Hank Wedel 2024
To straddle continents: hard-working singer-songwriter dreams half a world away to get far from where he’s started.
Born in the States and raised in Ireland and then splitting his life between the two countries, this artist has all the rights to gamble on the titular phrase of his second solo album and celebrate his sixtieth birthday in style – or, to be exact, in quite a few styles, for sticking to a particular genre never was Hank Wedel forte. What was is the wide melodic spectrum that’s in full flight on “What Happens In Cork” – the same scope that Christy Moore delved into on the title track of 2009’s “Listen” – the track the folk legend borrowed from Wedel’s repertoire, thus providing Hank with a genuine claim to fame. No wonder, then, in the veteran’s producer Declan Sinnott manning the board and playing on the younger musician’s record which compressed three years of work in almost half an hour of good time.
From the ’50s-flavored acoustic shuffle of “Poe Park 2AM” onwards, to a place where the gloriously nostalgic, smile-evoking finale “(We Are) The Rakes Of Mallow” jovially dances into the sunset, the two friends’ voices blend perfectly to deliver infectious refrains. However it’s the conversational tone of Wedel’s smoky vocals that make the listener relate to his adventures, with female backing and Sinnott’s slider elevating the songs’ mysteries to a captivating, psychedelia-stricken experience. Yet if the gentle “Lonely Tree” and “Word Of Mouth” with their shimmering organ draw on Irish tradition in both texture and structure, the groovy “Alright! Dynamite! Spiro!” goes for the jugular and wields a memorable bluesy riff, and “I Know I Know You Say” turns balladry into drama. And while the delicate “Sleep Out On The Beach” oozes Caribbean aroma, and “The Time We Share” sources sweet melancholy from the wells of Americana, “Ain’t Nothin’ Wrong With Me” whips up a boogie jive.
Still, the eventually rocking “One Too Many Goodbyes” is firmly rooted in the Éire soil, because that’s what it’s all about for this artist. And here’s the contradictory beauty of it all: not everything happening in Cork must stay in Cork – Hank Wedel’s music surely must not.
****2/3