CityLife

Lisa Hannigan

ENCHANTING: Hannigan

OUT of the shadows and into the limelight steps Lisa Hannigan who, after so many years playing the sublime-voiced, if somewhat spectre-like, sidekick to Damien Rice, is finally standing on her own two feet.

Whether she jumped or was pushed – and two years since the pair parted ways, does it really matter? – tonight’s gig proves it was high time Hannigan flew the nest.

Her first solo album Sea Sew is out in the UK this week, following critical success in Ireland and the US, and its hand-knitted and sewn artwork reflects the tactile, homemade feel that characterises her songs.

With a full band to support her – and we’re talking morally as well as musically if the encouraging smiles flying around the stage like a kind of beneficent semaphore are any indicator – Hannigan performed an impressive 16-song set.

Though predominantly of her own creation, a handful of unexpected covers revealed a pleasing depth to her influences, while cleverly adding points of reference for an audience which, in all possibility, was largely unfamiliar with her solo work.

Album opener Ocean and a Rock set the ball rolling, followed by Pistachio, a brooding number with echoes of Peggy Lee’s Fever, which swelled from sparse beginnings to a magnificent, multi-layered crescendo.

Splishy Splashy, Sea Song and Teeth were highlights, while a haunting cover of Air’s Playground Love complete with note-perfect backing vocals courtesy of the band, and an almost sinister rendition of The Lady is a Tramp, were nothing less than goosebump-inducing.

Melodica

Throughout the set Hannigan displayed an easy sort of musical proficiency, managing the harmonium, which esoteric instrument was a frequent feature, as well as banjo, guitar and melodica with playful aplomb.

In fact, ‘play’ is a verb relevant here in more than one way, as there was a prevailing sense that Hannigan, like a child, was filled with a sort of wonderment.

She talked happily, if quietly, between songs and at times really lost herself in her performance, moving and dancing around the stage in an unselfconscious way so far removed from the statue-still Hannigan of yore - who might stare into the middle distance as though hypnotised if she raised her gaze from the floor at all - as to be barely believable.

But for everyone crammed into the RNCM’s concert hall Hannigan’s achingly soulful, butter-soft voice was undoubtedly the main draw, and she didn’t disappoint.

Not only did she fail to hit a wrong note, but she demonstrated, in a way she might not have been able had she continued supplying the breathy counterpoint to Rice’s rawness, an impressive range and unexpected power that never lost its distinctive purity of tone.

The radio-friendly I Don’t Know and Lille preceded a solo cover of John Martyn’s Couldn’t Love You More and a full-band rendition of Iron and Wine’s Free Until They Cut Me Down in the encore.

For my money, it would have been nice to hear a little more of Hannigan on her own - although her band showed themselves to be first-class, highly intuitive musicians, right down to the tour manager’s stylophone playing, which made Keep It All sound rather like the soundtrack to a particularly unsuccessful game of Operation.

In a good way.