GLEN HANSARD
Winning Streak (3/5)
Plateau
The musician, actor and future Captain Birdseye returns this week with a new single he calls "a pat on the back and an encouragement to try and see the good in the everyday". A critic less enamoured with the joys of life might call it a thinly disguised rewrite of Bob Dylan's Forever Young. In any case, Hansard's new album is called Didn't He Ramble and it features guest appearances by John Sheahan (Dubliners), Sam Beam (Iron & Wine) and Sam Amidon.
BLOOD ORANGE
Do You See My Skin Through the Flames? (4/5)
From the Trayvon Martin shooting in 2012 to the Charleston massacre last month, musical meditations on race have appeared thick and fast in this column. Even so, a spoken-word sound collage, performed by an artist with a plummy English accent, is always going to stand out. On this meandering track, Dev Hynes delves into everything from racial profiling to white privilege to just how a black artist of Caribbean extraction happens to have an Irish surname. (Spoiler alert: it isn't a funny story.)
PHARRELL
Freedom (4/5)
Columbia
It's billed as Pharrell's follow- up to his smash hit Happy, but Freedom has a little less chirp and a lot more soul. Indeed, the piano riff here is one of the most pounding and relentless things you'll hear this side of Nina Simone's Sinnerman. And thanks to a lucrative exclusivity deal, the paean to liberty and personal empowerment is available only through Apple Music. Praise the Lord!
SEAMUS FOGARTY
Ducks & Drakes (3/5)
Lost Map Records
On the title track from his Ducks & Drakes EP, the singer- songwriter spends a lazy day in the park watching paddle boats, knobbly knees and "posh dogs wearing Prada and Yves Saint Laurent". Mayo native Fogarty supports Lisa O'Neill on tour dates in Wexford, Kilkenny and Cork next month.
