Donegal X-Press Hits NYC
by Mike Farragher
From the Irish Voice - May 1, 2001
The Donegal X-Press made tracks from their Baltimore home of Mick O'Shea's to the Big Apple recently, taking time to appear on Irish Radio's Adrian Flannelly Show before rocking the midtown Manhattan crowd at Connolly's that night.

DXP's special blend of rafter-rattling rock and punk attitude makes nasty with the sacred traditional Irish melodies that ooze out of their instruments. Brad Dunnels (singer, guitar), Lyle Hein (bass), Jason Tinney (harmonica, vocals), Jeff Malcom (drums), Skye Sadowski (violin) and Laura Hein (keyboards) played a loose set, with Skye's flailing ponytail keeping the beat throughout the performance.

Their irreverent approach to the traditional tunes of our heritage was lapped up by the animated crowd, as fists pumped during fast numbers like "Paddy's Lament" and "Tell Me Ma." "Pissed-Off Paddy Barman" was a set highlight, and it went down like cool stout after a hot day cutting turf in the bogs.

The crowd was peppered with DXP family and friends, including a group of enthusiastic band mothers who knew how to shake their tailfeathers. Rock on, mom! The cream of the New York Irish musical crop was there as well, including members of the Prodigals. This home team nodded approvingly as the DXP rolled through their amazing performance.
The triumphant return to New York is the icing on the cake of a great year for the band. After being named band of the year in this fine publication, their song, "Omagh," won First Place at the 6th Annual Songs for Peace Contest in Cork, Ireland, on March 4. After their swing through Manhattan, the DXP returned to the studio to finish work on their third album. The follow-up to the award-winning Quinn's Diaries (they topped the Irish Voice's list of top albums last year) should be out in the late summer timeframe.

"We've done these songs a million times already," sighs an exasperated Skye. "We're doing the mixing now, making sure that it sounds great." The band tells me that there are about 12 songs in the can.

While you are awaiting the release of their new disc, I'd encourage you to pick up a copy of the CD from the Wayfarers, a folksy outfit formed by Dunnels and Tinney. Their CD is a sparse collection of introspective unplugged tunes; with the exception of a harmonica riff that occasionally dusts the arrangements, the songs are largely made up of acoustic guitar strumming.

The songs alternate between the sweet singing of vocalist Laura Cosner and the spoken word poetry readings of Brad Dunnels. Cosner's voice has a great range that alternates between a seductive barmaid's pillow talk and the bluesy howl of a woman possessed.
You can hear the ache of waiting of a loved one on Dunnels' "Bus Depot," a track that chronicles the bustle of the bus station's platform. "I went to the ticketman and his eyes were desperate/I saw the mockingbird and I said 'mockingbird, don't mock me'/not unless you're the sweet bird who's gonna fly my baby home to me."

"Our music is really, in all honesty, old music," said Brad Dunnels during an interview with the Irish Voice last year. "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."

This poetic outlook on life filters its way into the beatnik lyrics on the Wayfarers CD. While most of the tunes on this collection are originals, The Wayfarers do an interesting version of "James Connolly/The Patriot Game."

Tinney's dusty harmonica adds a spaghetti Western gunslinger element to this traditional rebel tune. Although the Wayfarers is a radical departure from the Donegal X-Press, their gentle music serves as a great sonic aspirin to soothe the hangover that you'll pick up after the X-Press rattles your brain in concert. The Wayfarers play regularly at Mick O'Shea's, and they've recently added DXP drummer Jeff Malcom as bass player.