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PRESS Sunday, November 04, 2007 Playground Sounds Pete O'Hanlon: Return of a Northern Man "I was ridin' with O' Hanlon in those wild and heady days - when he fell off the wagon onto his pagan ways. We rambled up and down the street to where we'd come to be. We sang our song and beat our drum in the State of Tennessee. I was ridin' with O'Hanlon..." Those are lyrics by American singer-songwriter RB Morris from a track on his 1997 album 'Take That Ride'. 'Ridin' With O' Hanlon' recounted his experiences in Nashville and beyond as he collaborated with Strabane musician Peter O' Hanlon. The need to immortalise those 'heady days' into verse and song merely encourages the mind's eye to attempt to visualise those days in Tennessee. Yet, they are just one chapter of the many in the life of Strabane's very own Peter O'Hanlon. Originally from the St. Colman's Drive area of Strabane, Peter cites the late great Rory Gallagher as a major influence on him as a musician. At the age of 13 he saw Gallagher perform in the Guildhall in Derry. It was that gig, Peter believes, that set him off on his own journey into the world of rock n' roll. A year later, Peter found himself playing guitar for local dancehall act Double Vision. Reflecting on those days he says, "It was a great experience. Those were early days for me but not so much for the dancehall era. The showband era was dying and the dancehall nights grew less frequent as more and more lounge bars began to open. Yet I still loved those days playing with the likes of Double Vision, Frankie McBride and Pat McGeehan." As the Showband era came to a close, Irish music was to be taken in a new direction and led by the musicians who 'cut their teeth' on the Showband circuit. Rory Gallagher was one such musician leading the charge. In 1978, Peter found himself on the road with the legendary guitarist as a support act on his Christmas tour. Around this period Peter was also forging a friendship with Thin Lizzy front man Phil Lynott. In 1980, Peter along with Phil and Terry Woods, who would later become a member of The Pogues, recorded a single called "Tennessee Stud". Peter has some great memories of Phil. One incident he looks back on with great humour was the night Phil and he went to the Baggott Inn in Dublin to watch Brush Shiels perform. "Brush was just starting into 'Whiskey In The Jar'," Peter recalls, "and Phil leaped up off the chair, sneaked his way onto the stage and crept up behind Brush. Brush had his eyes closed and when he heard the screams of the crowd he assumed they were aimed at him. It made him 'feel' the song even more. Then, just as he was about to sing, Phil ran to the mic and started singing himself. Brush opened his eyes to realise that the crowd were indeed going mad for a guy on the stage…but not necessarily him!" As a lead guitarist, Peter has continually found himself in major demand. Along with working with the likes of Irish folk group De Dannan, Shana Morrison (daughter of Van), Dolores Keane and her brother Sean Keane and touring heavily in Canada and Nashville, he has both recorded and performed with 'Van the Man' himself. Peter played on Morrison's 1997 album 'The Healing Game', which many regard as Morrison's finest album of that decade. He also performed with Morrison at the City Hall in Belfast in 1995 as part of the events celebrating President Clinton's visit to the City. In 1999, Peter released a solo album called 'Trick of Time'. Yet having the opportunity to invest his time on solo projects has been difficult down through the years. "I've been writing my own songs since I was 13," he stresses, "but playing guitar has continually side-tracked me into working for other people. There just hasn't been the time to focus on my own stuff. Perhaps I say 'yes' too much," he jokes. Yet it seems that Peter has finally found a balance between working with other people and working on his own material. "I've been taking my own stuff out live and seeing how it works with a live audience," he enthuses. "It always helps to see the reaction from the crowd." He has also been collaborating and playing live with ex-Energy Orchard frontman Bap Kennedy. Peter is very optimistic about the music scene in Strabane at the moment. "One of the things that is really positive in at the minute", he states, "is that young people are writing and performing their own material and having a blast doing it. Even though I've been writing my own stuff since I was 13, I can recall in the early days getting strange looks if you even suggested that you were going to play something you wrote yourself. It's almost the opposite now." One of our most well travelled musical sons returns to the local stage on Monday November 5 at the All Stars Bar, Strabane, for what promises to be an unforgettable night. -------------------------------------- Strabane Unplugged One of Strabane greatest talents, Peter has preformed with many artists around the world, on his tours he has played in every top venue a musician could dream of. Peter spent a long spell in Nashville playing in various clubs and toured the states many times over. In Belfast Peter played with Van Morrison to a crowd of around 80,000 people, the concert was to promote the peace process and was attended by Bill Clinton the American president and many top politicians. Peter plays a large range of instruments he is best known for his guitar skills but is also a very accomplished harmonica player, on many albums he also plays slide and Dobro even a Cajon. His dobro playing can be heard on Van Morrison CD The Healing Game, Peter has also done some Banjo work on a CD called "Dreaming up the tunes" Also worth checking out is Tom Pacheco's Eagle in the rain Album. But if you want to get the full Peter experience listen to "Trick of Time" which has Peter doing his own thing, my personal favourite is a song about John McNaughton a classic story brilliantly recreated in song. Peter has played in the Strabane Unplugged a few times, sometimes unplanned where he will pop in to enjoy the atmosphere and end up playing with other artists much to the crowds delight. Peter and Bap Kennedy had a classic night together, the kind of entertainment you can only get in the right venue, one night he done an impromptu stand in with P.P. Slaggart which will be remembered for a long time for the great music and the totally side splitting humour that developed between the two of them. Rumours have it that Peter is soon to release another album near the end of 2007, I for one will be looking forward to that as will many others around the world. Pics at ... http://www.strabaneunplugged.co.uk/Artists/pete%20o%20hanlon/pete.htm ---------------------------------------------- (From Bap Kennedy website) Peter O'Hanlon has been playing guitar with Bap. He ROCKS! Pete is an accomplished singer/songwriter himself, lives in Ireland, and has previously played with both Van Morrison and Van's daughter, Shana Morrison, in her touring band. Pete is quite well known in Nashville by various songwriters and musicians, including Steve Earle. Excellent company Pete has kept, and his talent is most worthy of very high praise! ---------------------------- Guitar genius O'Hanlon pluys 'Unplugged' (From The Ulster Herald Published: Thu, Nov 8, 2007) Strabane has been staking an unofficial but credible claim as the musical capital of Tyrone, following a number of highly successful concerts featuring top international acts in the Alley Theatre. But almost as significant as the Alley is the little underground club 'Strabane Unplugged' which appears on the first Monday of every month at the All-stars club on Main Street. The little acoustic club has attracted some of the top talent in Ireland's blues, folk, song writing, and rock scene, and is seen as a must play venue for anyone who is anyone in music. The likes of Bap Kennedy, and PP Slaggart have graced the stage in the last 6 months. Every second person in the audience is likely to an accomplished musician, singer, song-writer in his own right and occasionally, and without ceremony the industry big guns slip in to remember what music can still be like without the corporation. This coming Monday (November 5) promises another extraordinary gig as one of Ireland's true virtuoso guitarists and song-writer Pete O'Hanlon, takes to the stage supported by the classy Roy Arbuckle. If you haven't heard O'Hanlon playing you are still living in the dark ages. He's got a remarkable ability to create the illusion that you are listening to a guitar quartet. Clearly, his talent is not normal and in a world of good musicians O'Hanlon is great, so great in fact that it is a sumptuous treat to get to see him play locally. Quite apart from his guitar playing - he is an accomplished song-writer. Indeed, one of Pete's numbers, 'Northern Man' was recently adopted by the Smithsonian Institute in Washington DC, along with songs from other rock greats such as Ledbelly, Springsteen, and others. O'Hanlon isn't so much a well kept secret as treasure trove that Strabane is lucky to have. The word virtuoso is used loosely these days for a lot musicians who can pluck, strum or blow a tune, in Pete's case the description is accurate, in fact, if there was a higher distinction available he'd fit the bill just as easily. |
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