part, it’s down to the band, the same bunch of powerful musicians who played on the album and who previously added their stamp to records by acts from Amy Winehouse to Lee Fields. In part too, it’s down to the material, a bunch of songs which sees Rebennack taking the mask off and reflecting on the bigger issues around faith and family.

  The real reason for the boogaloo, though, comes down to the man in the middle of the stage behind the Farfisa and Hammond B3. Sure, there’s the odd nod to that patented Dr John stage shtick – and yes, there’s also a few glances at the more popular corners of the back-catalogue with solo piano nods to “Tipitina” and “Such A Night” – but this is about the power and precision of a very strong album and Rebennack is extremely hip to that fact.

  He also knows that he is at the helm of a very hot band, who are keenly tuned to every spike and swing in the music, from “Ice Age” to “My Children, My Angels”. When they turn their attention to the classics like “I Walked On Guilded Splinters” and “Black John the Conqueror”, a whole new set of expectations take flight.

  If Auerbach has been the facilitator who has shown Rebennack a new way to skin a cat, you know that the man himself just won’t leave it at that. Expect the good doctor to relish this new lease of life for some time to come.

  

• Going back on the reunion trail

  March 2, 2012 @ 9:45 am | by Jim Carroll

  Once upon a time, a band getting back together again was an event. Now, the reunion is part of the career plan.

  Look at the first list of acts announced fro this year’s Electric Picnic bill, for instance, which was announced yesterday and features several familiar faces which you thought you’d never see again.

  Say hello (again) to The Cure. Welcome back (again) Orbital. And you’ll also be getting Nineties gothcore (again) from Cranes, whether you like it or not or even can remember them from the first time around.

  

  But they’re not the only ones who have a longing on them to get back into action with their old muckers. This summer, you can’t move for bands of old getting doing the reunion shuffle. From the Stone Roses to the Cranberries, it’s time for hugs, smiles and collective bonhomie – at least in public.

  For some acts, it’s an interesting u-turn. They may have called it a day while they were still just about on grunting terms with eachother but, fast-forward ten years, and the acrimony of old is forgotten when solo projects fail to ignite and bill payments are overdue. Nothing beats the lure of a big cheque to overcome any lingering doubts band members might have about doing one more for the road.

  Sometimes, the reunion works wonders for act and audience. There are many who speak highly of recent reunion shows by Pulp and Blur as highlights of those particular years.

  Sometimes, though, the reunion reminds you vividly that the band in question will never be able to relive their glory days whatever they think. Case in point? Pixies, who returned to great acclaim in 2004, but who quickly became part of the furniture by playing anywhere that would have them. Lethargy and disinterest soon followed from all but the hardcore fanbase. That should serve as a warning to those bands sizing up the reunion trail for the summer.

• Robbing the Banks

  February 7, 2012 @ 8:47 am | by Jim Carroll

  It will probably take most reviewers longer than Azealia Banks was onstage in Whelan’s last night to write their reviews of her Irish debut. Then again, did anyone who paid their money and took their chances on the next big thing’s next big thing – the Lana Del Rey you won’t hear on mainstream radio (yet) – really expect anything more than Banks, her DJ and a short, snappy, punchy set of half-a-dozen bangers done and dusted within half an hour, a show which was more club PA than gig? There was far more surprise in the news from Thurles last night than anything that happened on Wexford Street.

  This was always going to be the hype show, the fun gig you could crow about seeing when she blows up later in the year. That’s the way the event gig meme goes. And we’ve been here before. In fact, roughly a year ago, we were actually in the exact same spot with Mona, a band who ended the same year playing an under-the-radar student show in the city and licking their wounds when they didn’t turn into the Kings of Leon.

  Will Banks go the same way? At this stage, it’s anyone’e guess. We all know “212″, that brilliantly bolshie rudegirl banger delivered over Lazy Jay’s “Float My Boat” and that’s a hit. Going on the lusty way the crowd sang along with that (and, surprisingly, a couple of other tunes too), Banks has shizzle which could be converted into gold when the Paul Epworth-produced album lands later in the year. Yes, this could finally be the year when someone who tips the hat to Yo Majesty, Neneh Cherry and wisecracking, voguing downtown NYC trannies is what it takes to make a hit act.

  Mind, and this is not going to surprise anyone, she’s still got a long way to go on the gig front. The sassy, hardchaw, tough-talking, don’t-mess-with-me-bub attitude works well in the context of a mobbed Monday night at Whelan’s, but take it up a notch and that alone is not really going to fly. It’s difficult at this stage – especially when there’s no album to judge matters – to see how the show will be bulked up, but it will happen. If this is going to work, it can’t be just Banks and the hyperactive, jiggerbug DJ Cosmo on that stage.

  The question, though, is if it will work. We’ve had filthy-mouthed female rappers before and we’ve had more Princess Superstars than Nicki Minajs in terms of any crossover in that regard. Right now, Banks has game thanks to “212″, but she needs half-a-dozen more of those jams to retain the heat. Perhaps Lazy Jay has a few more grooves hanging around for her to get on? After all, going on what we heard last night, Banks and co are fans of pumped-up, jumped-up funky-dunky slammers, but these need to be more distinctive than Diplo rejects to make a splash.

  For now, though, it’s thumbs up for Banks. Last night was big fun, a giddy night out with the belle of the moment. A sign of the times that more and more promoters are going to cop on to is that there’s a big market here as elsewhere for catching the hot, rising acts before they come to the boil or start to simmer. You don’t need the old tools – the radio hits, the old-school press spin, the posters on every wall – to sell out a show if the act is as hot as this. The temperature may well have changed next time around, but last night’s done and dusted and Banks most definitely got a result.

  

• The high profile absentees from the end-of-year lists

  January 17, 2012 @ 9:14 am | by Jim Carroll

  Now that 2011′s musical comings and goings have been settled (though we’re still waiting for the Irish record industry to let us know about sales for the year – they’re obviously too busy suing this plucky little outcrop of rock in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean to get the stats out as quickly as their UK and US peers), it’s interesting to have a look at some of the more high profile absentees from those end-of-year lists we were all fuming about a month ago. Yes, it was just a month ago.

  While there were some acts who dominated the lists, there were others who were oddly missing from the running. Our old friends Radiohead released an album in 2011, but this is something which could easily have escaped your attention when you were going through those best albums-of-the-year lists because “King Of Limbs” just didn’t feature as heavily as previous albums from Thom Yorke and friends. Oh, yes, I know that you could spot it here and there in the also-rans, but it didn’t light up the sharp end like PJ Harvey, Adele or, indeed, previous albums from the band in other years. While I’m sure the band are happy enough with how the album performed, it’s telling that the album didn’t quite capture the imagination beyond that of the dedicated core on this occasion. Perhaps the musical worm has turned here.

  Another act who didn’t quite dominate list proceedings as much as when she launched her current album was Florence & The Machine. “Ceremonials” is a decent album, but it’s no “Lungs”. The album release may have come with all the major label trimmings you’d expect like big ad campaigns and media coverage, but it didn’t quite last the pace to those end-of-year lists because all seemed a little tired of Ms Welch and her dramatics. If we wanted an album which was the same as a well-received debut but slightly different to justify the hype, we were going for Bon Iver or Fleet Foxes.

  Of course, it’s unlikely that either act will be unduly worried by their poor showing in those 2011 lists. Both acts are still capable of selling out big rooms and headlining festival stages so they haven’t suddenly lost their lustre and commercial appeal overnight. Yet it’s telling nonetheless about how album which are well-received by fans and critics – and albums which come with a well-executed marketing plan – doesn’t translate into stickability. Even applying caveats about the wisdom of a crowd (especially the perceived wisdom of a crowd of critics in many cases) and the fact that much better albums were released in 2011 than “King Of Limbs” and “Ceremonials”, their failure to strike it large is still telling about the disconnect between well-reviewed albums and how they play out a few months later.

• Eurosonic 2012 – Friday night, Saturday morning and Saturday afternoon

  January 16, 2012 @ 9:02 am | by Jim Carroll

  The hits kept coming at Eurosonic on Friday. After chairing the Irish music in Europe panel – which came to the conclusion that Irish acts need to work harder and smarter (and get a few lucky breaks) to make a splash in Europe – it was time to get on the bike and hit the road again.

  We started with Hauschka playing at the gorgeous Stadsschouwburg music hall (the German composer’s prepared piano pieces were the stuff of wonder and made us appreciate his last couple of albums all the more) and ended a couple of hours later with the haunting, twitchy, slo-mo hypnohouse of Stay+ at Simplon. There were a couple of duds encountered inbetween – buzz bands like Citizens!, Zulu Winter and especially the risible Tribes (the world’s first Razorlight tribute band fronted by Bryan Adams’ fans) didn’t quite zing as much as their champions hoped – but you could quickly move on to the next venue and experience something much better.

  Acts earning a mention in the OTR despatches include Honningbarna (our band of the weekend turn out to be a bunch of Norwegian brats playing fast, fierce and furious punk rock. You won’t forget their intense, wild-eyed frontman in a hurry, especially with that blue jumper and how he wielded his cello like a machine-gun), Iceage (menacing, thrilling and edgy punk rock from the Danish teens behind the bracing, brave “New Brigade” album) and New Build (the latest Hot Chip offshoot played their fourth ever live show and impressed with spacey, vibey disco jams).

  We also had mad love for Philco Fiction (sweet, dreamy fjord-pop from the Oslo-based trio Philco Fiction whose current album “Take It Personal” is full of graceful, striking, off-kilter pop ideas), Vondelpark (the act named after an Amsterdam park turn out to be four-strong in number, all the better to embelish their deep, dreamy, snowblind, slo-mo shoegaze beats and abstract Night Nurse bleeps), The Cast of Cheers (on the evidence of new songs like “Animals”, album number two from the now tighter than a mosquito’s tweeter Cast of Cheers is going to blow a lot of minds) and Jennie Abrahamson (dark, spry, hugely likable pop sounds from a member of Ane Brun’s touring band).

  Niet stoppen til je genoeg: Daughter (this must be what Other Voices is like as Elena Tonra’s beautiful, hushed, bare-bones, melancholic folk-pop caused goosebumps all round in a lovely atmospheric old church), Cashier No 9 (a band whose swagger is really coming on apace and no wonder given the strength in depth of their “To the Death Of Fun” album), Emeli Sande (we finally clicked that our favourite ex-neuroscience student reminded us of Tasmin Archer), Funeral Suits (a band who are getting better and bolder with every passing show – all eyes now on their debut album which, the band say, will be released in April) and Toby Kaar (corking electronic grooves, bright ideas and smashing new tunes)

  Saturday is Noorderslag day in Groningen when the Dutch pop and rock acts come out to play and the vast majority of the non-Dutch visitors leave town. But there was one last act to catch and that was the amazing Lefties Soul Connection playing an afternoon store at a downtown cafe. I’ve known about the Amsterdam band through their stonking version of DJ Shadow’s “Organ Donor” (see video below). Live, they were smoking, throwing down an alluring mix of Hammond organ swing, Daptonetastic soul (especially with soul belter Michelle David out front) and meaty, gritty funk. A big ol’ good time hit.

  

• Eurosonic 2012 – it’s the new rock’n'roll

  January 13, 2012 @ 10:44 am | by Jim Carroll

  If it’s January, it must be Groningen and time for OTR to return to the lovely Dutch city for the annual Eurosonic festival. For a couple of nighrs. festival bookers, radio programmers, agents, promoters, media folk and your ordinary decent music fan run around the city to try to see as many of the acts playing as possible. OTR has decided to be at least 21 per cent more productive this year by hiring a bike to get around. Now, that’s the new rock’n'roll.

  2012 is the year of the Irish at Eurosonic as Ireland becomes the festival’s focus country. There are 21 Irish acts playing – 22, if you count the Irish-born and Bristol-bred 2:54 (a lot of twos in there) – as well as various Irish-themed events in the convention (I’m moderating the We’re Not At Eurovision Now, Dorothy panel later today). You can’t avoid the Irish this weekend, bud. It will be interesting to see, though, what effect this Irish exposure will have overall. The main way to guage a band’s success at Eurosonic is in the amount of summer festival bookings received afterwards, which is one of the main props of the European Talent Exchange Program (ETEP). Given the amount of festival bookers in attendance last night, I’d say God Is An Astronaut will be in clover afterwards, while Lisa Hannigan’s name has come up several times already.

  Highlights from the first two nights zipping around the city include the aforementioned 2:54 (spellbinding, bootgazing swirlscapes from the Thurlow sisters with hues of Belly and The xx in the mix) and God Is An Astronaut (“Remembrance Day” alone was worth the price of admission as the hugely under-rated band – at home, at least – instrumentally rocked out with great aplomb). It was also hugely significant to see James Vincent McMorrow in one of the biggest rooms at the festival, especially as he played one of the smallest rooms here last year. McMorrow also won an European Border Breakers Award to cap a great year for him – and that album campaign ain’t over yet either.

  Others to check out from sightings include Francois & The Atlas Mountains (alluring bang of Beta Band and Animal Collective from these merry pranksters who also specialise in Kraut-fro grooves and oddly sweet synchronised dancing), Theme Park (lovely breezy tropical pop with “Wax” as the hit tune of the night), Lianne La Havas (stunning songs and perfectly pitched performance from one of the brighest tips for 2012) and Boy (cute-as-a-button new-school pop from a German duo armed with a fine band).

  More from the despatches: Tove Styrke (name-drop clanger alert: it was Lykke Li who tipped me off to this Swedish popster already turning out some wild songs like “Million Pieces” and “Call My Name” at this early stage), Rocketnumbernine (incandescent improvtronica and renegade soundwaves with the oomph factor from the Page brothers), Thulebasen (hat tip to from Lizzie Newton from SXSW for alerting me ages ago to these Danish freak-scensters with oodles of out-there notions to their filthy synth jams) and Spector (bespoke crombie-indie with dashing hooks and interesting stitching from the sharp-dressed men).

  Proof of 21 per cent increase in OTR productivity this year: Redinho (soulful, grimey cuts and bleeps from the Numbers-affiliated dude who may well “do a SBTRKT” but without the mask), Jessie Ware (old-fashioned soul with new-school footing from one of the finest new voices you’ll hear right now) and, leaving one of the best till last, Madeon (17 year old Nantes’ producer tearing up the gaff with crazily addictive pop-dance hooks and big-room bangers. Hit!)

  More reports to come. You’ll find a full list of acts playing here and if you want to recommend some non-Irish and UK acts (I’m up to speed on those ones), please do so below.

• David Bowie at 65

  January 10, 2012 @ 1:46 pm | by Jim Carroll

  It will not have escaped your attention that David Bowie turned 65 at the weekend. There were a few gigs to mark the birthday, plenty of lengthy articles hailing the man hitting the bus-pass milestone and a lot of Bowie on the radio. What was missing, though, was Bowie himself. The man behind Ziggy Stardust, the Thin White Duke and Bowie bonds sat this one out.

  But there’s nothing new about this: Bowie has been absent from the music business coalface for quite a few years now. There’s the odd murmer from other parties (such as this to-do about Bowie’s retirement when a biographer did some musing to flog a book) and there’s always chatter about a new album, but the Duke abides.

  What’s fascinating about this silence is how it has amplified our view of the performer. While many of his peers spend their time doing heritage band tours to grow the pension pot (slowly demeaning themselves and causing lots of back problems as they do), Bowie just stays quiet. You won’t find him, as Alexis Petridis points out, telling us about his daily grind on Twitter. You won’t find him plotting a comeback by appearing on The X Factor or American Idol. There’s a dignity in Bowie’s refusal to play the game. Why bother with the industry stuff when the myth is far more enticing and exciting? And that legacy continues to shine brightly the longer Bowie stays away.

  It’s just guesswork to think about a new Bowie album or even what it might sound like, but you can be sure Bowie would know exactly what he was doing and what he was after long before he goes into the studio if that ever happens. I read Nile Rodgers’ fantastic “Le Freak” over the Christmas break and he talks in the book about working with Bowie on the “Let’s Dance” album.

  When the artist and the producer first talked about the album, Rodgers remembers Bowie going on about “the freedom to be flexible and do music the way he wanted…he was compelled to find what was beyond the horizon”. While this was music to Rodgers’ ears, who was keen to find new experimental means of composition at the time, what Bowie wanted was an album with hits. As simple as that. He wanted Rodgers to give him hits. And he got an album full of radio hits.

  At the time, Bowie didn’t have a record deal so he paid the bills for “Let’s Dance” himself which might explain why the recording sessions in New York with the band recruited by Rodgers took just 17 days. “Let’s Dance” revolutionised Bowie’s career. It may not be remembered as fondly as those albums from the Seventies like “Low” or “Station to Station”, but it’s the one which set up Bowie as a commercial giant and got him back on mainstream radars when it came to radio and tours (the subsequent Glass Spider tour fetched up in Slane in 1987).

  On that occasion, Bowie got what Bowie was after and there’s little to suggest that it wouldn’t be the same next time out – if there’s ever to be a next time. An artist like Bowie doesn’t get to this position without weighing up the options, taking wise counsel and recruiting the right people every time. Perhaps he’s just waiting for the right people to come along. Perhaps he’s decided that there’s little he can add to the story right now. Perhaps, indeed, he’s decided that silence is the best policy in his golden years.

• One Saturday night in Dublin city

  November 14, 2011 @ 8:54 am | by Jim Carroll

  Who said there was a recession in live music? On Saturday night in the capital, it seemed from text messages and tweets as if every venue was bringing its A game in terms of bookings and audiences responded at the door. You had Andy Irvine & Paul Brady doing it for the folkies in Vicar Street, Wiz Khalifa at large in the Olympia, Maverick Sabre rocking the Village, Ane Brun keeping it sweet in Whelan’s, Twin Sister wowing the indiesomethings in the Grand Social, a rake of pop acts giving it up for charity at Childline in the O2 and black metal lads Gorgogoth at the Button Factory. That’s a fierce rake of gigs for one night in a city at a time when money is too tight to mention. If Saturday night wasn’t enough to be going on with, you had St Vincent at the Button Factory, The Naked & Famous at the Olympia and the Fountains of Wayne at the Academy last night. And the assistant business editor of The Irish Times can’t be the only old goth bleating on about the Sisters Of Mercy at the Olympia on Friday night.

  That’s an impressive list of acts for any weekend of the year. Hell, you’d probably buy a ticket for a festival if you’d all of them on the same bill (especially if there was a chance of a duet between Gorgogoth and Westlife). There are times when promoters get it bang on. It didn’t seem as if any of the acts had been put in a venue which was too big for them and clangers were not dropped.

  I had plans for some binge-gigging on Saturday night but, an hour into the first show on my list, I just couldn’t drag myself away because the Robert Glasper Experiement at large in the Workman’s Club was quite an occasion. This was two hours deep inside the groove, a wonderful excursion into those space-age lines where jazz vibrations and post-Dilla hip-hop intersect and you’re transported away to another dimension. This ain’t your Daddy’s jazz, bud, this is something else entirely. It swung, it swayed, it went left, it went right and then it roared through the roof. By the time the band took “Smells Like Teen Spirit” apart, gave it a thorough rebooting and re-arranged it again, the audience was well and truly hooked.

  The three musicians onstage have the kind of form you know makes for a feast. Glasper was last in Dublin 2 playing with Q-Tip, but he’s also worked with Mos Def, Kanye West J Dilla, Erykah Badu, Jay-Z, Talib Kweli, Common and other hip-hop and r’n'b bold print names as well as helming a bunch of albums in his own right. You’ll find bassist Derrick Hodge on a bunch of records from some of the above as well as jazz luminaries like Clark Terry and Terence Blanchard plus a bunch film scores as musician and composer. Chris Dave is usually on drums, but it was Mark Colenburg this time around, a St Louis drummer with another heady pedigree. No sign of saxaphonist Casey Benjamin on this occasion.

  Glasper and co are at an interesting juncture in their trip. A new album “Black Radio” comes out in early 2012 and it’s a whopper, with Badu, Bilal, Mos Def, Meshell Ndegeocello, Lupe Fiasco, Lalah Hathaway and others on the microphone. It’s an all-star jam where the tracks just hit their stride with no fuss or drama and pull you into their stream. It’s also an album which will be interesting to tour because you’re just not going to get those vocalists together on the same stage for an entire run of dates.

  As things stand, Glasper will be due an upgrade next time out when he hits Dublin because there will be considerable positive post-match word-of-mouth about this show. An interesting hip turnout too, with considerably more non-jazzers than purists in the room. Chalk this down to Glasper’s considerable hip-hop cred, but also down to the more promiscuous musical tastes of the music massive in ’11.

  Promoters may scratch their heads at how they get crowds these days. The traditional methods don’t quite work as well as they used to do so how do you flip the script and still fill the hall without losing your cash? Some will go gung-ho down the social media road and annoy everyone they come across. Others will simply take out more ads and wonder why these don’t work.

  The answer is to choose their act wisely because they’re the ones who cross all the tracks and do all the hard work to begin with. This year, we’ve seen packed rooms gather to see acts like Baths, Gold Panda and Star Slinger, acts where the buzz has happened largely with imported rather than domestic media because potential audiences don’t rely exclusively on homegrown media for pointers any more. Just how much ink and coverage has Glasper received from Irish sources, for instance? The trick is to know when to make a punt on an act who is getting all that traction and to put ‘em on in a venue where the costs and the door-take make sense. Of course, it all changes when it comes to scaling up to bigger venues (and you’re on your own there, pal), but it’s worth remembering that there is enough adverturous, sussed gig-goers out there to make choice punts worth a go.

• Taking time to get the talent right

  November 11, 2011 @ 10:00 am | by Jim Carroll

  In the end, it comes down to talent. Forget about spending your time advocating for radio quotas for Irish bands, agitating against Spotify’s royalty rates and giving out yards about not getting support gigs. They’re important, but not as important as having the talent to write a song which gets everyone singing along in the first place.

  Broadcast on BBC1 during the week, Simon and Garfunkel – The Harmony Game, Jennifer Lebeau’s excellent documentary on the writing and recording of the duo’s “Bridge Over Troubled Water”, provided a masterclass in what talent is all about.

  Paul Simon may have written the timeless title track, but it was Art Garfunkel’s voice which made that song soar. Unlike what happens in the fairytales, the song didn’t just appear overnight in Simon’s imagination. It took time to fashion that tune from a raw demo and rough idea into a recording which record label boss Clive Davis knew on first listen was one of those once-in-a-decade tunes.

  It’s important to remember too that “Bridge Over Troubled Water” didn’t sound like anything else on the radio at the time. When it was played, it stood out from what came before and after it. While many acts and labels would baulk at the idea of releasing such a strange tune as a single, Simon & Garfunkel took a leap of faith and the rest is history.

  For acts, there are plenty of lessons in all of this, but many will chose to ignore them. After all, grumbling about not getting played on daytime radio is easier to do than writing a brilliant song. After all, if Simon & Garfunkel were more concerned about radio, we’d probably never have got “Bridge Over Troubled Water” in the first place. Time to acts to realise that the really important stuff comes down to what they do with the talent they have.

• Here comes the Chop-Up

  November 2, 2011 @ 9:24 am | by Jim Carroll

  There’s an unspoken rule about reviewing live shows which I’m going to break in the very first line: you never talk about the audience. You’re there to review what’s happening on the stage and not in the stalls. Unless the audience decide to pelt the act with cushions (see Aida at the O2 in 2009) or boo like crazy (Cat Stevens in the same venue also in 2009), you ignore them. Yet it’s well worth noting that a full Vicar Street turned out last night to see, enjoy, appreciate and rave about a show where they probably hadn’t heard most of the material ever before. Hell, up to a week or two ago, the musicians onstage for the Honest Jon’s Chop-Up hadn’t even played together before. Yet it all came together superbly. It wasn’t flawless but the best things in life aren’t perfect.

  Most were here because of the man who sat to the left of the stage for the show with a big grin on his gob for the duration. To use that hoary reality TV show trope, Damon Albarn has had one hell of a journey. I remember seeing him on the Rollercoaster tour nearly 20 years ago when Blur were touring with My Bloody Valentine, Dinosaur Jr and The Jesus & Mary Chain and stuck out like a sore thumb. That was followed by the Britpop years and the post-Britpop years, when Blur became more interesting than everyone else. Take in the Gorillaz adventure which has taken Albarn to some weird places and the other solo projects and star turns like The Good, The Bad & The Queen and add in an engaging curiosity about music and his fellow musicians which has taken him from Mali to the Congo and you’ve got one of the modern music’s most fascinating characters. Noel Gallagher may give good interviews and Liam Gallagher may flog expensive parkas, but I think I prefer the idea of Albarn throwing musicians with very disparate styles and sounds together in the manner of last night’s dazzling Honest Jon’s Chop-Up.

  Albarn, though, will point out that he’s just one of 16 musicians who come on and offstage all gig long, yet none would be there if it were not for his involvement in the Honest Jon’s set-up. Do you really think that a bona-fide rock superstar like Flea would find himself jamming on an uptown Dublin stage with the Shangaan Electro gang and house producer Theo Parrish were it not for Albarn?

  When I interviewed him last week ahead of this show, he talked about how compatibility is what attracts him to potential collaborators: “will they all be able to listen to each other and play with each other? Will they be able to crossfertilise ideas? We always want to select open-minded, talented musicians, but they need to be able to co-operate as well.” For Albarn, collaboration has become key over the years. “I suppose I’ve mellowed into it. I’ve matured into having an appreciation for and an ear for all voices. That for me is necessary, because I like to learn. It’s like going back to school every time I meet a new musician.”

  I don’t know about you but I don’t remember school being this much fun. From top to toe, this was a show which glowed and glittered. There was an exuberence to the playing and performance throughout, which was all the more remarkable given how this was very much on the hoof for just four shows. From the Hypnotic Brass Ensemble (the hardest working men on the night, given that they were onstage for nearly the entire show) and their dad Phil Cohran to Afrobeat grandmaster Tony Allen providing the beating heart of the operation from the back and Malian vocalist Fatoumata Diawara adding the sweetness, here were musicians just buzzing off the art of the possible, something Albarn seems to have dedicated his recent musical adventures to pursing. That it’s lead to everything from Gorillaz to DRC Music is proof that if you follow your imagination, it will lead you to some strange, magical places. And the best news is that there’s probably a whole lot more to come.

• Bon Iver and the big rooms

  October 24, 2011 @ 8:36 am | by Jim Carroll

  He was never going to stay on the downlow, was he? Too much has happened since Justin Vernon released that first Bon Iver album, the flawless, desolate wildness of “For Emma, Forever Ago”. Too many people have copped onto his voice, his songs, his sound for him to remain a secret. When your narrative includes references to Kanye West and your song “Skinny Love” becoming a favourite to be butchered by kids with stars in their eyes on The X Factor, things were always going to get strange. He was never going back to that cabin in the wilds of Wisconsin.

  The last time Vernon was around these parts, it was 2009 and he was playing the Big Top at the Galway Arts Festival and the craziness was just about to begin. Of course, he’d played three Dublin shows in the space of six months the previous year, as the promoter made the most of a hot act, but what happened between then and now is quite something else. Those off-stage noises mentioned above and the second Bon Iver album meant Vernon had to move on up. Forget about the big tents and the festival turns, the big rooms were calling and about to become the norm.

  It’s always telling when an act reaches this juncture and can sell out a venue like the 2,111-capacity Grand Canal Theatre without blinking an eye. The move from the micro to the macro demands a response. What do you, as an artist, do in these circumstances with your show when you have to fill a big room? Do you add dancers, backing singers, orchestras and elephants? Do you keep the core of the sound intact and hope the venue gets in enough extra PA to reach the back rows? Do you curtain off large sections of the stage and hope no-one notices? Or do you do something else entirely?

  In the case of Vernon, you get the gang in (the Gayngs? in and book an extra tour bus. There were nine musicians onstage for last week’s show, which means the songs can be stretched, amplified, reworked, recast and spun in far different directions than was the case when Vernon was first in these parts and hunkering down on stages with a handful of musicians. Instead of enticing the listener in by virtue of the sparse, spooky space between the lines, the Bon Iver band now have the manpower (and the chops) to provide an abundance of musical scaffolding to build and augment the melodies.

  There are times, though, when all that extra punctuation from brass and strings threatens to flatline and muffle the songs. But as the musicians win out the room, the hurt and melancholic tones in Vernon’s voice are beautifully balanced by the band’s pows and wows. Their sound turns songs like “Stacks”, “Calgary” and especially “Holocene” into glorious, strange symphonies. Yes, there’s the occasional moment when Dan Fogelberg, Phil Collins and the gorilla from the Cadbury’s Dairy Milk ad stride that stage – and not just on the soft-rock indulgence “Beth/Rest”, to be fair – but let’s call that a cul-de-sac and move rapidly on.

  Many may find the new Bon Iver width, depth and volume too much of a remove from the Bon Iver who initially coaxed our interest in 2007 and 2008 (certainly, it’s a different beast to the one encountered by me at SXSW ’08). Artists change and move on. You either embrace what’s happening and let your ambitions roam or you do a Ryan Adams and sulk back to your pit. And if those ambitions entail supersizing your band and touring the bigger rooms of the world, so be it. Remember that there would also be complaints had Vernon simply went back to a cabin and killed a few more deer. It’s only when artists evolve and challenge themselves that you see their true colours.

  Overall, it’s a triumphant show, as much for how the audience are willing them to succeed as the newly minted melodic pyrotechnics in the songs. By the time next summer comes around and the band are playing in the open-air, this show will be a very interesting beast. What happens beyond there is down to Vernon and the songs which come next. The strange narrative may well have many more chapters to run.

• Hard Working Class Heroes 2011: the pointyheaded overview

  October 10, 2011 @ 9:36 am | by Jim Carroll

  Now, that’s what we call a weekend. The ninth Hard Working Class Heroes’ shebang hit the capital’s streets with a plethora of gigs, panels, conversations and gossip between bands, fans and those who make a living connecting one with the other. To our eyes, there was a hell of a lot more people binge-gigging every night (yes, including a school night like Thursday), which is a very good thing. It’s all very well to talk about some sort of boom in Irish music but it’s nothing without people standing out front checking out the bands and roaming in a pack from venue to venue. After the jump, the news, views and pointyheaded opinions from #hwch11.
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• Weak Tea and bad satire

  September 27, 2011 @ 9:51 am | by Jim Carroll

  When RTE first aired Green Tea earlier this year, it was obvious to all that there were many problems with the radio satire show fronted by Nob Nation dude Oliver Callan. Of course, it takes time for a show to find its feet, especially a political satire show given the heavyweight precedents for that particular beast on the national airwaves.

  This time around on the show’s second run, though, it’s obvious that the people behind the scenes have not actually done anything at all about the main problem with the show: it’s just not funny, sharp or satirical in any way, shape or form. Like all satirical shows, it gains its juice by caricaturing and magnifying the more ludicrous elements of its victims. But Green Tea prefers to be light rather than dark, a succession of sketches with funny voices which seek to lampoon the character’s traits and mannerisms rather than actually tear the more pompous elements of the political gallery apart. It’s not likable enough or nasty enough to stick in your memory. It’s as if Callan is happy enough to slag his victims off, but stops short of angering or annoying them for fear they might not invite him around for a cup of tea in the future.

  However, it’s not just Callan who lacks an edge. With the exception of occasional Gift Grub sketches (and we’d be interested to hear if Apres Match could do the do on radio as well as on TV), Irish radio satire has all the attack potential of a three day old kitten. From (Un)Funny Friday on RTE Radio One’s Liveline to the terrible sketches which pop up now and again on Today FM’s Last Word (indeed, every radio show’s attempts at cutting-edge satire), Irish radio prefers to paint cosy, rhyming pen-pictures of the cast of rogues and scoundrels at its disposal rather than villify them in any way. It lacks that dangerous edge or element of surprise, that moment when you stare at the radio and go “did they really say that?” Of course, we still stare at our radios and go “did they really say that?” but it’s with a groan rather than a note of surprise. We know what we get with Callan and co turn their attentions to Enda Kenny or David Norris. We know the lines and the weak spots. We also know that they’ll inevitably throw Ryan Tubridy, Paul Galvin and Miriam O’Callaghan into the mix. We know they won’t go for the real loopers on the national stage because they’re afraid we won’t recognise them. Irish radio satire as predictable as an Irish summer.

  Perhaps it’s really down to the long shadow cast by Scrap Saturday and a fear that you’re competing with a show which can’t be bettered because it really went to the edge and back, though it’s hard to believe that a show which ran for just two years over 20 years ago still has such an effect. But when you remind yourself of the show’s highlights (many captured in this article) and remember how the Irish political culture of the time reacted to the sketches, you quickly realise that Scrap Saturday was a much different, darker, funnier beast. Maybe we were living in much more innocent times or maybe the targets the late Dermot Morgan, Gerry Stembridge, Pauline McLynn and Owen Roe had to aim at were far better bad guys to be aiming at, but the sketches show that they were going hell for leather for the jugular every time and didn’t give a toss who they offend. Now, that was satire.

• So, how was your weekend?

  August 2, 2011 @ 9:07 am | by Jim Carroll

  That was the action-packed August bank holiday weekend and, given that OTR was out foreign, we want to hear from you. Reviews, reports and remarks from and about Prince, Castlepalooza, Indiependence, the Reich Effect, Moz (any more bon mots – or, if you like, insensitive, malicious attention-seeking clangers – from ol’ bigmouth?), the latest batch of @ the Park gigs, the Dublin Super Cup, the imploding David Norris 4 Prez campaign and the weekend’s GAA games are welcome. Hell, there may even have been OTR readers who were at the Waterford Music Festival to see Fiddy and Faithless. We’re all ears.

• Oxegen 2011: the pointyheaded overview

  July 11, 2011 @ 9:59 am | by Jim Carroll

  Well, that’s that for another year. You’ll find all the Irish Times’ reviews from the weekend at Punchestown Racecourse here as our reviewers scratch their chins about everyone from The Strokes and Tinie Tempah to The Pretty Reckless and Friendly Fires at Oxegen 2011. As for the by now customary pointyheaded overview of the who, what, why, when, how and where, click this way….
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• The Doors and the problem with classic rock

  July 5, 2011 @ 9:59 am | by Jim Carroll

  There is nothing classic rock loves more than the chance to mark an anniversary. Classic rock is obviously not in the business of producing anything new – of course, some of the practitioners do have a go, but the results are never as good as what’s already in the canon and is usually only of appeal to the die-hards – hence the reliance on new ways of selling old rope with reissues and anniversaries as the main weapons in the arsenal. It’s why Paul McCartney appears to be on the cover of Mojo magazine most months – there is always an old album to be reissued and another interview to be done with McCartney about what happened back in the day. The fact that these reissues and retrospectives also sell more than the vast majority of new acts ever will should not be overlooked.

  Every time I walked by a radio yesterday, I clocked a Doors’ song as the DJs unlocked the classic rock vaults to mark the 40th anniversary of the death of one of the most over-rated frontmen of all time. Jim Morrison was just 27 when he died in a bathtub in Paris in 1971, so chances are he would still be touring and acting the gom onstage had he lived until today. It would probably be a different live show to the one which made all the headlines during their pomp, but you could imagine them doing one of those @ The Park gigs which were getting heavily advertised inbetween all the Doors’ tunes yesterday.

  Despite the fact that we live in an era when music tastes are hugely eclectic, everyone still has blind spots when it comes to what they like and don’t. While I can appreciate why people like heavy metal or hard rock, those genres are not for me. I’ve tried to go beyond mere appreciation, but there are too many other fish in the sea.

  When it comes to actual bands (and we’ve been here before), a significant bugbear are The Doors, a classic rock band you think you should be able to appreciate because of their place in the musical family tree, but who’ve never made an iota of sense to me. Everything about them – Morrison’s ridiculous sham poetry, the melodramatic pomp of the music, the elaborately over-wrought romance of the songs, the rock’n'roll cliches of their entire career – is a turn-off. They are the band who give classic rock a bad name and, worse, who gave so many terrible bands a handbook to follow.

  You could always tell the bands who followed the Morrison star a mile away when they came onstage. Years ago, I used to do a lot of DJ-ing in old-school Dublin venue, the Rock Garden. You’d start playing tunes at 8pm and keep playing between bands until the place would shut at 2 or 2.30am. The vast majority of the acts you’d get on that stage were bad, but the worst offenders by far were the acts who came through those doors of perception and took a wrong turn. They believed that they were the spiritual children of Morrison when nothing could be further from the truth. Just to bang the point home with a large sledgehammer, there would always be a hokey version of a Doors’ tune in the set. Whatever about the originals, the covers were coming from a different planet entirely. All you could do was shake your head with disbelief and cue up something completely different to play once they’d hopped off the stage in an effort to disinfect your ears.

  Yet even after all these years, The Doors abide and their appeal shows no signs of abating. With every passing year, the records continue to be played, the royalties are paid and the myths get louder. They’re one of the acts who hit the classic rock jackpot and whose music made it into the canon. Because of how the business has changed, this is something most new acts will never be able to achieve. Indeed, the number of acts who will join classic rock’s ranks in the years to come is going to become less and less. Yet the genre itself will sadly continue to roll.

• The 30 best albums of the year so far

  June 28, 2011 @ 9:32 am | by Jim Carroll

  You know the score as I’ve done this in 2008, 2009 and 2010. Here’s a rundown of the 30 albums which have impressed me the most over the first six months of this year. Yes, folks, it’s a list.

  Some notes before you dive in and get listing: I reckon if this list was compiled a fortnight from now, I might well be finding room for Gillian Welch, Tieranniesaur, DJ Quik, B-Movie Lighting and Ricardo Villalobos & Max Loderbauer, as all of these albums have arrived in the last couple of days and come highly recommended. Albums are in no particular order, bar the first three on the list. Links provided to reviews and interviews which I’ve done for The Ticket.

  Nicolas Jaar “Space Is Only Noise” (Circus Company) (review)
  Tune-Yards “Whokill” (4AD) (review, interview)
  Adele “21″ (XL)
  SBTRKT “SBTRKT” (Young Turks)
  James Blake “James Blake” (Atlas) (review, interview)
  The Middle East “I Want That You Are Always Happy” (PIAS) (review)
  Lykke Li “Wounded Rhymes” (LL)
  PJ Harvey “Let England Shake” (Island)
  Shabazz Palaces “Black Up” (Sub Pop) (review)
  Anna Calvi “Anna Calvi” (Domino) (review)
  Braids “Native Speaker” (Kanine) (review)
  Beastie Boys “Hot Sauce Committee Part 2″ (Parlophone) (review)
  Paul Simon “So Beautiful Or So What” (Decca)
  Friendly Fires “Pala” (XL) (interview)
  Mark E “Stone Breaker” (Ghostly International)
  Holy Ghost! “Holy Ghost!” (DFA) (review, interview)
  Belles Will Ring “Crystal Theatre” (Dot Dash)
  White Denim “D” (Downtown) (review)
  Cashier No 9 “To the Death Of Fun” (Bella Union)
  Cloud Control “Bliss Release” (Infectious) (review)
  Metronomy “The English Riviera” (Because) (review)
  Jamie Woon “Mirrorwriting” (Polydor) (review)
  Charles Bradley “No Time For Dreaming” (Dunham) (review, interview)
  Bon Iver “Bon Iver” (4AD)
  TV On the Radio “Nine Types of Light” (Interscope)
  Dutch Uncles “Cadenza” (Memphis Industries)
  The Unthanks “Last” (EMI)
  Dels “Gob” (Big Dada) (review)
  Tyler, the Creator “Goblin” (XL)
  Julianna Barwick “The Magic Place” (Asthmatic Kitty) (review)

• There goes Rhymin’ Simon

  June 21, 2011 @ 9:38 am | by Jim Carroll

  Sometimes, we can take artists like Paul Simon for granted. He’s in the master collection, for sure. Those albums with Art Garfunkel, the early solo records, the magnificent exuberence of “Graceland”: Simon has produced a body of work which has both bent to the will of the times and probably helped to define some of those eras too. There’s always been a permanent feeling of curiosity to his sounds, a sense that he’s never been happy to just do what his peers have done. He was always looking for something else.

  He’s still at it today. Simon’s latest album “So Beautiful Or So What” is a beautiful, engaging, warm-hearted set of songs. There are spry, gleeful, gleaming Afropop guitars providing the scaffolding for nimble songs where the soon-to-be-70-year-old muses on the philosophies of life and death. It’s a humdinger which deserves an audience.

  I wonder how many of those who trotted down to Vicar Street for last night’s event gig (Simon joining a long list of big-room acts like Neil Young, Bob Dylan, Kanye West and Justin Timberlake who’d played such shows at the Thomas Street venue) had listened to the album before the show. In years gone by, you’d have already checked out and analysed the new album long before you went to the show. In the topsy-turvey new-music-biz world, chances are that just doesn’t happen. Now, the album is there to plug the tour rather than the act touring to plug the album. You make your money and your traction on the road.

  Simon’s show was a masterclass in how to join the dots between the past and present. Sure, he played the hits from various stages of his career, but those new songs flourished in such lofty company. Between the nods to “Graceland” with “Boy In the Bubble”, “Diamonds On the Soles Of Her Shoes” and a lusty “That Was Your Mother” (you quickly realise that Vampire Weekend were ripping off, sorry, “influenced by” the sounds of “Graceland” and not, as they claimed, some tapes of Afrojive) and those glorious fleece-wrapped memories from the very old days like “Kodachrome” and “50 Ways To Leave Your Lover”, there was the beautiful shape-throwing of the new album’s title track or the playful rhymes of “The Afterlife”. Even the covers pebbledashed throughout the show – a tough take on Jimmy Cliff’s “Vietnam” to place “Mother And Child Reunion” in the context of its Jamaican birth, “Mystery Train”, “Here Comes the Sun” – were perfectly chosen.

  There’s more than just Simon onstage. The eight-strong cast of musicians with him add spectacular flourishes and shades to the song. The playing is subtle, unforced and sympathetic to how the leader wants to pitch those songs because those songs really are the show. “The Sound Of Silence” may be 47 years old and may well have been played thousands – millions? – of time by now, but it hasn’t grown old. When Simon sings it, the room is naturally bathed in silence as memories flow.

  They really aren’t making ‘em like Simon any more. It’s taken decades of songcraft and stagecraft to produce a show of such exquisite quality. I’d seen Simon twice before, once when he brought a boisterous “Graceland” show to Dublin back in 1987 (1987!) and once in 2004 when he had reunited with Garfunkel, but the understated panache and poise of last night’s gig shows that Simon has perfectly captured where he is right now. Sure, he’s looking back (the crowd are certainly demanding that), but those new songs and the new record indicate that he’s still motivated to keep kicking, prying and asking questions. He won’t be around forever – these musical veterans eventually stop, as seen by the death at the weekend of the great Clarence Clemons – but it’s reassuring to know that he’s not prepared to go quietly into the night.

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