The Chieftains Collection: The Very Best of the Claddagh years (Ceirnini Cladaigh)
God be with the days of screeching along on a tin whistle to these blunt marches, planxties and dance tunes, here rescued from the Ceirnini Fada series, Chieftains 1 5. Some of it survives better in the memory, but it's still good to revisit Paddy Moloney's vigorous, rough-cut piping, Sean Potts' whistles, Martin Fay's and Sean Keane's fiddles, Michael Tubridy's flutes/concertina, Derek Bell's histrionic harp and Peadar Mercier's ultrasonic bodhrans - all stomping around Aughrims and Athenries of the imagination. The orchestrations are inimitable - the whistle mania of Morning Dew, the prosecution of Tabhar Dom Do Lamh, the psychedeliain-woolknits of Samhradh Samhradh. Trail-blazers to be sure.
- Mic Moroney
Mike McGoldrick: (Vertical Records)
Many younger fluters are embracing the jazz-trad fusion template embraced by this nicely accomplished musican on his generously-produced new solo vehicle. Some tunes are traditional, while others are selfpenned in that sugary, jazz-purly idiom which destabilises melodies into off-beat, syncopated pastures. Joined by Capercaillie's Donal Shaw (who also produces/programmes), piano-accordionist Alan Kelly, Dezi Donnelly's fiddle, Manus Lunny and singers Karen Matheson and Karan Casey, Og), McGoldrick negotiates a dense mix of tablas and snares over acid-jazz drums'n'bass, muted trumpets, flangey/wahwah guitar, scripted 1970s-funk bass, etc. It's a quickly exhaustable idiom, but they achieve plenty of vibey, voluptuous grooves.
- Mic Moroney