THE RELEASE of Loner Deluxe's second album, Songs I Taped Off The Radio, should be a red letter day, but given this album is being released on July 12 that makes it very much an 'orange' occasion.
Whatever the colour, the 13-track album - released on independent Galway label Rusted Rail - is coming out on cassette, an eccentric format perhaps, but entirely logical given the album title. It is also inkeeping with the musical contents which are equally eccentric and quirky, and sometimes quite delightful.
The albums opens with a gem - 'Winter's Last Fire' - a haunting indie-folk number distinguished by the vocals of Cecilia Danell - who really inhabits the fearful character of the song - and tasteful bouzouki playing by the brilliant Eddie Keenan.
Other highlight s include 'Watch Lake Eli' is wonderfully atmospheric and genuinely eerie - as befits a Twin Peaks fan, which the Loner is; the joyful closing track 'Summer Song'; and 'How To Sleep Better', which acknowledges Loner's love of Krautrock. The riffing guitars of Aaron Coyne and Gary Morrison are what Michael Rother might have sounded like had he wanted to be Keith Richards. The voice on the track was culled from the 1970 LP by a Dublin doctor - who sounds eerily like former justice minister Alan Shatter - dispensing advice on how to sleep.
Loner Deluxe launches Songs I Taped Off The Radio at Citóg in the Róisín Dubh on Wednesday July 12 with support from singer-songwriter A Lilac Decline and avant-garde indie band Phantom Dog Beneath The Moon. Admission is free.
