Conor O’Brien has recently made a couple of unusual moves. First, the Villagers frontman released atypically frank album Darling Arithmetic in April 2015, to share his experience of life as a closeted gay man in Ireland. Then he transferred that album’s pared down arrangements to this new release, made up of past material and recorded in one day in a London studio. The resulting songs – most of them laid down on the first or second take, apparently – maintain their loose shapes, anchored by his gossamer-light voice and plucked guitar lines. As is always the case with live sessions, there’s nowhere to hide and O’Brien’s delicate songwriting is laid bare. He makes the odd misstep, with Hot Scary Summer’s slightly hackneyed melodies and The Soul Serene’s vague meaning lessening the album’s overall rawness. But, as with Bright Eyes, Damien Rice and other artists to whom Villagers are often compared, O’Brien shows signs of a visceral intensity. He’s going about this his own way.
