Day Five at Other Voices 8 - Evening

The xx arrived into St James, and kicked off the final night with six tracks from their beautiful moody and atmospheric self titled album. Fighting their jet lag they got the audience into the swing of things, performing two of their stand out tracks from the xx, ‘Basic Space’ and Ray D’Arcy’s favourite single ‘Islands’.

Next up was the amazing Speech Debelle who performed four tracks from her Mercury Music Prize winning album ‘Speech Therapy”. She was accompanied by Ciaran on acoustic guitar and the Other Voices onlookers were stunned into silence by her music, which worked unbelievably well stripped bare and pure, the perfect way to hear her lyrics. Her performance was honest and rhythmic, leaving a church full of bobbing heads.

Adrian Crowley and band performed three new tracks from ‘Seasons of The Sparks’ his fifth studio album, released just a week earlier to critical acclaim and critics stars aplenty! He also performed the title track from ‘Long Distance Swimmer’ his 2007 Choice Music Prize nominated album and finished off with a beautifully captivating performance of 'Photographic Lightning Strikes' from 2004 release ‘Northern Country’.

Richard Hawley staged a very special extra long performance with his full band this year, delighting the Dingle crowd. He chatted with the audience and told stories throughout his set, saluting Foxy Johns for being the most relaxed bar he’d been in where you can buy a hammer, rat poison and a pint! He performed a song he had written in Dingle the year before, which he told us that when he had played it to Billy Brag his response was “it’s not bad” which in Richard’s world was the equivalent to saying it was pure genius! “In every Elvis film there was one hit song and this was my favourite”, he said, bursting into a fantastic rendition of “Crawfish” and he closed the night saying “The thing about Dingle is you cannot leave without taking something with you and I’m taking tonight” and then launched into an incredible version of ‘Open Up The Door’.

After the Church, Other Voices PR lady Emma Harney nabbed Speech Debelle, Ciaran Fahy her guitarist (who’s father hails from Loughrea) and her lovely tour manager Laura and was insisted on a tour of local pubs. Unfortunately Foxys and Currans were closed , so the wayward group headed to Droichead Beag to challenge the locals on the pool table. They were joined there by Pias’ Bernie Divilly and The Irish Star’s Shilpa Ganatra. Just before they left to return to Benners, Speech free styled over a local whistler, another genuine Other Voices moment.

Benner’s was a mix of tired and excited crew, celebrating the near close of another hugely successful year of Other Voices church recordings. Many however were still on their best behaviour, as tomorrow sees the recording of The IMRO Other Room in McCarthy’s. The very best new Irish acts are in town for their recording sessions including Low Mountain, Valerie Francis, James McMorrow, 202s, O Emperor and The Chakras. The evening didn’t actually come to a close tonight and rumour has it there were a number of small gatherings in bedrooms across Benners. However, what happens in Dingle, stays in Dingle! Over and out!