Clannad at Manchester Bridgewater Hall, 14th March 2020
Ever since the late eighties, Clannad have been in my CD collection. I managed to borrow ‘Sirius’ from my local library and have been hooked to their haunting tunes ever since.
When I saw that this was a final tour, I had to go and where better to see them than a venue designed for music rather than numbers, Manchester’s Bridgewater Hall. I wasn’t too sure what to expect because apart from knowing the ‘Sirius’ album inside out, I was only really familiar with tunes from Greatest Hits albums.
Little did I know of the treat I was in for, this would be a show in two halves, almost all of the first part of the show was music in Gaelic. These were songs I’d not really experienced too much but was loving the ‘irish folk’ sound at its finest.
The first song that caught my attention and had heard a lot was Buachaill Ón Éirne. This was why I was here, the angelic yet haunting vocals were amazing, from the 1985 album ‘Macalla‘ and it was on ‘Past/Present‘ where I had heard it. Soon to follow were a few more familiar songs like ‘Eleanor Plunkett’ and ‘New Grange‘ set the mood for the medley of Robin of Sherwood songs which included ‘Robin ( the hooded man)‘ and ‘Lady Marion‘ which took us into the interval.
Through the next hour they played countless songs which included ‘In a Lifetime‘, ‘Closer to your heart‘ and my favourite of the night ‘Dúlamán‘ which made me want to get up and dance. Bono sent his apologies for now being there, 15 minutes spared there I think. after leaving the stage for a minute or two they treated us to two more songs which included Teidhir Abhaile Riu‘.
I’m so glad I went, hopefully final tour will be followed by a final final tour because I will be there. Thank you Clannad.
