the Irish Rovers

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Silver Anniversary
1989—Potato POT 2500 LP

Record One
Side One
Come and Dance to Paddy's Reels
Song of the Antrim Coast
Sand and the Foam ^[2]
Bonnie Lady ^[2]
Jigs: Frost is All Over, Rakes of Kildare, I Will If I Can
Flower of Sweet Strabane
Shores of Americay

Side Two
Maid of Fife-O
Summertime Is Coming
Ghosts of Cape Horn ^[1]
Sweet Jazz Babies
Come By The Hills
Wasn't That A Party

Record Two
Side One
What Wid Ye Do
Mick Maguire
My Green Valleys ^[1]
McDonalds' Raiders
Reels: Pigeon on the Gate, Teetotaler
Grandma's Rocking Chair ^[1]
Castle of Dromore
Rare Old Mountain Dew

Side Two
Maggie Mae
Rathdrum Fair (Mick Fitzgerald) ^[1]
Windship ^[1]
Mama Was a Moonshine Man
Circle of Seasons ^[1]
New York Gals
Unicorn

Credits

Will Millar
George Millar
Jimmy Ferguson
Joe Millar
Wicil McDowell

Sleeve Notes

"Let us go forth, the tellers of tales,
And seize whatever prey the heart longs for and have no fear.
Everything exists, everything is true,
And the earth is only a little dust under our feet."

Quite some time ago, an old Belfast acquaintance, David Hammond, wrote these words to me. They must have been penned with people like The Irish Rovers in mind.

Twenty-five years of musical dust under our feet now! Dust that turned out a grand crop of singing and musical tales.

We passed through the folk clubs of the sixties—places like The Ice House, The Purple Union, The Hungry I, and The Troubador (to name a few)—to the great concert halls like Carnegie Hall and The Sydney Opera House. We've seized our lot of "happiness times".

I suppose, underneath it all, in the beginning, the only "prey" we were after was the laughs, and the miles, and the good times that lay just down the road in the next 'pub! Somehow or other, our music carried us along. We took it to heights that we once only dreamed about. We even opened our own "Unicorn Pubs".

We are still the same old "Irish Rovers" — my brother George and cousin Joe, Big Jimmy and Wilcil. We have never missed one year's touring in all our 25 years. It's been a great party. I wouldn't have missed it for the world.

There's an old saying in Ireland (there are lots of old sayings in Ireland!) that says "A bird never flew on one wing" and that goes for The Irish Rovers as well. A lot of great people helped us along—and Les Weinstein and Bob Silk, our managers for all these years, top the list. Here's a big toast to you all!

I hope we have another 25 years of music to share with you.

"May we all live as long as we want to. And may we want to as long as we live!"

All Of Our Best
Will Millar, 1989

Alternate releases

Silver Anniversary: 1989 - Attic ACD 1303 CD

…Balladeers Notes

This album was released on CD with at least 2-covers (White and Green). I don't have any information on the "white cover", but I am assuming it is a straight forward CD release—song for song. However, on the "green cover" release, 8 songs are omitted. Two of the said missing songs showed up on their next release, The Boys Come Rolling Home.

¹ omitted on "green cover" CD release
² omitted on "green cover" CD release and appears on The Boys Come Rolling Home

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