Liam O'Maonlai, the golden-maned vocalist and songwriter who fronts Hothouse Flowers, has the kind of vision evidenced in only a few popular musicians of each generation. In performance he alternates the unchecked physical fury of a Jim Morrison with the oratorical zeal of a roadside preacher. On record he subjugates this persona to the songs themselves, which he delivers with reverent, emotional precision, and this is where his vision becomes apparent. In the space of two full-length recordings, O'Maonlai has constructed a worldview.
unwilling to surrender his roots. It's a poet's quest, and O'Maonlai undertakes it in the spirit of his lyric forebears – Yeats, Joyce and O'Casey; Dylan, Springsteen and Ronnie Van Zant.
Perhaps he is closest in spirit to Van Zant, the restless lyric poet of Southern rock. Like Van Zant, O'Maonlai is an outsider at the crossroads of the Western world. Instead of hailing from the rural swamps of Florida, O'Maonlai is a Dubliner, informed by the pop culture of both London and New York yet tied to the secret knowledge of his homeland's heritage.
The world O'Maonlai writes about appears hopelessly bleak – "Hardstone City," where "you gotta carry a gun," could easily be an Irish immigrant's view of contemporary New York. O'Maonlai explores different escapes from this world: the realm of fantasy ("Movies") or the conviviality of the barroom (the CD-only "Trying to Get Through").
O'Maonlai offers hope in the end through such ancient virtues as love and generosity. In "Give It Up," he urges the listener to "Share it out/Help who you can/Talk about it." Then, in "Christ-church Bells," he turns a simple laborer's lament into a metaphor for the human search for acceptance.
O'Maonlai shifts credit for his band's vision to the other members, and the hand-in-glove spirit of their sound underscores the claim. They play the pop-gospel song "I Can See Clearly Now" and the Gaelic ballad "Seoladh Na nGamhna" with equal aplomb, forcing a comparative view of two forms that sound so at home together here.
Many of the great Irish rock bands, from Thin Lizzy to Moving Hearts, have flourished briefly only to founder under the burdens of creativity – too many personal problems, too many directions to take. Hothouse Flowers just might have the tenacity to make it all the way. (RS 585)
JOHN SWENSON
