Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 9/10

The feeling of loss is something that overwhelms us all at times, whether it’s for a person, a situation, a much loved memory or an ideal, loss is as much at the heart of Human experience as joy and triumph. It takes though someone with passion running through their veins to put those words into an emotion that we can feel, that we can feel the sense of such things and into which the grief and pain soon subside because they have offered the prospect of truth in their words.

When that person though is adopted son of Liverpool and genuinely full of praise for humanity then the words mean more, the song of Ireland runs through his veins, he has given master classes of musical excellence across the sea in America but place the smooth rich voice into the realm of what drives a song forward, put those words of comfort into the hands of Dave O’ Grady and the world seems unbreakable and in the double A Side My Oldest Friend and Whiskey the songs are blindingly beautiful and reassuring.

There are moments in life when the thought of either topic that Mr. O’ Grady sings of is uppermost in the most, the waves of nostalgia hit the body and leave a trail of damage that takes emotional fortitude to wipe up afterwards. It is though with persuasive charm that the music device employed by Dave O’ Grady cuts through the wreckage and brings the softness of fallibility and the natural urge to let Time do its thing that makes the despair crumple away, be placed aside but still resonate and in which the healing can begin.

The two songs are, as always, ones that highlight the depth of character that lives and breathes in the heart of a man who knows that people hurt, who seems to understand their peculiar pain and wants to in some shape or form, try and help if possible. The sweetness of such humanity is carefully considered, genuine and heart-breaking, music is the point of existence, especially when it creates a small piece of Heaven in the sadness that surrounds us at time and nobody captures it quite so well as Dave O’ Grady.

Ian D. Hall