Songs From A Small Room

In celebration of the institution that was once the weekly Tuesday songwriter night at the International bar comes Songs From A Small Room, a collection of live recordings from the final two Tuesday sessions featuring performances from the likes of Glen Hansard, Gemma Hayes, Luka Bloom and Nick Kelly. As you would expect from such a line-up, there are a multitude of hi-lights. Glen Hansard’s ‘Lay Me Down’ is a gorgeous blend of smooth, beautifully charged acoustic guitar and a sleepy, soulful violin, swept along by the lull of his soft, heady vocals. Nina Hynes’ ‘The Other Side Of Now’ is another gem, her voice soaring over notes hanging resonant in the air and underscored by the odd coarse cough or clink of glass from the audience that’s adds an immediate intimacy. Mundy steps up the tempo with ‘The Sound Of Keys’ – “It’s hard to write a sad song when you’re happy, that’s why I’ve done none for you” – and Sinead Martin delivers a stunning performance of ‘Not Here’, all guitar and tripping melodies.

Songs From A Small Room is one of those rare live albums that really captures the moment. It places the listener in that tiny, dingy yet sparkling little room and engages, enthrals and entices them with raw music without the trimmings, unabashed by a mid-song cough or wrong note. It leaves in its wake an overall fragile, delicate quality that’s real – not digital or processed or imaginary. It’s a popular pursuit among music fans critics to argue the merits of what constitutes ‘real’ music. In judging this album I’d guess that the jury would be unanimous. This is as real as it gets.