THE BEST OF 2000!
by Mike Farragher
From the Irish Voice - December 20, 2000
2000 was a banner year for Irish music. Artists as diverse as Everlast, U2 and the Corrs dominated the Billboard charts. Bands like the Prodigals and Black 47 ventured outside of the five boroughs to spread the American Celtic sound to all corners of the world; meanwhile, the likes of Neck, the Popes, and the Sawdoctors imported their vibrant sounds across the sea to American clubs.

There were so many great CDs produced by Irish and Irish American artists this year that it almost made up for having to endure the sonic scourge known as Westlife. Submitted for your approval is a list of personal favorites that arrived in the mailbag. Any of these great releases would make great stocking stuffers for you last minute shoppers. Happy Christmas!

10. Phil Coulter's "Highland Cathedral": yeah, yeah, I know. Given the other artists on this list, Phil Coulter's New Age sound blends in like Richard Simmons at an NRA cookout. That said, there's no denying the fact that Coulter has easily made the best record of his career. The ability to siphon the talents of up and coming artists for his own purposes is this man's forte, and he uses Highland Cathedral to showcase the spine-tingling talents of Donegal native Aoiffe. Her breathy, ethereal vocal adds a haunting quality to Phil's pristine piano arrangements. Bodrhans and bagpipes add marvelous textures to these "lighter than air" melodies.

9. Seanachai and the Unity Squad's "A Sunday at the Turn of the Century": the Irish community scratched their collective head when Black 47 founding member Chris Byrne left the band last Spring. Thankfully, this parting of the ways has left us with two great bands to enjoy. Byrne took his band into the kitchen of Rocky Sullivan's, where he plays every Firday, and cooked up a street savvy Celtic stew. Turntable scratches are right at home beside the pipes and tin whistles on "A Sunday." Byrne blends his trademark hard-hitting political raps with gentle history lessons passed between father and son ("Let Me Tell You Where You're From"). The sweet sounds of singer Rachel Fitzgerald ("Fields of "Athenrye") would melt the heart of the most hardened New Yorker.

8. Black 47's "Trouble in the Land": fans of the groundbreaking band Black 47 were treated to a CD that ranks among the best in the band's formidable history. Songs like the raucous "Bodrhans on the Brain" and the smoky ganja island beats that propel "Desperate" won the band some new fans around the world. These additions to their set list were instantly embraced by the legions of old fans as well. "It was a year of great change," reflects lead singer Larry Kirwan. "Chris Byrne left at the end of April. There was a sadness, but change is inevitable. Joseph Mulvanerty joined and has added a new dimension to the musicality of the group." Kirwan gave the Irish Voice a peek at the band's schedule for 2001. "My solo cd, Kilroy Was Here, comes out on Feb. 27. I'm currently writing the material for Black 47's next cd, which will be out in January, 2002. We hope to make a trip to the UK for gigs next summer, with a return tour of Argentina with gigs in Chile also in the Fall of 2001."

7. Rubyhorse's "Rubyhorse": This year saw the band travel from their hometown of Cork to complete their self-titled album in Nashville. A long road trip in support of Culture Club followed, and the band caught fire in amphitheaters across America. Their plan for world domination is simple: tour, tour, and then tour some more. The strategy is paying off. Their hard driving sound thrilled audiences and they won fans wherever they played. One of their famous fans, George Harrison, added some beautiful slide guitar playing on the hit single "Punchdrunk." As this paper went to press, the Rubyhorse songs "Punchdrunk" and "Teenage Distraction" were BOTH #1 in their respective charts on mp3.com, ahead of both The Offspring and The Deftones. The band has just released Rubyhorse on Horsetrade Records, and you can buy it by logging onto www.rubyhorse.com or by visiting your local Best Buy store. If you're looking for Cork's answer to U2, be sure to catch Rubyhorse when they tour the Northeast in January. This is "the next big thing," folks.

6. The Offspring of Shane McGown: the Popes, Shane's crackerjack backing band, stepped away from their joyously reckless leader to release the amazing Holloway Boulevard this year. Swirling Mexican mariachi into their whiskey-soaked barroom sound, the Popes expanded on the foundations that Shane laid with the Pogues. Another Shane alumni, guitarist Leeson O'Keefe, released the fine EP CD Psycho Ceildh with his band Neck!. The brakes have been removed from this rocking machine, and the Celtic punk sound hits the eardrum like a runaway train. Neck has done numerous gigs along the Eastern corridor, occasionally sharing the stage with the likes of Black 47. Don't miss them during their next swing into your town.

5. The Lancaster County Prison Band's "Death Waltz 2000": if Johnny Cash and the Ramones snorted shamrocks before hitting a Dublin stage, they might sound like The Lancaster County Prison band. A wildly original blend of punk, dung-kicking country, and bagpipes, the band were white-hot in backup slot on this year's Shane McGowan tour.

4. Kila's "Lemonade and Biscuits": tribal percussion, tropical rain stick sounds, and esoteric instrumentation blend with Kila's traditional Irish sensibilities to produce a tasty sonic brunch. Would you like some kiwi and guava juice with those rashers and black pudding?

3. U2's "All That You Can't Leave Behind": the boys from Dublin peeled away the techno-barnacles from the hull of their ship to uncover a sound brimming with a sweet soul and a renewed purpose. The Edge's arena rock bravado is front and center in songs like "Kite" and "Walk On."

2. Sinead O'Connor's "Faith and Courage": since she ripped up the pope's picture, the Catholic church has made buying Sinead O'Connor's records a cardinal sin. Fortunately, the greatest female Irish singer of all time has created a killer soundtrack to keep you company during those hot days in Hell. The woman that our race loves to hate roared back at her detractors with a disc that is naked and raw in it's confessional tone. Her public comments often have her contradicting herself, and this dissent is evident in the disc's grooves. She swears off men in the pop treat "No Man's Woman" right before she paints her face and dons "thigh high boots" to snag a man on the furious "Daddy I'm Fine." She apologizes for her past sins against humanity while lounging in her own "Healing Room." Sinead employs hard driving rock, reggae, and folk to tell the stories that make up this latest chapter of her fascinating career. No self-respecting music fan should be without this disc.

ARTIST OF THE YEAR
1. The Donegal X-Press' "Quinn's Diaries": "our music is really, in all honesty, old music. It's the music of Ireland and America. It's wide-open spaces and stone crosses. It's East Coast harbors in the early 1900s, but it's also Kentucky Bourbon, a 70s baby blue convertible Cadillac, cowboys and Indians, Coca-Cola and twizzlers. We are still trying find how all of that fits together." That's how guitarist Brad Dunnels describes the sound of his band, the Donegal X-Press. Does he really believe this trite diatribe, or is he just pulling our collective leg here? You never know, and this tongue-in-cheek tone of the lyrics within the notes of Quinn's Diaries always keeps you guessing. After slogging through the bags of CDs that arrived at the Irish Voice offices this year, I can confidently say that no one is producing music that's more exciting or original than this Baltimore-based band. This outfit changes musical styles like socks on Quinn's Diaries. I haven't heard a band mix punk, rock, and jazz this well since the Replacements called it quits. Biting beatnik poetry wafts over a furious bodrhan beat on "12 Round Knockout." The traditional nugget "Tell Me Ma" is reworked in the hands of the group; the old melody is sped up to warp speed and it helps tell the story about chasing underage girls on Bainbridge Avenue. "Irish is as Irish does/I like my peaches without fuzz." Indeed. The X-Press run the gamut of great drunken singsongs ("Pissed Off Paddy Barman," "Raise Your Glasses") and political commentary ("Omagh") in their repertoire. They call the Baltimore bar Mick O'Shea's their home, and they use the watering hole to test the boundaries of Irish music on their rabid fan base. They sometimes splinter off to form side projects that add a creative fuel to the goup's engine. Dunnells and vocalist Jason Tinney combine spoken word poetry, Irish ballads and original compositions in the genre of the "sheanachai," or story teller. On any given night, the Wayfarers will treat the audience to a grab bag of Irish, rock, folk, blues or Jazz in a laid-back atmosphere. Lyle Hein (bass player) has formed his own band, ominously known as the Sheepshaggers. With a name like that I GOTTA hear what this sounds like. What does that say about me? The Donegal Xpress has an exciting 2001 planned. Brad and Lyle recently went into the studio with local hip-hop producer Hugh Harrell to lay down some possible tracks for the next Donegal X-Press album. Once some ideas are sifted through, the entire band will begin recording in January.