Celtic Crush Sunday- ” Galway Girl”- Steve Earle.

“And I ask you, friend what’s a fella to do? ‘Cause her hair was black and her eyes were blue.”

I have written about Steve Earle before. He is on my Mount Rushmore of music performers -{The Beatles, Bob Dylan, Elvis Costello and Steve Earle.} There are three songs if you see him in concert that you are guaranteed to hear- they won’t let him leave unless he plays his signature songs- “Copperhead Road”, “Guitar Town” and from 2001- “Galway Girl.”

“Galway Girl” is off of my favorite Steve Earle album-“Transcendental Blues” from 2000. {I can’t believe the 20th anniversary of that album is just months away.} The great Irish accordion player Sharon Shannon is featured on it. Sharon Shannon would later with Mundy- record the song and make it the most downloaded song in Ireland in 2008.

“Galway Girl” is semi-autobiographical. I remember heading how Steve was living in Ireland for a while- and once in concert he mentioned a long distance relationship with a woman he met there. I have always imagined she must have been  the Galway girl. Galway is a harbor city on the west coast of Ireland with a population of around 80,000. For 2020 Galway is the European Capital of Culture.

On the Celtic Crush radio show- every few years they have a countdown of the favorite Celtic Crush songs as voted by the listeners- “Galway Girl” is always up near the top of the countdown- both Steve’s version and the Mundy/ Sharon Shannon versions.