Irish Accents: An Irishman in Chinatown

Luka Bloom: An Irishman in Chinatown

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This week, we are going to go a little barmy over St Patrick’s Day here on Star Maker Machine, and celebrate for the entire week. They say everyone is Irish on St Pat’s, so all of our songs will be Irish in some sense as well. The fun will be in seeing what that means from song to song. I’m going to start us off pretty close to home. Luka Bloom is an Irish singer-songwriter, and this song has a very traditional sound, musically. But the scene is New York City. Here is a displaced Irishman, a frequent theme in Irish song and story, who meets a woman displaced from China. Or does he? The song also displays that wonderful sense of humor for which the Irish are so justly known.

Homonyms: Forgiveness

Patty Griffin: Forgiveness

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Luka Bloom: Forgiveness

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The Lonesome Sisters: Forgiveness

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Single-word song titles are often homonymic, especially those that describe an emotional state; after all, there's a LOT of songs out there, and far fewer emotional states to channel through song. These three favorite interpretations of forgiveness were released within the single decade that took me through my twenties and into my early thirties - through marriage and parenthood, through graduate school and vocational epiphany, through unemployment and homelessness and back again - and each appeared just when I needed it: Patty Griffin's raw debut runs plaintive and deep enough to make my eternal "sad songs" playlist; Irish singer-songwriter Luka Bloom pays death's tribute with eerie atmosphere and a typically low-strung, high-reverb guitar; the Lonesome Sisters won prizewinning song at Merlefest for their deep holler harmonies on this bitter, truly lonesome song of love gone astray; all gave voice to my heart, at one younger, less confident time or another.

Acoustic Versions: I Need Love

Luka Bloom: I Need Love

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Boyhowdy posted a track from this various-artists live CD, In Their Own Words, Vol. 1, last year, but it's one of those albums that always seems to pop up when I'm searching for songs for the weekly themes here. So I hope you don't mind me revisiting it, because just about the whole album is perfect for this week's theme.

For those of you who have never heard of this album before, it is a collection of highlights from a series of shows that NYC radio DJ Vin Scelsa hosted at the now-defunct Bottom Line nightclub back in the '90s.

The series was called "In Their Own Words: A Bunch of Songwriters Sittin' Around Singin'", and that pretty much tells you want it was, except that they would talk, too, about the craft of songwriting and their inspirations. Each evening featured four songwriters, and they would often play on each other's songs. (I wish I could have been there for the night Barrett String, Richard Thompson, Dave Alvin, and Shawn Colvin shared the stage!)

One night Luka Bloom was part of the roundtable, and during the portion of the show where each songwriter is asked to play a cover song, he pulled out his reinvention of LL Cool J's "I Need Love". He released a studio version of it on his Acoustic Motorbike album, but this live version is the one to have. It's a revelation. The dated synths and beats on LL Cool J's original don't do much for me, but Luka's version is timeless. It makes my heart melt, and there are very few male singers who can do that to me.

Ghosts and Zombies: The Hungry Ghost

Luka Bloom: The Hungry Ghost

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Irish singer-songwriter Luka Bloom is generally found among the folk crowd, but then, they define folk differently on the far side of the pond. To these American ears, there's something perfectly 80s new wave about this track, like a B-side Midge Ure ballad: slack, jangly string accents driving the production, the haunting ebb and flow lyrics, the driving drumbeat and the wailed, echoing chorus fading away into the majestic haze of sound from which it first emerged.

Hungry ghosts are spirits driven by passion or desire; in many belief systems, they actually feed off human emotions. Like much of Bloom's influence, they are found throughout the Eastern religions, especially Buddhism, Taoism and Hindusim.