Better Late Than Never
Photograph by Dale Monette
Track 1: Lanagan’s Ball/Ha’Penny Bridge/Road to Listoonvarna
Jim and Jon- Vocals
Jim- guitar, 4-string banjo, mandolin
Robbie- fiddle
Chetz- bass
Track 2: Gone to the Wars
This beautiful song was written by Jon around the time of the first Gulf War. Jim’s brother Tom played this song in the Humvee while in Afghanistan. We always dedicate this song to Tom and Jean for their service in the FBI. We especially enjoy the walking ghost battalion effect in the end of the tune. When an early software glitch (or operator error) caused most of Chetz’ bass part to disappear Jim resurrected it from the surviving snippets. Just like original! Probably would have been easier just to ask him to play it again…
Jon- lead vocals, guitar
Jim- backing vocals, bouzouki
Chetz- bass, bodhran
Robbie- fiddle
Track 3: The Minstrel Boy
The Minstrel Boy to the wars has gone- one of our most downloaded songs, this is a very old Celtic song with lyrics by Thomas Moore. Jon and Jim have been singing this one since their O’Connor and Lees days. This song features the style of fingerpicking counterpoint that drove the sound of O’Connor and Lees.
Jim and Jon- vocals
Jim- 6 string guitar, tenor banjo, mandolin
Jon- 12 string guitar
Chetz- bass
Track 4: Star of the County Down
This is a well-known traditional song, probably most widely heard on the great album by Van Morrison and the Chieftains. Jon tells the story here.
Jon- lead vocals, guitar
Jim- backing vocals, bouzouki, mandolin, tenor banjo
Chetz- bass, bodhran
Pete- fiddle
Track 5: I’ll Wear Your Ring
Jim wrote this song after the title was suggested to him by Johnny Hanley, the drummer for the Paddy Noonan Irish Show Band on a long drive back from a gig in the Catskills. I remember him turning to me and saying, “someone should write a song called, ‘Come back with me darlin’ and I’ll Wear your Ring’”- so here it is! Chetz takes a rare turn on the accordion here.
Jim- vocals, 6-string guitar
Jon- vocals, 12-string guitar
Chetz- bass, accordion
Track 6- Chicago/Trippin’ Up the Stairs
This song is by far our most downloaded song- no doubt because its inclusion on Marc Gunn’s Celtic Music Podcast compilation album. A great pair of jigs.
Pete- fiddle, bodhran
Robbie- fiddle
Jon- guitar
Jim- mandolin, tenor banjo, bouzouki
Chetz- bass
Track 7- Foggy Dew
My father tells me this was one of my grandfather’s favorite songs, which tells us where his sentiments lay. A rousing old rebel tune.
Jon- lead vocals
Jim- backing vocals
Pete- fiddle
Chetz- bass
Dale- snare
Track 8. Back When the Craic was Grand
In the 1980s Jim worked as guitarist and singer for a group that included some of the greatest trad players of the time- Johnny Cronin, fiddle, Joe Burke, button accordion, Andy McGann, fiddle, Banjo Joe Burke tenor banjo. The group played at Tom O’Reilly’s Irish Pub on 23rd and Lexington in New York City. The gig lasted from 9pm to 4am (you read that right).
In order to access the pub, you first needed to negotiate a phalanx of aggressive ladies of the night whose main goal seemed to be picking your pocket. As the sun was getting ready to rise the bartender would unlock the door and admit a line of children and their parents who had been waiting outside in hopes of sitting in with their idols in the early morning session.
This song won first prize in the International Narrative Songwriting Competition.
Jim- vocals and 6 string-guitar
Jon- vocals and 12 string-guitar
Chetz- bass
Robbie- fiddle
Dale- drums
Track 9. Royalty and Rules
Jon wrote this one in the tradition of the great rebel tunes, though this song dates to the time of the peace accords. It manages to incorporate the injustice that fueled the troubles as well as the futility of violence and war.
Jon- vocals, 6-string guitar
Jim- vocals, 5-string banjo
Robbie- fiddle
Chetz- bass
Dale- drums
Track 10. Queenstown
This is another song written by a band member (Chetz) that fits easily into the traditional genre. This song fits well into the tradition of great songs about Irish emigration in the times of the famine. It is a heartbreaking telling of the struggle of the immigrant to safely reach America’s shores, one that resonates in the present times.
Chetz’ bass, piano and guitar parts were recorded at Signature Sounds in Pomfret CT by recording engineer Mark Thayer and incorporated into the record.
Jim- vocals, bouzouki, 4-string banjo
Jon- vocals, 12-string guitar
Chetz- piano, bass, guitar
Track 11. Time Lads
This is Jim’s tune, in the Celtic tradition of farewell and last call songs such as The Parting Glass. “With Guinness boys we slacked the thirst, but it was always music first, and think how we’d sound if we ever rehearsed, but it’s Time Lads, time.”
Jim- vocals, bouzouki
Jon- vocals, 12-string guitar
Chetz- bass
Dale- drums (recorded at Signature Sounds)