Artist: O'Rourke, Declan
Label: V2
Release: 2006
Rating: 4/5
Declan O’Rourke is a young musician from Ireland. His debut record is named after a small Australian town where he spent some time with his family in his early youth. It’s said to carry the memory of that place and above all of the priest who gave him his first guitar and, in a way, became the ‘culprit’ responsible for turning a young lad into a young musician.
A fair bit of time has passed since then and plenty has changed, hence the album title “Since Kyabram”. And you can tell it’s really been a while since Kyabram: Declan is now a highly respected and famous musician, especially in the British Isles and Australia. This album was reportedly one of the most anticipated debuts ever in the UK, and right at the launch it sold out a venue in Dublin, and not just once but three nights in a row, on top of which it was played live on international radio. It quickly settled at the very top of the Irish charts and it’s still there today, even though the album originally came out as far back as late October 2004! At first it was only released on the smaller N4 label, and the rest of the world only got a proper chance to hear it this year, when the mightier V2 put it out, tweaked it a little, and opened even more doors to success for him.
So the stars are clearly aligned for him. Besides the praise from critics and strong sales, his fellow musicians are also thrilled with him: in his short career he’s already shared a stage with singer Bic Runga, stood on the same stage as Bob Dylan, and now Paul Weller has taken him under his wing and honored him with the chance to warm up the crowd at some of his shows.
Now, to the music. For the most part you could place Declan O’Rourke among the typical modern-day singer-songwriters who draw their inspiration from the rich legacy of the 60s and 70s, but any comparison to anyone else is unnecessary. The musician comes across as mature and thoughtful, working with slow yet very optimistic acoustic music built mainly on guitar, backed by piano and simple but rich orchestral arrangements that paint the dreamy background with an extremely gentle touch and love to conjure up forgotten autumn seaside landscapes.
What draws you into the album even more are the light drums and percussion, which at times border on ‘late-night’ jazz and add extra melancholy and drama to his voice, which mostly sits in the baritone range but occasionally drifts into falsetto too.
The album opens with the quiet sound of rain, but the moment the instruments kick in, it becomes clear this isn’t the kind of rain that ruins your mood just because everything’s soaked again. It’s the rain you badly need to wash away all past troubles and woes, a welcome, wanted, if not downright redemptive rain. And there’s no escaping it, as the song title “No Place To Hide” suggests.
Whatever the reasons these songs were written for, and judging by the lyrics they often deal with tangled relationships, there’s no cloud of anxiety or unease hanging over them, and the voice they belong to sounds determined and at peace with whatever situation they brought him.
The whole album then slowly weaves and builds on itself, keeping up, fairly successfully, the intensity and tenderness it set for itself in the first three songs.
The only detours that slightly break this mood show up in the songs that already stand apart from the rest (Your World, No Brakes and 1-Way Minds). They’re a bit more bouncy and lighter, bordering on ‘power ballads’, and at heart they were probably meant for a wider audience, but they’re anything but essential.
A fitting comparison might be John Mayer, one of the biggest new hopes of somewhat more ‘demanding’ music a few years back, who was also celebrated as an exceptional songwriter and performer, but whose very similar ‘power ballads’ shot him to the top of media attention while also making him appealing mainly to (still, only) teenagers, especially teenage girls.
All the standout songs mentioned above sit in the middle of the album, so toward the end the melancholy mood settles again, and the song that wraps the album up as a successful whole, “Marrying The Sea – Til Death Do Us Part”, is sung a cappella, completely unwavering and direct, despite the probably tragic fate of its hero, who asks the sea for its hand and gets his wish. The only ‘instrument’ accompanying it is the quiet lapping of waves in the background, and when the singing suddenly sinks into silence, a playful melody appears, played on purely acoustic instruments, rocking on the waves for a few more minutes before it too vanishes somewhere among them. All that’s left is ever-quieter waves and the pleasant feeling that has been building up throughout the album.
All in all, it’s a considerable achievement that will surely find its way into plenty more ears, and rightly so.
Lineup
Declan O’Rourke – vocals, guitar
Steve Wickham – arrangements, violin
Production
Declan O’Rourke
Track list
01. No Place To Hide
02. Birds Of A Feather
03. Galileo (Someone Like You)
04. Your World
05. No Brakes
06. We Didn’t Mean To Go To Sea
07. 1-Way Minds
08. Love Is The Way
09. Sarah (Last Night In A Dream)
10. Everything Is Different
11. Marrying The Sea – Til Death Do Us Part
Album length: 46.15
