Fureys Lacking Fury!

The Fureys

Theatre Severn

March 16th 2035

Many years ago, in the Seventies I was then and am now a card-carrying folkie. Many of you may know that about me.  Anyway, I bought an album of the Fureys greatest hits and I played it until it wore out. That was then I am now older and so are they.  However, St. Patricks Day Eve, the Fureys and some great songs and music, what could go wrong.

If you learned how skilled the musicians were and how beautifully the two remaining Fureys sing, and the way they band can play tunes, how they harmonise so tightly on stage, you would also be asking what can go wrong. The answer, nothing. So why did this show fail to engage one? Before I give the full review it was noted that the audience seemed to get a lot from this show and sang along, laughed along and clapped along, and seemed to have fun.

But sadly, with a lot more corn than Fray Bentos the Fureys delivered schmaltzy, sentimental song after sentimental songs. Songs about dead people reuniting, or songs of heartbreak and songs of love. All so prosaic. Since that album there seems to have been little change over fifty years. The personnel has changed as is natural, but the act was just a little dusty rather like the album which is now in the loft, one imagines! There had been no shift towards a different style of song and it gave the act a feeling of anachronicity and one wondered where was the life. Where was the crack and where was the hooley that one would expect from a famous Irish band on St. Patricks eve.

Instead one was served a very scant serving of traditional music and a huge dollop of what can only be classed as trite, sentimental nonsense that left the recipient wondering why the writer has written such a song and why had the Fureys bothered singing it. Of course marry that with long, long, stories between songs. And the potential cracks should begin to show. Talk about Chocolate Box Ireland; this sort of stuff perpetuates a stereotype that hasn’t existed for many a year.

The instrumental traditional Irish music was played so incredibly dexterously provided by banjo and melodeon one could not fault the genius of the players abilities. But the speed at which they played seemed about four times as fast as it should be, it was as if they had to cram as many notes as they could into a fixed allotted time, so they thought they’d better hurry up. So, whilst impressed by their talent, one thought that to slow it down and really demonstrate the nuances of the music, might have been more respectful. Given their talent one felt like one had been served a huge Sunday roast with all the trimmings and given a minute to eat it in. But it played to this perpetuating stereotype that has now left the British Folk scene by enlarge, when people realised played slightly slower all Irish traditional music does not sound  the same. But it gets toes tapping with some of the crowd so we had ludicrously fast music which sounded in some instances like showing off. Slightly selfish way of performing one may believe.

The thing that one was sure to notice, the audience/performer relationship didn’t amount to much. The Fureys could have been playing Shrewsbury, Dewsbury or Ulaanbaatar for that matter they didn’t connect. They read some dedications out from the stage for various songs but this was done in a rather haphazard almost forgotten kind of way and enunciation made it hard to tell who the dedications were for anyway.

So how to take every aspect of a potentially great night and turn into a mediocre one, just ignore your audience, follow your well-honed script of ad-libs. Sing out, playout and get out. That’s how they appeared to this reviewer.

This is A Three Star Review.

Sofia Lewis