Clannamore
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Thursday, June 15, 2000 |
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Thursday, June 15, 2000 |
Clannamore. “Beer, Bawd, & Ballads” (Rockville Records)
On the completely opposite end on the live-CD spectrum is “Beer, Bawd, & Ballads,” the second
album by the Elizabethtown Celtic-music duo Clannamore (guitarist and singer Blaise Liffick and
his wife, dulcimer player and singer Alanna Berger).
Recorded last December at Bube’s Brewery in Mount Joy, a favorite Clannamore hangout, the record is rich with crowd noise and band-audience interaction. You can even hear laughter and the clinking of beer glasses between songs.
Its title, too, is self-explanatory. The two perform a collection of drinking songs, including “Beer, Beer, Beer” (with a really funny verse about a mouse who tastes spilled Guinness on a pub floor) and the Irish song “Whiskey, You’re the Divil.” Hence, the “beer” part of the title.
There’s also a crop of seriously raunchy tunes. “Scotsman’s Kilt” answers that age-old question (“what’s underneath?) by way of a drunken Highlander and a couple of curious maidens. “Jolly Tinker” is about a tinker who’s good at more than just mending pots. The pun-rich “Chastity Belt,” which Clannamore plays at Bube’s periodic medieval feasts . . . aw, heck, listen to it yourself. Thus the “bawd” part.
And there’s a selection of ballads, some sad, such as “Henry Martin” (about a young Scot forced into piracy to support his family), “The Leaving of Liverpool” (two lovers who must part) or “William Martin/Johnny I Hardly Knew Ye” (a cleverly interwoven set of Irish tunes about the ravages of war told from the perspective of both men and women).
Some are humorous, such as “Nightingale,” “Dear Boss” and “Ode to Evansville” (that’s Indiana, Liffick’s hometown). And some are spirited, such as “Pennsylvania” and “Let Him Go, Let Him Tarry.”
A set of Irish polkas (“Ger the Rigger/Maggie in the Woods/Bill Sullivan’s Polka”) and another of jigs (“Muckin’ of Geordie’s Byre/Tobin’s Favorite/Trip to the Cottage/Trippin’ Upstairs”) give the singers a break and show off Berger’s skill on the dulcimer.
All in all, it’s great fun. The couple’s down-home voices, often weaving around each other, suit the simplicity of the music to a T. They’re unpolished and sometimes a little ragged, but this is a live record, after all, and that quality only adds to its charm.
Kira L. Schlechter, who covers music and entertainment, can be reached at 257-4763 or kschlechter@patriot-news.com.