Two Fleadh favourites – folk-rocker Matt McGinn and the legendary Paul Brady – have joined forces in the writing room and composed a song together for the first time.
Okay, this dynamic duo may not be appearing at this year’s Iúr Cinn Fleadh – but they have performed at the Fleadh separately at different times in the past. And each of their gigs was highly praised by the punters.
FRESH INSPIRATION
Since their Fleadh appearances, what they have done is remind us – by writing the sparkling new track Sweet Love – that we can find fresh inspiration when we work together.
Matt’s email announcing the collaborative piece arrived at the Fleadh office (virtual!), just as we were about to close the laptop for the day. Matt had recorded the track and released it for us all to hear. We could well imagine his little face beaming about it, as he pressed ‘send’.
When we heard the composition, we just had to share our sheer delight. Sweet Love is an enchantment. Matt delivers a gentle flowing melody with delicious chord changes, rich harmonies, dreamy steel guitar from Cork musician David Murphy and tasteful drumming by Derry’s Liam Bradley. Note that these are superb players in their own right!
The track is like a signature tune to a TV series or film. You wonder, have I seen this? It’s one of those pieces that tells a story, sets a mood and puts you at ease for the next working day with a touch of inspiration about self belief – ‘How can we love somebody else without loving ourselves?’
So how did this happen?
It was just a few months ago when Matt had the opportunity to work with Paul, one of his favourite artists of all time. Matt had been following Paul’s music since seeing him on the 1990 TV series Bringing It All Back Home.
Back then, the stand out performance for the young Matt was seeing Paul alongside Donal Lunny playing Nothing But The Same Old Story. ‘The lyrics rocked me,’ Matt remembered, ‘but the energy with which the song was delivered was outstanding and stayed with me.’
Fast forward 34 years and Matt found himself in the same room as the man – ‘the two of us trying to catch a song from the ether’.
VOCAL CHORDS
Matt recalled, ‘It wasn’t as intimidating as I’d pictured it would be. A few years ago it might have been, but I’ve put in my hours, and it means that at the very least I knew I could hold my own.
‘Every now and again, though, I’d hear a chord or a belt of the vocal chords of the person next to me that transported me right back to being that 11 year old, thinking…”Holy God, that’s Paul feckin’ Brady!”.’
You can listen to the song yourself right here, right now.
