Willi Carlisle blew into Belfast on a miserable, wet, winter’s night and left the audience wondering what had just happened. Comprising only a moderate forty punters, Willie noted that this was actually ten times the audience for his first and only previous Belfast visit. Tonight was the last date of a long European tour and although he had laryngitis, it wasn’t obvious to the appreciative audience.
Introducing himself simply as ‘a folk singer from America’, he blasted off with the poignantly hilarious, long, talking blues Peculiar, Missouri, performed quicker than the version on the album of the same name. Swapping his acoustic guitar for a set of bones and a harmonica, he remarked that Irish audiences don’t bat an eyelid at the bones (although they’re usually made of sheep ribs in Ireland, as opposed to Willi’s deer rib version), while Americans are not familiar with this ancient musical instrument. There follows a version of What The Rocks Don’t Know from his first album TO TELL YOU THE TRUTH.
Next up it’s his open backed frailing banjo for The Chicken Roost Blues, a fun story song which he found in the Ozark Folksong Collection, followed by the audience participation Free Little Bird, which the Belfast audience took part in enthusiastically, as they usually do. More PECULIAR, MISSISSIPPI songs were featured, including Tulsa’s Last Magician and the semi-autobiographical Vanlife. Cheap Cocaine, an earlier song, prompts the admission from Willi that although this came from his past life, he still has the tendency to party too much when he’s on the road. It was the natural pre-cursor to a preview of a new song, When The Pills Wear Off, from his upcoming new album CRITTERLAND. Always open about his past escapades, you get the impression that he is not capable of being anything other than honest, and leaving himself very vulnerable in the process. He approaches the subject of drug taking and addiction here in a non-judgemental way.
Another new song The Arrangement, is set in the aftermath of a funeral and was prompted by the recent near-death experience of his father, who luckily has survived to tell the tale! A new instrument is produced, another one very familiar to Irish folk/trad audiences, Willi explains that he discovered the concertina on his first trip here and he uses it on the road, presumably because its dinky size lends itself to travelling. He accompanies himself on it for a Shaker hymn from his childhood, followed by a sublime cover of Richard Thompson’s Beeswing, admitting that he has only recently discovered Thompson’s work. What a time is ahead of him, exploring the rich trove of the English folkie’s body of work.
After a sneak preview of Critterland, inspired by an intentional community in the US, we are treated to a spine-tingling a capella cover of Steve Goodman’s The Ballad of Penny Evans and he bids goodbye with the singalong Your Heart’s A Big Tent. And so Willi Carlisle went off into the night, on a lonely bus ride to Dublin airport for an early morning flight home, leaving a bit of humanity and love in his wake. Safe travels, Willi.
Review and photos by Eilís Boland