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Gigs 2008.

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LIVE REVIEW

Irish Music Magazine - John Spillane - Vicar Street - Nov 29th 1999

Vicar Street, empty before the start of the gig. Candles flickering on every table and looking like a shoal of votive lamps in the nave of a mediaeval church lacking the odour of sanctity. All a bit weird and maybe a bit intimidating for the performer one suspects. When the Sunday night crowd streamed in they were up for the gig and not in the least subdued by the ecclesiastical atmosphere.

When John Spillane came on the stage they joined with him fight away in a conspiracy of intimacy which conjured up a host of ghosts which delighted and distributed and ended in something approaching sacrilegious joy and near abandon. None of your Œhitting over the head music¹ from this singer songwriter from Bishops town in the County Cork. His songs are full of nuance, humour , and meaning delivered in an understated way that most times adds to their power. The words are important and well worth listening to but the voice is sometimes held on to tight a rein. On the odd occasion when he let his voice fly one felt as if a bird had escaped from a cage and was celebrating freedom with a great show of power and colour and emotion. This man has more to offer than he thinks. Has he yet broken with the discipline of his years with Nomos? Rugadh me i gCorcaigh is a poem by Galway poet Louis de Paor set to music by Spillane and delivered in a brilliant fusion of sean nos and a driving up-tempo rhythm. A product of what he calls the Gaelic Hit Factory. By the time he invited Declan Sinnott on stage to join him Spillane as in full flow. The weaving guitar of Sinnott seemed to draw Spillane¹s voice out and he reeled of a clutch of songs- My Love Will Not Sing For Me, Seanie Boo and the Big BlueEmpty, and Let the River Flow. This last a haunting song of tragedy, which it was not surprising to learn later, was born out of a personal experience of suicide.

He brought the audience to a full throated roar of approval immediately after with Johnny Don¹t go to Ballincollig which even those not from the rebel county (and we were in the minority), who may have been short on local knowledge to understand all the subtleties of this song, joined in with gusto. The audience many of whom are, one suspects, regulars at Johnny¹s gigs in the Cobblestone across the river took his gentle, good-humoured chiding like family members might. No gulf here between performer and audience. Everything about this man is round. His hair his body his voice and his personality. No jagged edges except of course in some of his more serious songs which still however manage to deal with the harsher realities in life with humanity and compassion.

A gig that made you feel a little bit better about yourself.

Jim Kelly (Irish Music Magazine/ Feb 2000)"