Music Review A Ceili Rain cocktail

By Earle Htchner

CEILI RAIN, Towne Crier Cafe, 62 Rte. 22, Pawling, N.Y., May 31.

Pop, rock, Irish traditional, funk: Ceili Rain, the Nashville-based septet, has them all. The band features Buddy Connolly, a three-time All-Ireland button accordion champion from N.J.; fiddler Gretchen Priest, who’s played with Lyle Lovett; Skip Cleavinger, a Bowling Green, Ky., native who plays highland pipes, Scottish smallpipes, and low and tin whistles; lead electric guitarist Raymond Arias; drummer Lang Bliss, and electric bassist Andrew Lamb, who recently replaced Lance Hoppen, formerly of the band Orleans.

Founded in 1995, Ceili Rain is led by Syracuse-born singer and acoustic guitar and harmonica player Bob Halligan, Jr., who’s written songs for the eclectic likes of Judas Priest, Joan Jett, Michael Bolton, Kiss, Blue Oyster Cult, Kathy Mattea, and Cher. That striking variety suggests a wide reach in musical sensibilities for Halligan, and the songs he’s written for Ceili Rain are no exception. There’s an undercurrent of spirituality coursing through them, but without the battened moralizing most composers fall prey to.

In “That’s All the Lumber You Sent,” a song revealing traces of Pogues-like humor, a celestial newcomer discovers a stone mansion, then progressively smaller and humbler abodes until he comes to his own: a two-room shack. Why so ramshackle? The song title says it all.

The same whimsical touch is evident on such songs as “Long Black Cadillac,” a rocking harmonica-flecked ballad about death, “666 Degrees,” gauging the heat of hell through white-hot electric guitar and button accordion playing, and “You Then Me Then You Then Me,” a rolling entreaty for people to be a little less selfish, with a tantalizing hambone syncopation percolating right along.

“Love Travels,” Halligan’s 1997 hit for Kathy Mattea, is kicked off by Cleavinger’s highland pipes, then segues into a shower of percussion, electric guitars, fiddle, and button accordion that creates some catchy pop-rock. The band’s signature song, “Ceili Rain,” is principally conveyed through acoustic guitar, tin whistle, and fiddle, while “Peace Has Broken Out,” graced by fine understated piping, echoes what’s happening in Northern Ireland right now.

The last lengthy song before the encore featured each member soloing for a while. It was spiked by strong shots of “The Irish Washerwoman,” “La Cucaracha,” Free’s “All Right Now,” Wild Cherry’s “Play That Funky Music,” and “Letter B,” a tongue-in-cheek Halligan spoof of the Beatles’ “Let It Be.” And it all worked.

Most of Ceili Rain’s concert worked equally as well, though their hyperkinetic lead singer, Halligan, needs to rein in his more flamboyant gestures and gyrations, which seem pitched to stadium, not club, gigs. Then again, maybe the former is within Ceili Rain’s sights. Certainly this talented, never-boring band can create the right amount of energy and excitement for them. And that may be just the tonic a lot of parched-palate rock fans thirst for.