Back in the ‘90s there was a band called The Great Western Squares, a motley crew of punks and hippies, who produced two raucous albums of old school country music when alt-country was just a rumour amongst other Irish musicians. Now one of their singers, Gary Fitzpatrick, has a new group and there's nothing 'alt' about it. The Inistioge Folly sounds like the kind of olde tyme folk record you might accidentally find in a charity shop and quickly grow to love.
Fitzpatrick shares lead vocals and the songwriting load with Angie McLaughlin and the band provide accompaniment on harmonica, ukulele, mandolin, banjo, fiddle, and dobro. McLaughlin’s contributions contain the album’s only references to anything invented after 1900 (although that wouldn’t have stopped ‘Rainy Days’ or ‘Under The Moon’ from being hit records in the 1940s). They’re beautiful dateless things with loveless, hard-drinking protagonists and archaic phrasing, and his ageless baritone can anchor a song in a way that needs very little ornamentation. ‘Far Away From Home’ is the kind of plaintive blues song Johnny Cash might have dug out for his American Recordings series, while ‘The Shrew Shanty’ comes on like an English folk ballad unearthed by Steeleye Span. These songs, however, have been ‘unearthed’ from Fitzpatrick’s head and it’s good to see that, once in a blue moon, they do make them like this anymore.