Paddy Casey Turn This Ship Around review – folk wrapped in pop

Forever associated with the singer-songwriter boom of the early 2000s, where any bearded man with a guitar hanging around Dublin’s Camden Street could (and did) become a headline star overnight, Crumlin man Paddy Casey leans pop-wards on his double album rather than adhering to the maudlin ways of his former peers.

Sitting on a stack of song ideas for years and wanting to follow up on 2012’s The Secret Life Of … Casey used 2020’s lockdown to record and produce, roping in friends, his singer-songwriter daughter Saoirse and partner Sophia Cadogan, who also did the artwork, to contribute vocals or play instruments.

While the differentiation in moods between the two discs is slight, the album feels more like an exercise in setting songs free rather than threading a cohesive narrative through them. However, joy is the backbone of everything Casey does, and this elation beams on the bouncing tropicana found on You Are the One and intentionally daffy delivery of The Goodbye Song.

The self-explanatory Times Are Tough (But So Are We) previewed as a short home video in March 2020, with his daughters and Cadogan playing piano and ukuleles in the background. It captures the heart-on-sleeve approach of Casey’s artistry.

Inspired by traditional folk but wrapped up in a carefree, easy-listening pop package, this is a “best of” collection of never-released songs.

[ paddycaseymusic.com ]