Spaceship Earth, Landing

Mara are Irish brother and sister duo Sean (song-writer, guitarist and vocalist) and Maura Donaghy (vocals). They hail from Co-Tyrone and have been in the music-biz for in and around a decade: doing musical-theatre and playing in a series of cover-bands throughout Ireland and England. This project is their first together as an original band. Mara's musical lineage, blood-wise, comes from their ballad-singing mother Eileen Donaghy; who, as 'Ireland's Queen of Song', sold millions of records in the 60s and 70s, throughout the world and continues to sell to the global Irish Diaspora. Mara share a variety of musical influences. These range from the indigenous music they experienced in and around the Ireland of their youth, to Kate Bush, David Bowie, Sex Pistols, Carpenters, Beatles, Pink Floyd, Neil Young, Joni Mitchell and onto more recent outfits like Radiohead, Turin Brakes, Paula Cole, Relish and the like. Mara, through songwriter Sean, tackle a variety of subjects in a, sometimes, witty, always, non-preaching and intelligent manner, reminiscent of the great lyricists. For example, 'Spaceship Earth', the first 'sung' track on the album, takes us into the origin of the species with the enigmatic lines: 'In the beginning, when chaos was king, Darkness and no-thing, along came light. And day took the nighttime away, before we came to Spaceship Earth'. It then goes on to discuss the question of over-population, but, unusually, doesn't make a judgement; just tells it like it is. 'All aboard the Spaceship Earth. Running to overload the wonder-ball. All aboard the Spaceship Earth. Trying to understand, to comprehend... Life'. Life is a big theme in this album, and not just the foibles of everyday life. Evident in 'Spaceship Earth, Landing', is Sean's investigations into religions, myths and philosophies of the world. Not surprisingly, the inner life is portrayed here in a very comprehensive way, in respond to Sean's ongoing, personal search for the elusive goal of 'truth' with a capital 'T'. Once again, no preaching is allowed, it is enough to merely try and describe the transcendent honestly and non-pretentiously. Real-life is here though in bucket-loads. The relationship anger in 'But, Baby I love You' is apparent from the first few menacing chords, and rises to near mayhem when the key chances and some Fripp-influenced guitar madness is spewed from Sean's soaring Charvel. In 'Adonis in Silk Sheets' we see a different side of love, where Maura as Aphrodite well-nigh bleeds with adoration for her lost lover: 'I shed the tears, they fall as flowers. They kiss the blood-red rose as they fall'. The beautiful haunting harmonies and dramatic, musical light and shade in this track will leave listeners both emotionally alive and in the grip of personal Cupids. Pilate once famously asked a question, which exposed his view that there existed a variety of truths. The quirky, upbeat, guitar-pop of 'Because You're Lovely', revels in the story of an Alanis Morrisette fan who is stuck in that awful time-warp that fans often get stuck in, which leaves their quest for 'truth', whatever that is, in eternal limbo, because of too great reliance on others. The album finishes with a couplet of songs inspired by the death of the bands father. 'Near-death Lullaby' (the dying person and the new-born baby are both, in the lyricists eyes, imbued with many similar characteristics) gives an insight into Sean's optimistic, Buddhistic outlook on death. Here sis' sings metaphorically: 'Don't cry, everything's alright. Time to chance, to dream. Sleep tight, weary is the night. Soon it will be day.' 'Rebirth' continues this theme, beginning with the lines, 'One in a million, a million have gone. How many times must I play this part again? Just another lifetime, a being, someone. How many ends do I have to start again?' And concludes with the nirvana-thought, 'Rebirth - I can stay here forever. Rebirth - if I just get it right for once. Rebirth - not a cloud over sunlight. Now I know what a fool I've been.' Mara say thank-you for taking an interest in new artists generally and, particularly, hopes you enjoy their work.