3

There's no sign of The Gloaming losing that special touch on their third studio album, which opens with an intense Iarla Ó Lionáird performance of ‘Meáchan Rudaí (The Weight of Things)’, a poem by Irish-language Cork poet Liam Ó Muirthile, guided by pianist and producer Thomas Bartlett's single repeated note. It's one of five poems set to music on the album – it's a shame there's no booklet with the texts (or English translations) included, as they strike me as the focus of 3, refocusing away from the deep, immersive instrumental tune sets that dominated previous releases. (Though having said that, the album does include an expansive ten-minute tour de force, ‘Doctor O'Neill’.) The poem-songs here are ancient and modern, but largely concerned with death, and Bartlett's arrangements keep plenty of space with which to amplify the feel and the themes in the music.

There's no sonic crowding around the body here, and you can trace the skeleton of the tunes as well as revel in their flesh. The playing of Martin Hayes remains at the forefront and in the sweet spot, while the throaty depths of Caoimhín Ó Raghallaigh's Hardanger fiddle, Bartlett's punctuating piano and Dennis Cahill's guitar are crisply and imaginatively deployed. Yet again, The Gloaming make it new.