Shane first caught my eye inside the pool room of McGrath's pub, Puckane, County Tipperary. The pool room and the main bar are separated by a wall, so to walk into that space and see Shane standing there with a pool cue in "our spot” was an unforgettable moment.

Alan Hayes turned to me and said, "Hey Sean, that's Shane MacGowan there in front of you.” As if I didn’t know.

A mixture of shock, disbelief and amazement took over as I watched Shane for several minutes, the massive medallion around his neck almost hitting the green surface as he racked the balls, and hovered around the pool table, apparently without a care in the world.

In was still the 27th of December 2003. Shane was wearing a black suit jacket, black trousers and a mixed-coloured button-down shirt underneath that strange medallion. The infamous hissing snake-like sound, familiar to Shane-watchers, accompanied the crack of the balls, on a table we had all played on many times with familiar folks but never with a 'man of the world', as he was referred to by one of the older local people on that night. He seemed very much at ease, as if he was in his local boozer and fame was a world far away. No one was really in his face. He could drink his pints of Brandy in peace.

LAZARUS-LIKE RESURRECTION

As the night progressed and the flow of drinks among the locals increased, things shifted perceptibly. Several people, mostly older folk, began to approach Shane with requests to sing 'Fairytale of New York’. This elicited a mildly cantankerous response, some unintelligible groaning, and low-key mutterings, from a man who seemed to have no interest in singing that tune on this particular night. I got the impression that this was a request he had been burdened with far too many times, in all sorts of gin mills across the globe. Kirsty MacColl's tragic death, on 18 December 2000, had been a source of deep pain for Shane. It wasn’t a place he’d choose to revisit if he could avoid it. Or so I imagined.

Illustration: David Rooney

At one point, however, to placate those making what were now incessant requests, he offered to sing ‘Fairytale' as long as a pretty brunette at the bar would do so alongside him. She flatly refused and that, it seemed, was that!

At approximately 9pm, the music entertainer booked for the evening appeared. A look of surprise and worry creased his face as he began to set up his guitar, microphone and speaker for what he had presumed would be a routine performance among familiar faces. He must have twigged that this was not going to be the case when he saw Shane's head down on the bar, a mere 7-8 feet from his alleged ‘stage’, in the corner of the room right next to the bar.

As the singer began his set, a noticeable shift occurred in Shane himself. A Lazarus-like resurrection seemed to happen inside the man. His head rose up and tilted towards the sound of music.

He got to his feet and approached the evening's entertainer. They exchanged a few words, unheard by the rest of the local patrons. Shane then sat on a stool in front of the nervous musician with a child-like grin on his face. As soon as it became clear that Shane would be singing a song, the crowd seemed to swell. All eyes were now on the musician’s area.

The sudden awakening that had occurred only proved that for Shane – regardless of time, place, circumstance or substance – the fundamental allure of musical intoxication was essential to the very fabric of his dynamic character. And then he was on...

RAUCOUS APPLAUSE

Shane's eyes squinted, a cigarette burned to the butt through his tobacco coloured fingers, as he belted out a couple of ballads everyone in the bar already knew the words to, from the rich volume, all stored inside his brandy soaked brain. At one point he banged an ashtray on the microphone to really send the crowd wild.

The atmosphere in the pub became electric, sizzling with sparks of delightful genius that glowed in front of us all, on what outside was a dark winter's night. As usual Shane's character sparkled the brightest. There was a hiccup of sorts when he turned to the improvising musical entertainer and delivered him an angry-bewildered glare: the instruction, it seemed, was to speed up the pace with the guitar pick. A nervousness settled on the poor man's face – this was not the night he had foreseen when he pulled up with his equipment only a short time before to do his job for the night – but he hit the musical accelerator and did his best to oblige.

Shane never did sing 'Fairytale of New York' that night, but a set of melodies heavily steeped in the blood and soil of Ireland, were belted out with electric spontaneity and received raucous applause along with broad smiles, raised pint glasses and shouts of "Go on MacGowan!! Go on MacGowan!! Go on MacGowan!!”

He did and we were there to witness the great man in action close-up. Now, all of 20 years later, with the incomparable Shane MacGowan gone and buried in Tipperary soil, it is a memory that will surely resonate down all the days.

Nenagh, Tipperary. Friday 8th of December 2023. Copyright Miguel Ruiz.