Kevin Rowland has been bandying around the idea of an album of Irish songs for 30 years. Now he’s finally done it, in the process expanding out the remit to include non-Irish songs such as To Love Somebody (Bee Gees) and You Wear It Well (Rod Stewart) among others. They’ve applied a sparse and clean soul treatment to the songs, reinterpreting tracks made famous by The Platters, Johnny Cash, Joni Mitchell, Hugh Masekela and more – all with Rowland’s particular emotive/dramatic style of phrasing. For the most part these songs work very well, becoming distinctly Dexy in their new incarnations and presenting some fascinating new musical perspectives.

Chris Familton