Paddy Hanna: Oylegate (Strange Brew) ★★★★☆
Paddy Hanna has been a critics’ darling for years. Oylegate, his fifth album, may not help him cross the line to commercial success, but if there is some contentment in writing songs that make the weight of the world less burdensome, then he has achieved that, at least. Produced by Daniel Fox of Gilla Band, the album features silky-smooth alt.pop/rock – which is strikingly ironic given that the songs’ lyrics are influenced by “the crushing lows and euphoric highs of parenthood” and “by an artist embracing change rather than fighting it”, as Hanna puts it in the album notes.
Lullahush: Ithaca (Future Classic) ★★★☆☆
The Athens-based Dubliner Daniel McIntyre, aka Lullahush, is on to something with Ithaca, his paganistic marriage of traditional Irish music and twitchy electronica. The album is a brazenly multilayered piece of work, by turns serious and skittish. Irish colloquialisms and spoken word sit beside spine-tingling sean-nós (Saileog Ní Cheannabháin’s An Droighneán Donn), Hawaiian guitars, techno drones, the vocals of Maija Sofia (radiant on Jimmy an Chladaigh) and the most imaginative version of Patrick Kavanagh’s Raglan Road you’re likely to hear. Occasionally messy it might be, but McIntyre has fashioned something different here, something bold, something else.
Cushla: Tech Duinn (Foehn Records) ★★★☆☆
Cushla’s debut album, Tech Duinn, a collaborative project between the Wexford-based producer Marc Fernandez, the Co Kilkenny composer and remixer Leo Pearson and the Co Cork Gaeltacht singer Nell Ní Chróinín, pleasingly ventures to places we’re becoming very much accustomed to. Tracks such as The Mountain, 7 Years, Aisling, Fós and Geantraí nimbly fuse sean-nós with soft drum-machine pulses, synthesiser embellishments and engrossing ambient music.
Maria Somerville: Luster (4AD) ★★★☆☆
Maria Somerville has never been reticent about drawing influences from her native Connemara, but what marks her out as an original is the way she complements the uneven, magnificent wilderness of the landscapes with lush shoegaze and slow-motion postpunk. She wrote and recorded most of Luster at home, close to Lough Corrib, with notable contributions from Ian Lynch of Lankum, who provides uilleann-pipe drones on Violet, and Margie Jean Lewis, who plays violin on Flutter.
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Danny Groenland: Burning Rome (self-released) ★★★★☆
Danny Groenland’s album Burning Rome brings influences of Steely Dan, Weather Report, Marvin Gaye, Curtis Mayfield and D’Angelo to its meticulously executed soul/jazz. The narrative focus may not be joyful – themes include homelessness, inequality, mental health, police brutality, climate change, racism and genocide – but not one song on the album is a drag to listen to. From soulful summer heat (Somewhere) and Steely Dan-style silkiness (Work Out) to piano ballads (Never Going Home) and positive vibes (Chip In), Burning Rome sizzles from start to end.
