Between Worlds
Aine Minogue's BETWEEN THE WORLDS transports the soul to the crossover, to the threshold where the temporal and the eternal are know as co-existential, where visible and invisible ( in the words of John O' Donohue)" experience no separation. . ." [for with the music] " We enter the deeper dimension of time where the eternal is hidden.  Time is never still; it brings us to new frontiers in every moment, " ("The Threshold," Forward to the album's magnificent liner notes). Ms. Minogue is a sensitive and radiantly inspired harpist/vocalist who allows us to embark with her upon the journey between the worlds, to time unbound wherein all is flow (female as yin, male as yang), wherein fludity and flux enmesh and conjoin with the reaches of masculinity within which each power is fulfilled each in the other, in and out of time at that "threshold moment" between the worlds. Above all, this is an album for meditation, deep introspection, for letting go. O'Donohue's liner notes provide expansive commentary and directive, are true aids to "opening" that spirit may experience nuance and subtlety. If one is willing to pay attention to each cut, paradoxically by allowing each number to blossom in the attentive heart, something akin to a Yeatsian epiphany may occur. I would suggest that one lie down in darkness, allow BETWEEN THE WORLDS to carry one in repose and reverie to whatever may spiritually transpire. Later, both lyrics and notes may be read to allow the rational and mystical to entertwine. Subsequent attention to BETWEEN THE WORLDS will provide "answers" to heretofore unasked questions.  From Ms. Minogue's opening song, "Exile," to her "Silence" (cut 3), to "The Grave" (cut 4) to the hypnotic "Mal Bhan Ni Chuilionain" ("Song of Beltaine), on to the title number, "Between the Worlds" (cut 6), with its admonition: "And as you move between the worlds/Such sorrow makes us reel (real)/As first and last they journey same/Through nature's passageway"--one falls under her spell. And there are other surprises too--"Rosemary Faire," a lovely "courting song" duet (with John Arlmond) and marvelous whistling by Seamus Egan (a song whose sardonic lyrics are far removed from those we recognize as the "Scarborough Fair" ballad), a splendid Irish harp rendition of the "Jezebel Carol" (cut 10), and an ethereal climax (cut 11) in which John Lennon's and Paul McCartney's "Across the Universe" brings the force between the worlds home to the heart: "Sounds of laughter, shades of earth are ringing/through my open ears/ Inciting and inviting me/ Limitless undying love which shines around me/like a million seas/And calls me on and on across the universe." Aine Minogue is in good company on this watershed album: The incredible Lindsey Horner on double bass ( now with Susan McKeown and the Chanting House*), the incomparable Seamus Egan (mandolin, nylon string guitar, whistles and flutes), Winnie Horan (onn fiddle), Barry Phillips (on cello), Takaaki Masuko (percussion), Alasdair Halliday and Jeramie Hamond (harmony vocals), John McGann (rhythm guitars), and members of the Arden String Quartet.  BETWEEN THE WORLDS is more that a mystical experience. For those willing, it is a journey away from and back to self, out of the world to noumena, to the universe and beyond and back again. Changeless, unchangeable, always changing in spiritual flow!**