When Canadian Emm Gryner decided to sing some of her favourite Irish rock and pop tunes, she created a whole new way of listening to artists as disparate as The Corrs and the Virgin Prunes, says Tony Clayton-Lea

ON PAPER - hey, even in conversation - it's a recipe for disaster at best, yawning indifference at worst: take 10 Irish rock songs, get underneath their skin, pull at the tissue, twist them out of shape, and present them to the world. Canadian singer-songwriter Emm Gryner has, if nothing else, set the proverbial cat among the pigeons by covering songs from the likes of Thin Lizzy (Running Back), The Undertones (Julie Ocean), The Thrills (Deckchairs and Cigarettes), Horslips (Dearg Doom), Ash (Shining Light), Gilbert O'Sullivan (Nothing Rhymed) and Therapy? (Nowhere). Oh, and just in case you thought her mix'n'match selection was unadventurous, she also tackles The Virgin Prunes (Bau-Dachong) and The Corrs (Breathless).

Gryner is no clearly no slouch when it comes to cover versions. Best known in her native country as a Juno-nominated (a Canuck version of the Grammys) act with accompanying best-selling albums, she has been down the cover version route before: on 2001's Girl Versions, she engaged with testosterone via songs by the likes of Def Leppard, Nick Cave, Ozzy Osbourne and The Clash.

On her "Irish" album, Songs of Love and Death, she engages with the material in a similar manner - with the exception of the fragrant Corrs, all are male-written songs. The result is not so much a work of muscular deconstruction as a renovation orchestrated by an adept interior designer.

"I wanted to change them as much as possible, or at least where it felt right," Gryner says. "But I also didn't want to change things just for the sake of it - Forget Georgia (by Something Happens) sounds great the way it is, do you know what I mean?"

And so it is that Therapy?'s Nowhere comes across as a singer-songwriter country song; Ash's Shining Light, meanwhile, is psalm-like, virtually a classical piece of work.

"I studied classical music," says Gryner, "and the chords to Shining Light are all straight out of what a hymn would be. Don't let those blazing, vodka-infused guitars fool you. Every time I listened to it I heard a hymn. Even the lyrics lend themselves to the approach I took, although I'm sure some Ash fans might disagree with me. It's a celebration of love, a table for two."

Sweet, huh? The two most curious versions on a very curious record are Bau-Dachong and Breathless. Surely no one has ventured close to reinterpreting the notoriously unclassifiable Virgin Prunes, and surely no one in their right minds would even want to stray close to the smothering blandness of The Corrs. And yet, Bau-Dachong, with its 'If I die, I die' refrain, comes across as an exercise in solace while Breathless is transformed from a needy pop song into a meditation on loss.

"I approached that song by taking the title literally - as in not living, rather than the generic term of it meaning 'you take my breath away'. I don't know if anyone has picked up on that. When you change the chords underneath and make it morose and morbid, it makes the song more interesting."

The Corrs interesting? The Virgin Prunes accessible? Surely Gryner has gone beyond the call of duty and done us all a service? As for Shining Light and Julie Ocean, she has taken already superb songs and altered our perspectives on them. Like most things that work, it's a simple idea executed with a minimum of fuss, as well as eschewing easy options and obvious targets.

Gryner got the idea, she says, from visiting Ireland repeatedly. She first came here in 1997 tofind her ancestors (her grandmother is from

Co Monaghan). Subsequent visits (as a member of David Bowie's backing band, a honeymooning period) and an enquiring musical frame of mind unearthed many Irish bands and songs she had never heard before.

"I listened to a lot of music and talked to a lot of people; I went around record shops and spent loads of money on albums. I wanted to find about a dozen songs that really meant something to me lyrically, that would sound interesting sung by a woman. There are good, relevant lines in every song, and that's why I chose them. With the exception of The Corrs track, I felt it was important they were all male songs; I don't like covering other women. I also didn't want to pick U2 or Van Morrison, or stuff like that, because there is so much more interesting music around."

Gryner's ambitions for the record were modest. She says she made it in a bubble, and did not expect it to be released in Ireland; nor did she envisage sharing it with any of the originators of the songs - she admits to embarrassment when being interviewed by Eamon Carr (Horslips drummer turned Evening Herald journalist) and Tom Dunne (Something Happens singer turned Today FM presenter).

As yet, there are no plans for a follow-up, despite there being loads of suitable material. "I was going to do a Stiff Little Fingers song, but I didn't make it in time. And I recently found out about The Blades; I was going to do a song of theirs called Downmarket. It didn't get the axe, I just found out about them after the fact. People suggested covering songs by Paul Brady, The Frames, Mic Christopher. Since doing the record I've definitely tuned into more stuff. I like Snow Patrol, Ann Scott. Oh, and Damien Rice - how can you not love him?"

Very easily, but that's for another day. In the meantime, Gryner has ensured herself of a small but important footnote in Irish rock music history by making The Corrs credible. She makes a purty face, admonishes The Ticket for being so cynical, and comes up with a theory all her own.

"I feel that Ireland and Canada share a parallel. England and the US are the superpowers, whereas we're kinda neighbours, and there's a connection between us. The point is that I have, in my opinion, a small but important Irish background, and I thought doing the record would be a fun thing to do.

"It wasn't meant to be a big celebration," she says, downplaying her contribution, "but in a way I suppose it is."

Songs of Love and Death is on release. Emm Gryner plays The Spirit Store, Dundalk, Co Louth on November 22nd; Crawdaddy, Dublin on November 24th; Half Moon, Cork on November 25th; Dolan's, Limerick on November 26th; and Connolly's of Leap, Cork on November 27th. On November 28th, Emm Gryner supports US songwriter Stephen Bishop at Vicar St, Dublin