Woo hoo!!!
Finally the lads from Lunasa have freed themselves from the clutches of Green Linnet and they are just about to release a new LIVE album!! I’ve been praying for a live album ever since their first CD and I’m darn glad they’ve finally gone and done it. Yee ha!
The official press release is below.
Chris
Lúnasa: The Kinnitty Sessions
Compass 4377
Available March 2nd, 2004!
Lúnasa’s self-titled 1996 debut album (Compass 4317) was considered by many to be a new chapter in the development of Irish music. By pinning traditional elements of composition and instrumentation to a fluid rhythmic undercurrent, Lúnasa achieved a new pinnacle of urgency and intricacy – sparking off unprecedented acclaim and notoriety in the process.
The Kinnitty Sessions, their fifth album, returns the band to that immediate style of recording. Cut before a live audience at Kinnitty Castle in Ireland, the recording blends the best elements of a studio recording with the energy and spontaneity of a live album. Building on the rock-solid rhythmic foundation of double-bassist Trevor Hutchinson (ex-Waterboys, Sharon Shannon Band) and guitarist Donogh Hennessy (Sharon Shannon Band), piper Cillian Vallely, flutist Kevin Crawford, and fiddler Sean Smyth ride the surging rhythms with impeccable grace – alternating blistering unison passages with episodes of deft counterpoint. Four years of constant touring has elevated the band’s already-formidable skill to peak brilliance, perfectly captured by the unique setting of The Kinnitty Sessions.
Hope it will be good. I like their original live album best. The press release of course forgets to mention that it was J McSherry & M McGoldrick then.
May I sound a note of caution? I saw Lunasa live this past summer in a somewhat outdoor venue–it was under a tent. It was a helluva lot of fun and all, but the sound was a bit rockish. The subtlety of their recordings was missing. That can work live, with the good cheer and dancing and all, but it would be a mistake to release it to the world on a disc. So, hopefully, the recording was done in a carefully selected environment.
Enter “Lunasa” in the search box and listen to the second of their archived performances for an example of how they sounded live at the Kennedy Center. Elendil, I would be curious to hear from you if/how this performance is similar or different from the one you attended.
Well, I didnt read the link above, but I would like to point out the acoustics of a tent versus a castle are quite different. The cloth (or most likely plasticy) material used for most tents while enclosing the sound, muddies it up bad (as me and a good friend of mine found out one night playing guitar and whistle) while the stone(?) walls of a castle and natural size of the areas will give us really good large sound (I am not a sound technition, just speaking laymen through experience) and give us a nice (tasteful? I hope) reverb to their sound.
Is it just me or does the audio stream from their more recent of the two concerts only come out of one channel?? (left in my case) The right may be there, bit it si SUPER faint. Everything else works fine as far as other streams from the web and CDs and such. I haven’t changed any settings…just curious
Great news! We’re going to see them on March 18th. I hope they’re not hung over.
Concerning live recordings, what lacks in sonic quality is often times made up in enthusiasm. BTW, I saw them this summer in a tent and it was one of the greatest live shows I’ve ever seen. Trevor’s bass was a little too distorted but it didn’t really take anything away from the performance.
The thing from the article that does concern me, however, is this line:
“Band introductions, stage patter, and crowd clapping were removed out of concern that Irish radio might be put off by them.”
I’m not sure how they could do this without some sort of digital workstation processing, which is never good for the sound of a recording.
