Susan O’Neill was recently presented an IMRO Award in recognition of her album Now in a Minute.
The IMRO Number 1 Award was introduced to acknowledge IMRO members who reach number 1 in the album charts here in Ireland.
Vulnerable but strong, dark but hopeful – Now in a Minute confirms Susan O’Neill as a fascinating and gifted new voice in music.
An album that brims with darkness and light, passions that burn and consume, chaos and solitude, brave journeys towards freedom, beautiful, crucial connections with others and that thin thread of hope that lifts the heaviness within.
Four of these songs (Tijuana, Lilt, Everyone’s Blind and Too Many Ways) are co-writes with Mick Flannery, but the others reunite Susan with Cillian and Lorcan Byrne, with production by Christian Best.
“It was great to work with them again, they’ve grown so much musically. There’s a moment playing together when you feel like the engine is revving, the telepathy is working, it’s so quick. There are nerves, excitement, and fun. There are infinite possibilities.”
“Writing entails dreaming up songs. There is self-expression and practice but then you have to deliver them to people, and that involves neon lights, hi-res amps, smoke and mirrors, and you have to trust the process, and I trust them, totally.”
That process is working wonderfully.
From the ethereal Apparitions (“Sitting with darkness inside yourself, unafraid to acknowledge the depths, but saluting that thread of hope you find at the bottom”) to the driving Lilt (“a feminine salute to the journey of countless women that had a need to flee.”)
Drive (“it fell out of my mouth and onto the page in one brief sitting!”) bristles with intent, Everyone’s Blind (“a melody rose up as easily as breathing”) casts longing eyes homeward and Give You My All (“for my niece and nephews, it’s about passing on the love, wisdom and kindness”) can’t help but lift the spirit. The haunting ‘Malachi’ an ode to older times, and young friends lost. It’s a ballad for the ages, a real heart wrench. A song of honesty that’s not afraid to lean in.
All of the songs are enriched by the at times astonishing vocal harmonies. They soar, they swoop, they elevate. “Harmony decides everything,” says Susan, “that unity of voice is medicine. When you get to sing with another person, it’s like a Gospel.”
And Gospel it is, from beginning to end. Songs that will lift and nourish you. It’s hard to believe this is only Susan’s second album. The development is startling.