Brendan Shine – ‘Abbeyshrule’

22 August 1974

And why not Abbeyshrule? Surely every village, parish, sráidbhaile and townland in the country has its own celebratory ballad, right? What’s more, Abbeyshrule in Co. Longford is in the heart of what the nearest tourist office would call Goldsmith Country, so perhaps Brendan Shine is waxing lyrical here about his favourite 18th century Irish playwright and poet. Or maybe he’s even riffing on him to pay homage to sweet Abbeyshrule, loveliest village of the plain, and what have you.

Well, no. Abbeyshrule appears in this song purely as a rhyme for “school”, to which the young Brendan is walking barefoot back in the old days. Yes, it’s one of those songs. As is the norm for the Brendan Shine canon, ‘Abbeyshrule’ is archaic waltz-time céilí accordion fodder for the elderly, though it also features an excruciatingly laboured key change like shifting gears on a combine harvester. I’m still amazed how the Shiner keeps topping the Irish charts during the era of glam and ABBA, not to mention the home-grown rock of Rory and Van, with such patently dreary and fuddy-duddy product. As ever, he stoops to conquer.