Mondegreen
Sweet Memory Bells
(Mondegreen)
★★★★ (Out of 5)
AN ALBUM that was released — or rather escaped — at the end of November last year to no fanfare whatsoever, has just reached me by a convoluted route.
Perhaps the timing was wrong and it got lost or overlooked in the pre-Christmas scramble which was a shame.
However, Sweet Memory Bells deserves to be heard. If it had been made by some of the ‘recognised’ folk names it would be getting highly favourable reviews by now.
Mondegreen is a collective of folk musicians, friends and family. They run a small free entry folk club at Ryan’s Bar in London’s Stoke Newington Church Street and decided to record an album of new songs and traditional tunes.
The Arts Council helped with some funding and multi-instrumentalist/producer Gerry Diver, who also contributed mandolin on a couple of tracks, captured the talent, and spirit, of some fine musicians fusing Irish traditional music with Irish, English, Scottish and American songs.
All the songs are written by the very talented fiddle player/singer Nora Mulready and indeed the Mulready name features heavily on this album — well, it is a family-based group after all.
Excellent imaginative tasteful arrangements of instrumental tunes allied to well-constructed songs make this a potential commercial success.
Vocal harmonies are a feature on this album as the voices blend superbly. The album’s title track opens the CD and for me it is the standout song with a catchy chorus that I believe could really click with some deserved exposure. I found myself playing it several times.
You can get this excellent album from www.mondegreenfolk.com
