
Exceptional Irish Songwriters – Emmett Tinley
In this series I take a look at some of my favourite Irish songwriters. Some you may know, others you may not. With any luck you'll make some new musical friends along the way... Please enjoy... MR. Emmett Tinley
"Remember what was beautiful, not the dark inventions of your burning sorrow" - Polichinelle, The Prayerboat.
BALLAD OF A TIN MAN
Emmett Tinley is one of my favourite Songwriters. Irish or otherwise. He makes insanely beautiful music and has a voice that simply soars ... I first heard this voice was on an album called "Polichinelle" by "The Prayer Boat". Emmett was the band's singer and principle songwriter. It's a gorgeous record, stunning. In my opinion there are no weak songs on Polichinelle, and it contains a number of absolute gems.
I don't know of any particular collection of words that would do full justice to Tinley's voice. It's delicate, but at the same time strong. It's piercing but soothing, his voice is a lit up, golden thing that floats high above the song below. The important thing is to hear if for yourself.
Here's a great live performance of "It hurts to lose you", a song from the Polichinelle album, filmed in Dublin by Myles O'Reilly in 2009.
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Just happened to come across Emmett on Glen Hansard -Other Voices. What a fantastic voice, I think he’s amazing , just heading off to see if I can get his CD Attic Faith . Someone mentioned to me recently that Pete Courtney was very good also if you want to check him out.
Hope you managed to track down Attic Faith, it’s a classic. I know Pete Courtney too, he’s got some fine songs! Thanks for writing 🙂 PD