Following 2018’s traditional collection Heard a Long Song Gone for the River Lea imprint, The Wren EP in 2019 and an adaptation of Bob Dylan’s All the Tired Horses for the final scene of epic TV drama Peaky Blinders, Lisa O’Neill’s latest, her first album for the Rough Trade label, is entitled All of This Is Chance.
Long since noted as one of the most evocative singers and writers in contemporary Irish music, All of This Is Chance is a collection of new work that takes Lisa’s voice to greater heights, or depths, depending on which way you look at it.
Throughout all eight songs on this album, it feels like O’Neill is writing in a constant state of wonderment. Not only a portrait of the artist in love with nature, but one perplexed by the ever-expanding gulf between it and modern society. O’Neill sings across that divide while simultaneously digging deep into the land, eyes transfixed on a universe of colourful birds, and beyond them stargazing into the atomized constellations of outer space of which we ourselves are fragments.
????? “you’ll be lucky to hear a better record all year” – Sunday Times Culture
“The first indisputable classic of 2023” – Uncut, lead review, 9/10
???? “The bird kingdom gives lofty inspiration to the Irish singer-songwriter’s wild and wonderful fifth album” – The Guardian
“Transcendent and original – a triumph!” – The Observer
“O’Neill is a cultural hero in her own right. She has released five albums since 2009, building a reputation as a modern artist tapped into the ancient.” – New York Times
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