Unusual, Edgy New Irish Music Albums Recommended for “St. Patrick’s Month” 2023

By Bill Nevins, Contributing Writer, Freelance Journalist

The GREAT DAY is soon upon us: March 17th — Saint Patrick’s Day, when all the world is Irish, or would like to be. And what would the day be without Irish music? That music has gone through heavy changes in recent years, and there’s not much of the old too-ra-loorah-lay left. But it’s fascinating stuff. If you’d like to get your ears, and your dancing feet, ready, why not start with a few of the newer Irish music albums out there, all available via CD, LP or download via BandCamp or your outlet or streaming service of choice? They are each a wee bit off the beaten shamrock path. (To sample some of these diverse Celtic sounds, tune into the Sirius XM Loft program “Celtic Crush” every Sunday morning.)

Here are my personal suggestions:

Seo Linn, Anuas

A delightful collection of songs, mostly in the Irish language, that reach back into the old traditions but with a contemporary spark. Seo Linn are a long running Irish band who also happen to host a fun weekly podcast from their base in Limerick.

Turner and Kirwan of Wexford, Absolutely and Completely

I first met these lads in Malachy McCourt’s legendary bar The Bells of Hell. I knew instinctively that these young Irish immigrant long-hairs were “gonna be huge”, as Dave Letterman later declared. This is the great “lost” 1977 album (plus many tasty “extra tracks”) of the two Wexford, Ireland-born NYCity-based recording artists Pierce Turner and Larry Kirwan who each went on to the “new wave” band Major Thinkers, and then to stellar, ongoing, solo careers. Along the way, Kirwan co-founded the beloved political band Black 47, which had a grand 25- year run. This is the album which shows us how these two already-experienced Irish performers started out in America as a prog-rock duo playing quirky pop tunes laced with extended keyboard solos, firey guitars, catchy lyrics, heavy drums and fine singing. The stand- out tracks are “The Girl Next Door”, a cheerfully- delivered but sad song whose topic was racy enough to get the album banned from Irish radio, and an epic re-imagining of Ewan MacColl’s “Travellin’ People”. “Father Reilly Says Goodbye” and “Warts ‘n’ All” are also intriguing songs. It’s a fine start to two grand, prolific musical careers. This album may be ordered via https://shop.bandwear.com/search?q=Turner+and+Kirwan

Tau & the Drones of Praise Misneach

The title word in Irish means “cheerfulness” or “optimism” and this latest album from Irish singer Seán Mulrooney and his eclectic band of musicians begins with a tree rather cheerfully lecturing humans on respecting nature, then evolves into a sort of neo-pagan gospel service and celebration, and a grand one at that, with Damien Dempsey, drums, pipes and the shadowy folk called Tua de Danaan joining the party. Blissfully wild stuff, reminiscent of the heydays of the Incredible String Band.

Lankum, False Lankum

This long-awaited post-Covid album by the phenomenal Dublin quartet of singers and multi-instrumentalists, to be released March 24, promises to be their strangest and most intriguing collection yet, on the evidence of the advance video “Go Dig My Grave” which hones in on Radie Peat’s eerily ancient-sounding singing: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qhqpQiXnFx0

Cursed Murphy Vs. The Resistance, Republic of the Weird

This is the second album from Cursed Murphy Versus the Resistance, the eight-piece ensemble based in Wexford, Ireland, led by writer and musician Peter Murphy. This new album integrates orchestral elements, using analogue synthesizers, multi-tracked violin and choral parts alongside the band’s trademark noise guitar and propulsive rhythms. Thematically, the tracks range from sinister carnival calls (‘Something Wicked This Way Comes’) to eruptions of anger and compassion (‘Hold That Line’), existential bewilderment (the title track), songs of lost love (‘The Agony of the Leaves’), trauma and war (‘Upon That Hill’, ‘Federal Hall’). “Republic of the Weird refers to the state we’ve been living in for the past five or six years,” Peter says. “It’s about what happens when a generation of people who grew up on punk and electronic music, on dark sci-fi and speculative books and films, wake up one day to realize that their world has started to look like a present-day dystopia. But the feeling is strangely hopeful and inspiring too. We’re proud of the sound and the spirit of this record. It’s an album about future shock, but also hope and resilience.”