HAPPY TO MEET, SORRY TO PART

Just start your CD player (or MP3 player, or whatever), and what you'll hear is this: >>cough cough<<, deedeleedee . >>cough<< >>ahh<< >>cough<< - deedeleedeedeleedum .etc., passing into "Happy to meet", which together with the last track "Sorry to part" encloses the musical pieces of this album. In 1972, this kind of beginning a record was somehow way-out and surprisingly new, or so I was told by somebody who is about 20 years older than me. Today, I think it is at least quite inventive and very amusing. - As is the whole album with its wilful mixture of traditional Irish folk and progressive rock, thus having founded the term "Celtic rock" used later. Indeed, in "Hall of mirrors", "Furniture" and "The musical priest" we find true prog rock masterpieces, showing what was to come in the HORSLIPS' second album "The Tain". Anyone interested in how Irish folk music is transformed into a more progressive style will also enjoy "The clergy's lamentation", "An bratach ban" or "Bim istigh ag ol", which seem to me a kind of transition between both styles. Together with "Ace and deuce", the latter would quite fit into some early JETHRO TULL album featuring traditional arrangements. Apart from progressive music, there are some other masterpieces to be found on this album: "The Shamrock shore", which is a beautiful Irish song; and "Flower amang them all" - also known in Northumberland as "Sir John Fenwick" and regarded as one of the classics of the Northumbrian repertoire - played with traditional instruments and in a certain way representing the musical equivalent to a perpetuum mobile*. Just find out for yourself . [*This review is dedicated to W.W. - Thanks for the hint . -)); ]