Imelda May - Dreaming - Various Songs (2012-2014)

Here's the next stray tracks album from Imelda May. I live in the US, so I'm not totally sure, but I hear May is a big star in Britain and Ireland. But she's far less known everywhere else, including the US. That's a shame, because she has a great voice, great stage presence and beauty, and is a talented songwriter too. Her musical style is heavily influenced by earlier eras, and she's totally divorced from current pop trends. For me, that's a huge positive instead of a negative. If you like the other musicians I post at this blog, you're probably going to like her stuff too.

The songs come from singles, bonus tracks, various artists compilations, and so on. Five of the songs are officially unreleased and come from concert bootlegs. Those sound pretty good though, especially since two of them are from TV show appearances.

I'd hesitated to post the next in my series of stray tracks albums for her though, because I was missing two key songs. A week or so ago, a kind commenter here sent me one of them ("On My Radio"), so I'm proceeding with the next album.

(I'm still missing the other one, her version of "Rock Around with Ollie Vee," which has been officially released, but only as a bonus track to the various artists tribute album "Listen to Me: Buddy Holly." If anyone has it, please let me know, and I'll add it to this album.)

This album is from the time period when Imelda May was still heavily in her rockabilly phase. So expect some of that. But there's a wide variety of music here. For instance, the song "On My Radio" mentioned above is a cover of the ska hit by the Selekter. There's blues ("Spoonful"), traditional Irish (such as "Carolina Rua"), and even covers of songs by Blondie ("Dreaming") and Sonny and Cher ("Bang Bang (My Baby Shot Me Down)"). A lot of good stuff. I think this truly would make a nice album all on its own.

In terms of sound quality, four of the songs here are officially unreleased. But they generally sound pretty good. There's one more, "Important Words," that didn't quite make the cut as far as sound quality, so I bumped that one down to being a bonus track.

01. On My Radio (Imelda May)
02. Carolina Rua (Imelda May & the Chieftains)
03. Spoonful (Imelda May)
04. I Wish I Had Someone to Love Me (Imelda May & the Dubliners)
05. Mr. Five by Five (Imelda May)
06. Clint [Silence on Tourne] (Thomas Dutronc & Imelda May)
07. Meet You at the Moon [Acappella Version] (Imelda May)
08. Beautiful Day (Imelda May & the Levellers)
09. Zombie Girl (Imelda May)
10. Dreaming (Imelda May)
11. Amber Eyes (Imelda May)
12. Bang Bang [My Baby Shot Me Down] (Imelda May)

Important Words (Imelda May)

https://www120.zippyshare.com/v/DtbiSqf2/file.html

The cover art photo is of Imelda May in concert in London in 2012.