Vicar Street

A regular visitor to these shores (indeed, she has been living in Dublin for some months now, putting the finishing touches to a new album), Michelle Shocked connects with the kind of Irish audience who like nothing better than to kick off their shoes and earth themselves to the floor. Taking the barefoot route herself, Shocked proceeded to unearth the type of music that, when executed with equal parts wild abandon and bareknuckle confession, lends itself to frayed, rootsy greatness.

Alas, there was a little bit too much forced jollity for things to really take off. Aided and abetted by the unfeasibly talented texturing of Rich Armstrong, brass, guitar, and husky Hothouse Flower's Fiachna O'Braonain, guitar, vocals (and a man whom Shocked describes as "the wind beneath my wings"), it was only on a few occasions that the gig came anywhere close to above average.

Shocked is one of the most committed female singer/songwriters around, and has been touting her songs around the world from the mid-1980s. You would think that her numerous run-ins with the music industry might have turned initial enchantment into residual embitterment, but her good humour and modest, rural USA personality (albeit allied to her trenchant views) disprove this. It's a pity, then, that the good time ethos of her previous performances didn't exactly ring true on Monday night. Too much bluesy let's-have-a-good-time shouting, perhaps, and not enough considered, soft-song reflection?