House Of The Dolphins

Bilingual jazz/folk might inspire one of two things in any music listener: either baleful foreboding or hungry curiosity. O'Reilly's last album, Tír Na Mara, set the scene with an eclectic collection of material that melded the Irish tradition and subtle infusions of jazz with surprising skill. And second time round she's grown in confidence, with the result that House Of Dolphins is a mighty fine leap into the big blue.

Fitting really, since Melanie O'Reilly's music has a certain nautical - or at the very least aquatic - feel to it. It ebbs and flows, eddies and whirls as though driven by a remote force. Yet still, she remains utterly in possession of the songs.

House Of Dolphins swing shifts at its most beautiful in the strongly jazz-tinged set pieces such as the title track, where Ellen Cranitch's flute etches out the skeleton with rough hewn magnificence (and where O'Reilly's vocals are reminiscent of some fine moments from Mari Wilson many years back). Then there's 'City Of Dreams', a song that cradles O'Reilly's own rhythmic sensibilities as though she were born singing it.

Occasionally there are jarring moments when too much gravitas drags the momentum down to a snail's pace. 'Father, Mother, Lover', despite some beautiful low whistle from Joe McKenna, is the kind of track that might sail into the stratosphere in a live context, but in the cold light of the laser, it simply lurches from one melodrama to another.

But with only the occasional misgiving, House Of Dolphins is an album that's refreshingly free of artifice, and for that Melanie O'Reilly deserves a Grammy.