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OFF THE RECORD

Things are still 'Swell' for Marketa Irglova and Glen Hansard

By
Michael Farragher

Published Wednesday, November 11, 2009, 12:11 PM
Updated Wednesday, November 11, 2009, 12:11 PM


Marketa Irglova and Glen Hansard.
Marketa Irglova and Glen Hansard.

When I first heard that there was going to be another Swell Season album, I instantly thought of the word once, and not because that was the movie that brought Glen Hansard and Marketa Irglova, the members of Swell Season, to fame and fortune.

Their union was the centerpiece of the indie smash Once, and the soundtrack that they performed on won an Oscar and sold 700,000 copies, so why wouldn’t they duplicate the success with another go-round?

Here’s the thing - I was really jonesing for a new Frames album instead of Strict Joy, the new Swell Season release. The Frames were Hansard’s old band, and when he sang like his life depended on it while that band threw sonic fury behind him it was a thrill.

Hansard told The New York Times recently that the Frames, which developed a cult following and have been his musical home for two decades, were at a crossroads with the explosion of Once. He chose to take the middle way, asking his longtime band mates to join the Swell Season and tour.

Frames fiddler Colm Mac Con Iomaire told the Times that the Frames were ready to play for broader audiences and escape the confines of their cult status.

“At this point it’s sort of family, and we are a pair of comfortable slippers for Glen to put on,” he said.

“You have to remember that Glen is an overnight success who was 20 years in the making, and I think he took a real delight in sharing it with people he knows and trusts.”

The band is ready to move on from the Frames, and after hearing Strict Joy, I guess I am on board as well.

The Frames displayed a tender side on the song “Lay Me Down,” and that alternative folk vibe is fleshed out within the Swell Season. On their new single, “Low Rising,” the easy folk and bending slide guitar echoes call to mind the Celtic soul of Van Morrision (to hear their impassioned cover of Van’s “Into the Mystic,” log onto swellseason.com).

Flutes and fiddles tango in the background as Hansard loses himself in the music. “I want to sit you down and talk/I want to pull back the veils and find out what it is I’ve done wrong/I want to tear these curtains down/I want you to meet me somewhere tonight in this old tourist town/we’ve got to come up because there’s no further for us to fall/because I feel we’ve had enough,” he sings on the opening track.

And so the analysis begins.

Not since James Taylor and Carly Simon divorced in the seventies has a folk couple’s love life been so scrutinized in the press. Hansard, 39, and Irglova, 21, met in 2001 when the Frames from Ireland were touring Irglova's native Czech Republic. Her father, a concert promoter, invited the band to a party, where 13-year-old Irglova played a Mendelssohn piece on the piano, Hansard said.

Impressed, he invited her to play with him at several other gigs. What began as a friendship and a partnership resulted in a pair of starring roles in Once and a romantic relationship between Hansard and Irglova.

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Things are still 'Swell' for Marketa Irglova and Glen Hansard | Entertainment in Ireland and Around the World | IrishCentral


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