February 16, 2011
By Staff Reporter
By Earle Hitchner
FIRE IN THE KITCHEN, Unisphere Records/BMG Classics CD 09026-63133-2.
You have to hand it to Paddy Moloney of the Chieftains: he doesn’t let the musical grass grow under his feet. Following on the heels of “Long Journey Home,” released earlier in the year, this is the second recording he’s masterminded for the fledgling Unisphere imprint, which he founded to present world music.
Once more, he’s enlisted the services of his bandmates on a compilation featuring some of Canada’s most popular Celtic artists. The atmosphere Moloney hoped to re-create is reflected in the album’s title: a house party, a hooley, or what they once called in Boston the kitchen rackets. And to a remarkable extent, he achieves that goal.
Newfoundland’s raucous ballad bashers, Great Big Sea, favor maritime-flavored songs with fast, pounding rhythms calculated to charge up listeners. On “Lukey/Lukaloney,” their pub-propulsive brand of music is certainly fun, if forgettable, with rough-and-tumble vocal harmonies falling somewhere between the Pogues and the Dubliners.
In contrast, Cape Breton’s Rankin Family offers singing of pristine beauty, especially when the three sisters of Cookie, Raylene, and Heather blend their voices on the Gaelic traditional “An Innis Aigh.” It is a breath of fresh air to hear the Rankins break out from the pop cocoon they’ve spun around themselves on recent albums to tackle material showcasing the brilliance of their unadorned singing.
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Leahy, another family from Canada, certainly has the talent to put a lasting imprint on Celtic traditional music worldwide. Their concerts, combining music and dance, are high energy, to be sure. But the sometimes slick gimmickry of their presentation, both on stage and on record, seems an over-the-top attempt to please rather than to challenge or enrich. The medley of “Madame Bonaparte/Devil’s Dream/Mason’s Apron” starts off well enough on fiddle but then quickly descends into clever-for-its-own-sake bowing strapped to a backing tempo that would make a greyhound pant.
Faring far better are the tracks by Natalie MacMaster, Laura Smith, and La Bottine Souriante. On the medley called “Fingal’s Cave,” the interplay between Cape Breton fiddler MacMaster and guitarist Dave MacIsaac is magical, with the Chieftains lending excellent support.
Quebec’s La Bottine Souriante are an unabashed hoot, musicians who know how to have a good time without the slightest trace of self-absorption or artifice. “Le Lys Vert” captures the hard-driving, brass-backed, percussive-dancing ensemble in peak form, laying down a rhythm impossible to sit still through.
The real discovery on this album, however, is Cape Breton singer Laura Smith. Possessing a voice whose soulful timbre is mesmerizing, she transforms one of the most hackneyed ballads in the Celtic songbook, “My Bonnie Lies Over the Ocean,” into something utterly haunting and new. It is a radiant performance by a singer who deserves much wider exposure south of the Canadian border.
Tracks falling short of the mark are by singer Rita MacNeil, whose version of “Come by the Hills” adds little to this chestnut; the Ennis Sisters, whose “Red Is the Rose” is studied and laborious, and the Barra MacNeils, whose broad-ballad take on Robert Burns’ “Rattlin’ Roarin’ Willie” is devoid of surprise.
But high points far outnumber low points on “Fire in the Kitchen,” an admirable celebration of Celtic traditions thriving in Canada. Through Unisphere, Paddy Moloney’s world-music initiative is already paying dividends any lover of Celtic music can enjoy.