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Kilkenny Rhythm & Roots Festival THE 12TH Kilkenny Rhythm Roots Festival (this year sponsored by Guinness) got off to a terrific start on Friday. It’s been said before but it bears repeating that the best thing about this small festival with a big heart is the programming of unheard, untried and untested acts this side of the Atlantic. We’re not speaking of Jim White (The Ormonde Hotel, Friday and Saturday), the very alternative country singer whose experimental approach features high levels of strangeness and charm. Offbeat is the term here, with White evoking the literary narratives of Flannery O’Connor and Cormac McCarthy while simultaneously serving up in song and stage presence facets of his own insightful singularity (or as he himself wryly says, “a lot of stories about my own stupidity”). And we’re not speaking of, effectively, the festival’s resident band, Hillbilly Casino (which played in at least four venues over the weekend), the Nashville rockabilly act that started five years ago gigging for tips and which is now a red hot favourite wherever they perform. Did we say perform? This bunch – fronted by the constantly backcombing Nic Roulette – surge into your face like a balled-up manifestation of tattoos, energy, sweat and rhythm, covering Johnny Cash and Hank Williams songs, as well as laying down the law with their own brand of face-slapping rock’n’roll. Subtle? No. Great fun? Yes. But back to the unheard, untried, untested; say hello to Canadian act Luke Doucet the White Falcon (Cleeres, Friday; Ryan’s, Saturday; Kilford Hotel, Sunday), who are gaining ground in and around North America through their support slots with Blue Rodeo and James Blunt (an unlikely pairing, you’ll agree). Doucet himself is a personable type, all lanky hair, check shirt and good manners, but his music is something else altogether, as it blends a certain literate, post-punk familiarity (Graham Parker, Tom Petty) with fluid, guitar-driven and companionable Americana. Doucet’s fellow band member and wife, Melissa McClelland (Cleeres, Saturday), is cut from a different mould, with crystal-clear country tunes, Douglas Sirk movie looks and a range of lyrics that don’t hold back on the home truths. All in all, what we experienced over the weekend was yet another solid programme at what has to be Ireland’s most compact and hospitable music festival, where virtually everything is low-key but high grade. It concludes tonight (Monday, May 4th) with a hoedown come-all-ye at Paris Texas pub, featuring Hillbilly Casino and others. The walls will, no doubt, drip sweat — you have been warned. TONY CLAYTON LEA |
