Jack O'Rourke - Wild Place (2021)

Cork singer and songwriter Jack O’Rourke has always stood out from his contemporaries. His instrument of choice is piano, and because of this you can forget about comparisons to the likes of Glen Hansard, Damien Rice and all the rest of the guitar-swinging troubadours. Instead, think of O’Rourke along the lines of Tom Waits and Randy Newman, although without slurred lyrics and dog-rough vocals. More in line with O’Rourke’s aesthetic is someone like John Grant, albeit more entrenched in the balladeer mode. If that’s your thing, then Wild Place will not disappoint.

In truth, there isn’t one song here that you’d throw out of bed in the morning. Not only is O’Rourke’s classic balladeer style wholly persuasive, but across 11 songs are strings (cello, viola, violin) that even if you weren’t fully seduced, you’d still have a hankering to get with the programme. Melodies are in abundance, with O’Rourke effortlessly spinning out tune after tune with no fear of them running out.

The man is also a gifted lyricist. In Coffee Song he sings: “she’s worked here since the ‘80s when pumpkin lattes were a myth. She flunked all of her college dreams for punk rock schemes, playing bass for Patti Smith...” O’Rourke is able to succinctly express and/or mix fact and fiction. The result, not to put too fine a point on it, is chamber-pop class through and through.