Damien O’Kane is best known to folk audiences for his excellent guitar and banjo work, backing his wife, Kate Rusby. But now comes a confident and bravely original second solo album (or third if you count his collaboration with David Kosky) that promises to transform his career. He’s a thoughtful and powerful singer with a fine Ulster brogue, who specialises in reworking mostly traditional Irish songs with bold new settings. So his sturdy treatment of The Blacksmith is enlivened by startling percussion work from Cormac Byrne, while The Banks of the Bann is treated to a new melody, lush keyboard and guitar backing, and added vocals from Rusby. Half of the songs deal with emigration from Ireland and include a powerful new treatment of Erin’s Lovely Home that switches from banjo-backed lament to percussive stomp. An inventive set that could well become a crossover commercial success.
