No man is an Ireland..
Or are they? We finally got our hands on Warren Ireland‘s long awaited album this week. It’s been quite a week – we’ve been to gigs! Both featuring the aforementioned Mr Ireland, first up was Funke and the Two Tone Baby at The Hairy Dog in Derby on Wednesday. Funke is on fire at the moment. You should absolutely go see him. Then last night, having enjoyed ourselves so much we got ourselves some tickets to head up to the Black Market Venue last night where The Sweetchunks Band hosted a splendid evening with Warren and Sam Tucker? in support. I don’t think either of us had realised quite how much we’d missed going to gigs, and how lockdown-conditioned we’d become.
It still feels weird going out and socialising, but increasingly it’s a good weird! It was lovely to see folk we’ve not seen in years, to have a dance, to get lost in music again. More on that later.
The drive up gave us the opportunity to get Warren’s freshly ripped CD acquired on Wednesday playing in the car, so here’s some reflections. Warren is a difficult to define enigma – one man loop factory one minute, fusing guitar layers with beatbox, bass effects and vocals one minute, or perhaps playing in Darwin’s Rejects (sorry Russ, I can’t bear to leave out the apostrophe!) in a more conventional sense, he is at once folksy, bluesy, rock and roll with a dose of prog thrown in along with dancy overtones. One of the reflections I had whilst driving up is that his musical maturity and influences betrays his relatively young years – in a good way. You can tell this collection of songs is carefully distilled from what I imagine to be an overwhelming cacophony of ideas whirling around his mind.
In a strange departure from my normally haphazard attempts to describe genres or styles, the first two tracks Age Old and Don’t Look Back prompted an immediate thought and discussion in the car with Ella. Age Old evoked strongly a Sons of Anarchy soundtrack score – we were imagining the Sons preparing for some kind of raid or attack on a rival Gang, shots of leather clad bikers arming themselves from assorted stashes, securing their MC (where Piney in his denim cut stayed behind with a shotgun to defend the family members), as you reach the climax of the song the episode would end on a cliffhanger with Jax, Tig et al preparing their assault. The second track would open the next episode, the attack would be swift and not exactly what was planned, with a police ambush and chase ensuing, Rat would be caught along the way, the track probably ends with Jax and other key members in a jail cell probably about to be let out without much hassle by Sheriff Unser.
So yeah, that tells you very little about the intricate guitar picking work overlaid with beatbox and bluesy vocals for Old Age and the backing-vocal enriched sections, the lovely rolling rhythmic lyrical play sharing prominence with the punchy little guitar riffs, or the more rock-infused urgency of Don’t Look Back – but you know what? I’m not sorry – you should listen to it, see what imagery it evokes for you. It’s engaging, it’s clever, and just two tracks in you’ve already had a nice showcase of some of the facets Warren is exhibiting here. Spaceman is a different prospect – an interesting take on Sam Ryder’s Eurovision hit… no, I’m joking, it’s not that at all. Lilting gentle guitar and distant sounding vocals / backing vocals at times is a real shift in pace and style. You’ll be glad to know I’m going to stop trying to be a half-arsed TV screen-writer, although I could imagine some kind of Jemma-based introspective lament type scene backed by this – looking through some old paperwork and photos, then probably burning them. I promise, that’s the end of this, I’ve not even watched Sons of Anarchy in ages!
Lost in Music is up next, it’s almost indugent with prog-rock stylee guitar then some beatbox kicks in and dreamy vocals again – it’s a nice follow-on from the previous track, I wonder if it’s a little window into what composition must be like for someone like Warren, with loops and the ability to effectively fill all the roles within a more traditional band set up the options really must feel limitless at times. This feels like something that started as an experiment in layering riffs, chords, beats, harmonics, vocals into something cohesive that’s developed into this absorbing track you truly can get lost in. Explode picks up the urgency, there’s Gomez vibes in the strumming for a while, spat-out vocals evoking frustrations around lockdown and the subsequent desire to make the most of the opportunity we now have to get out there, Warren certainly lives by that – on Saturday we saw him play his second gig of the day at 9pm before hotfooting it up to Sheffield to play his third. I love this track, it’s an irresistible foot-tapper, and frankly an amazing feat of breath-control in being able to perform it!
Title-track Grown Up is another footstomping vocally-challenging charting of the challenge in how to get on in life in a more conventional sense, which being a full-time musician certainly isn’t – it comes with so many challenges, and the theme is picked up with Millennial – chugging dirty guitar and beatbox, he played this last night and described it as him imbibing and subsequently vomiting a dictionary into a song, again there’s a display of impressive ability (a) remember so many words and (b) get them all into a song whilst retaining the ability to breathe! If you listened to the album blind without knowing much about Warren’s live performances this is probably the one that hints most strongly at his looping credentials. I think that’s a good thing recorded too, the joy in a performer who uses looping is watching them do it, that’s a difficult thing to be able to do in a recording! Not that everything on here sounds like it’s built up of loops.
The next track Drinking definitely isn’t, and puts us back firmly into rock and roll territory, electric guitars chugs and riffs, it’s so catchy with crashing drums and empassioned vocals interspersed with awesome guitar riffs and strings. It might be favourite to be honest, and it has that timeless sound that drives my assertion that Warren is a musician with conceptions and influences that betray his tender years. Wanderlust part 2 brings the pace right down into whimsy and folk, it’s lovely – a kind of reprise of his already well established track called (unsurprisingly) Wanderlust – it takes cues from the original but is it’s own song and I suspect inspired by our mutual friends Tony and Trudi semi-retiring onto a canal boat they named Wanderlust in honour of Warren’s song, this is a lovely little tribute to a tribute. I love seeing Tony and Trudi’s travel updates on Facebook!
Which brings us round to the end – Save me a Seat is another rambling prog-influenced almost dirge. I don’t mean dirge negatively, to return briefly to what things evoke, the repeating simple riffs and distant vocals make me think of the closing track of a documentary. If Warren did a ‘making of’ video this one would definitely be playing whilst the credits rolled at the end, speaking of credits, the CD doesn’t offer much hint to who else might have been involved in the production, the chances are it would either be a very short credit list or it would feature one name covering many many roles. I’m sure there’s been a few helping hands along the way as well, though.
An excellently varied yet balanced album from the troubadour, I don’t think anyone would regret a purchase – and I would urge anyone who hasn’t to augment that purchase by making an effort to see Warren perform live too, which really does bring a different dimension to everything, he’s an exciting talent who’s got so much more to offer in the future. The temptation to compare him with Funke is difficult to resist but I think they both come at the insane art of looping quite differently, they complimented each other brilliantly in Derby on Wednesday, similar enough to appeal to each other’s fans but with enough differences to not make you think you’re just watching two sets that are too similar. And his rendering of Pink Floyd’s Another Brick in the Wall is quite frankly sublime.
You can find Grown Up on Spotify, Apple Music and I’m sure other platforms, or get in touch with Warren via his page if you’d prefer a physical CD!
