Haiti Benefit Gig

HAITI BENEFIT GIG – Christy Moore and John Spillane live at Vicar
Street, Dublin.
Well lads I have to report that last night was the new HIGHLIGHT OF MY CAREER! It was Christy Moore and John Spillane in Vicar Street, Dublin, playing to a sold out crowd of 1,200 people, a benefit gig to raise money for the people of Haiti. This is how it went; Firstly John O’ Shea of GOAL took the stage and spoke about the work they are doing there in Haiti. He showed a short film, praised the people of Ireland for their generosity, and introduced Christy Moore and Declan Sinnott. The lads then opened with the brand new song me and Christy have written for Haiti, then rocked that joint for about 40 minutes with a selection of some old and new great Christy numbers, including RIDE ON, SMOKE AND STRONG WHISKEY, the one about the black child down by the Dodder and a load of other great songs. To tell the truth I’m not sure what else they played as I was pacing the floor upstairs and downstairs, thinking I HAS TO FOLLOW THAT LIKE. Well the time came and Christy gave me a very warm introduction. He praised very highly my first album THE WELLS OF THE WORLD (1997) and called it one of the great classic Irish albums. I LOVE WHEN HE DOES THAT – especially as the album itself has a very troubled history, and was certainly not appreciated by the people who owned it, a record company who shall remain NAMELESS! ANYWAY! I tore onto that stage and dived into my big number PASSAGE WEST, got a great reaction, and then hit em hard with A ROCK TO CLING TO -  my new song and they were singing along. Then I done the MEDLEY of MORE IRISH SONGS WE LEARNED AT SCHOOL, which was great crack and had em all going. The highlight of my set was my new 19 second song MARTIN’S MAD ABOUT FISH, the theme song for the new Fish Cookery programme coming on RTE TV in April. I had a great gig and without boasting I have to say i went down a bomb. Declan Sinnott came out and joined me for EVERYTHING’S TURNING TO GOLD, CATHY, and then Christy came out and joined in on the bodhrán for ALL THE WAYS YOU WANDER, then did me the great honour of doing a duet with me on two more of my songs – MAGIC NIGHTS IN THE LOBBY BAR, and JOHNNY DON’T GO TO BALLINCOLLIG.  The rest of the night is a bit of blur for me, as I was in a place very near to Heaven, but i know we did THE CLIFFS OF DOONEEN, THE CITY OF CHICAGO,  and as an encore BLACK IS THE COLOUR!

What a buzz lads, what a buzz, what a buzz.

Thank you so so much Christy!
All this encourages me greatly to sit down and WRITE A SONG.
You ain’t seen nothing yet!
A Happy John, Cork, 24-3-2010!