Slide – Live Gig Review

The Irish Times, Thursday, December 18th, 2003.
Venue: Mother Redcaps, Dublin

Reviewer: Siobhán Long

With their military haircuts (well, on three of the four) and a grá for high-kicking gestures more commonly found in the midst of a rock and roll band, Slide don’t quite fit the mould of stalwart traditionalists.

Then again, this is a quartet who aren’t afraid to marry self-penned songs of local heroes (Brian Kenny) and crusading clampers (The Boys In Green) with powerhouse tunes cross-fertilised by time and by their own exceedingly fertile imaginations.

Gone are the days when Slide were the boys who wanted to show off all their toys at once. Their sound is startlingly orchestral, and yet gloriously spacious where previously it occasionally suffocated itself through overcrowding. Exuding bonhomie, and fired by fiddler Daire Bracken’s unfettered exuberance, Slide slid through a rake of fine sets, their identity tooled finely by drum-tight arrangements. Aogán Lynch’s concertina takes a surprising role center-stage (not always the most comfortable place for that instrument), but amidst the genteel surrounds of Eamonn De Barra’s flute and keyboards, Bracken’s fiddle and guitar and Mick Broderick’s bouzouki, it floats free of the pedestrian shackles that can sometimes root it to the ground.

Hearing four men tackle close harmony singing is a rarity and Slide embrace the challenge with gleeful intent. Their handling of the intricacies of Monday Night revealed a penchant for arrangements that owe at least some of their lineage to Planxty, bouzouki and vocals tiptoeing between the air pockets of Bracken’s guitar and Lynch’s medieval-toned concertina.

An occasional reliance on songs over-burdened by lyrical detail (High Time) fades into the backdrop once the instrumental pieces take flight. And how they soar; The Flying Pig and The Watchmaker’s Set affording them full rein to stretch and bend the notes across a 360-degree arc of their own making.

Head and shoulders above so many of their peers, the wonder is that Slide’s public profile doesn’t quite match their musicianship – yet.