Welcome Here Kind Stranger
| Welcome Here Kind Stranger | ||||
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| Studio album by Paul Brady | ||||
| Released | 1978 | |||
| Recorded | March and April 1978, Lombard Sound Studios, Dublin |
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| Genre | Irish folk music | |||
| Length | 43:03 | |||
| Label | PBCD | |||
| Producer | Paul Brady, Dónal Lunny | |||
| Paul Brady chronology | ||||
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The Missing Liberty Tapes album cover
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Welcome Here Kind Stranger is a 1978 album by Paul Brady. After leaving The Johnstons, Paul Brady toured with Planxty, but never recorded with them, although he went on to record a duo album with Andy Irvine in 1976. He also recorded the album 'The High Part of the Road' with Tommy Peoples as a duo in the same year.
Brady's first solo album, Welcome Here Kind Stranger is his third (and final) folk recording prior to his embarking on a successful, long-term foray into the realm of mainstream rock. Its title is a phrase taken from one of the album's songs: "The Lakes of Pontchartrain". The album was initially released (vinyl and cassette) on Dónal Lunny's Mulligan label (LUN024) in 1978 and was voted "Folk Album of the Year" by Melody Maker magazine. The album was never officially released on CD due to a breakdown in the relationship between Brady and the Mulligan label and remained out of print for many years, until finally re-mastered and released in 2009 on Brady's own label, PeeBee Music.
The songs on Welcome Here Kind Stranger are highly arranged – instruments are heard then disappear as they are replaced by others. Two of the songs on the album are long ballads – "I Am A Youth That's Inclined To Ramble" and "The Lakes of Pontchartrain". The latter song had been recorded previously by Planxty on Cold Blow and the Rainy Night, though Brady's version is slightly different. He later recorded it in Irish as "Bruach Loch Pontchartrain" for the 2002 compilation album Eist Vol.2: Éist Arís, Songs In Their Native Language. The historical context of an Irishman in Louisiana is unclear. It may be set during the Battle of New Orleans.
To launch Welcome Here Kind Stranger, Brady gave a concert on July 21, 1978 at Liberty Hall, Dublin. With the help of Irvine, Lunny, Liam O'Flynn, Matt Molloy, Paddy Glackin and Noel Hill, he presented the music from the album, minus "Young Edmund In The Lowlands Low" and "The Boy On The Hilltop/Johnny Goin' To Ceilidh", but adding "The Jolly Soldier", "Mary and the Soldier", "The Crooked Road to Dublin/The Bucks of Cranmore" and his own version of "Arthur McBride".
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