John Richardson: Celtic Drums (New World Music)
Richardson, a founder-member of the Rubettes, makes inner peace music for his mantra healing clinic in Essex, but brings more balls to this orchestrated bamslam bodhran/percussion album, embellished with strings, flutes, recorders, a handy uileann piper called Aiden O'Brien, harp, bouzouki, mandolin, keyboards and trad/scat improv-lilting. It peeves me that Richardson baldly appropriates so many Irish traditional tunes - never mind the epic album concept of warring leprechaun tribes (I swear!). But the armies of drums and handclaps do shake up the system. A Dutch friend, grappling with the echoing handball alley of Irish history, asked me if this was loyalist music. No, I tried to explain, just enthusiastic English folk-mercenaries flowing into the wake of Riverdance.
By Mic Moroney
The Bridge Ceili Band: Sparks on Flags (Clo IarChonnachta)
With nearly every track prefaced by two decisively bounced chords on the piano, you're in sure, downhome ceili territory with this clipped, Midlands battalion of five fiddles, two flutes, one accordion, one piano and one drum-kit. It's a line-out they've maintained since May 1970 in the Girls Club in Portarlington in preparation for that year's Leinster fleadh, and the bustling snare drum has marshalled them through cups and rosettes ever since. Musically the repertoire is lively: the ould polka-switches of the Gan Ainm set, into jigs like the Romanesque Classic or the Galloglach, or the merciful fiddle-duet attention on Charlie Lennon's reel, Lady's Choice. The pounding unison has a solid gallop, which is great for picking out the bones of a neglected tune.
By Mic Moroney
