Editorial Reviews Turner's first album was It's Only A Long Way Across, produced by Philip Glass and Kurt Munkacsi and released in 1987, with Glass contributing what some have said are the most gorgeous string arrangements in rock history (particularly on the breathtaking song called "How It Shone"). It's Only A Long Way Across was a nominee for Best Debut Album on on independent label at the New York Music Awards, and a single from the album, Wicklow Hills, was covered by Christy Moore, a celebrated champion of Turner's songs. His second album, The Sky And The Ground, was produced by Turner and Simon Boswell and released in 1989 and was widely cited as one of the top albums of the year in Ireland. Liam Fay of Ireland's Hot Press enthused "Joyce with a voice, Yeats on skates, or Brendan Behan with an electric guitar, Pierce Turner is a great artist and this could be his masterpiece." Turner's third album, Now Is Heaven, was released in 1991, attracting the same kind of critical acclaim as the two prior albums. It was produced by the legendary John Simon (known for Leonard Cohen's album Songs Of Leonard Cohen, Simon & Garfunkel's Bookends and The Band, among many other gold records too numerous to mention). Hot Press rated the album Number 5 in its 1991 critics' poll behind R.E.M., U2, Nirvana, and G.W. McLennan. Q's four-star review, by Jeremy Clarke, called Turner "Everyman with a thinking cap on" and cited the album's "unusually penetrating power". Anyone who hears Pierce's music will be struck by its distinctive ethos, at once earthy and visionary, spiritually unified while musically diverse, from the Ireland Turner implicitly consecrates with each loving lyric he writes, to the Manhattan streets he now calls his own.
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About the Artist
Pierce Turner is an important figure in a celebrated branch of the rock music family - "heir apparent to Van Morrison as the poetic champion of Celtic soul and every ounce the equal of such worthy contemporaries as Elvis Costello and Sinead O'Connor." Born into a family of entertainers in the town of Wexford, Ireland, his musical life began as a boy soprano in the church choir and progressed to singing and playing keyboards in a popular showband called The Arrows. He emigrated to New York with his Wexford friend, Larry Kirwan (now a principal in the New York/Irish rock band Black 47), and in 1980 formed a band with Kirwan, The Major Thinkers. Since 1985 he has pursued a solo career, signing to the UK independent label Beggars Banquet in 1986.
Album Description
Celtic soul in the poetic tradition of Van Morrison and Elvis Costello.