EIF: Lankum

Queen’s Hall - 17/08/23

A chorus of whooping and hollering met Dublin quintet Lankum as they took to the stage in a packed Queen’s Hall. The band has come a long way since the days when a tour stop in Edinburgh would have meant a house concert rather than a spot at the world’s leading arts festival. Unlike many contemporary Irish folk bands their focus is very much on song rather than the dance music repertoire, and what they bring to traditional song is a unique soundscape laden with influences beyond the folk tradition. 

Their opening number was one that is inextricably linked with the folk revival, a song that even the most folk-averse would recognise or may even have roared out at some point. I speak of course of ‘The Wild Rover’, the archetypal sing-along, here reimagined as a Gothic tale rather than a simple song of a sailor down on (or trying) his luck. The story unfolds to a backdrop of menacing drones, relentlessly building to a climax of thunderclaps, courtesy of a guest percussionist and a massive bass drum centre stage. 

All four of the band’s members sing, their voices not beautiful but powerful and expressive. Brothers Ian and Daragh Lynch have a nice line in unison singing which at times reminded this listener of nothing so much as early Pink Floyd in their bucolic mood. Lankum have crafted their vocal sound so that it sits perfectly with the pulsing vibrations of the drones set up by a range of instruments – uillean pipes, concertina, harmonium, fiddle, guitar (played at one point with a violin bow) and keyboards. As well as Pink Floyd in their radical days there seemed to be influences that spoke of time spent listening to Sonic Youth and German industrial music as much as Planxty and The Chieftains. The centre-piece of the set employing this approach was a magnificent ‘Rocky Road to Dublin’, another classic whose meaning has been refreshed and restored by Lankum’s attentions, conjuring up sounds not usual in folk bands.   

The late Cyril Tawney’s ‘On a Monday Morning’, with its delicate opening chords, was given a different treatment again before a favourite of the partisan audience, ‘Go Dig My Grave’, showed singer Radie Peat’s vocal control, the percussion again adding to what is already a dramatic song and arrangement. The band’s final song, which came after a humorous dig at the usual encore rituals, emerged from a wash of noise, Peat’s relentlessly repetitive concertina at its heart, again pointing up that there is no other band working in the traditional music field quite like them.  

Cover photo: Jess Shurte