The Haar – The Met, Bury: Live Review

By Mike Ainscoe on 20th April 2024 • ( Leave a comment )

The Haar – The Met, Bury – 19th April 2024

Last seen at the From The Whitehouse showcase for delegates at English Folk Expo in October 2023, The Haar had their cards marked as a band to return to see whenever – indeed as soon as – possible.

The Met provides that opportunity to reacquaint with Ciderhouse Rebellion pairing, Adam Summerhayes and Murray Grainger along with singer Molly Donnery and not for the first time Cormac Byrne. We’ve been Cor-watching for almost two decades and his presence up front with his traditional Irish drum – and not sat in his usual place at the back of Seth Lakeman’s band – is a revelation as he’s positively loquacious in his Haar role which he humbly explains involves the unenviable task of tuning a dead goat nailed onto a piece of wood.

And when we’re invited to enjoy “an evening of freedom and creativity” ahead of Carrickfergus, it’s right up the Summerhayes/Grainger strasse as a key element of their duo work. Molly also offers the warning that although the tunes may be bright and merry, “maybe just don’t listen to the words – sing along, or maybe cry along instead.“

Their reworking of traditional material, giving the tried, trusted and familiar into something that takes on a dark and mysterious air is their calling card. Take The Wild Rover for instance. Far removed from the drunken singalong with which many are familiar, The Haar take it off into a vaguely Gallic direction, pack it with a slow burning, dark theatricality and add a verse that keeps the death count for the evening in the ascendancy. Not satisfied with the ending, they do a similar to Willie Taylor with a pistol shot to the head addition that sees it sitting more comfortably in the repertoire lest we not get too jolly.

The signs are there from the start as they emerge, dressed in black (bar Molly’s dress) onto a sepia lit stage, yet there are the odd concessions to the uptempo and a chance now and again to look on the brighter side of life. Ten Minutes Too Late celebrates the relaxed Irish attitude to time keeping and Home Boys Home brings the first half to a suitably lively end.

The second set begins with Adam living up to he fRoots ‘Paganini’ description with a particularly fine bout of fiddlework. Maybe it’s something he’s imbibed during the interval or the effects of the huge kebab he was pictured with at the pre-gig feast, but there’s a real fire about his playing in set #2. She Moves Through The Fair is the first of another series of familiar songs that get the Haar tweak as Messers Kerr & Burchill’s chart topping alternative gets topped.

And while many in the Rock world are celebrating the 45th anniversary of Thin Lizzy’s Black Rose album – bear with us – The Haar’s Wild Mountain Thyme (quoted in the title track of the Lizzy album by Gary Moore and Scott Gorham indulging in a thrilling twin guitar jig) relies on the grand cathedral organ sound of the Grainger accordion – played “very loudly!” for its impact. Then there’s the second Lizzy connection with a more organic Whiskey In The Jar that’s as far removed from the radio friendly version as you;d anticipate.

For an encore they ask what we’d like. The consensus is happy and fast and while they try to get away with confessing that they don’t have any left, they do a grand job of leaving us on a foot tapping high and with an insight into audacious and ambitious music making.