“Another excellent podcast from Paul McDermott on one of my all time favourite songwriters, the great Will Merriman from The Harvest Ministers and their classic album, Little Dark Mansions on Sarah Records. Really well researched with John Peel introducing Harvest Ministers’ singles on the Beeb, fascinating background on the band and Sarah Records, and great stories from Will. Long overdue.”
John Hegarty

Episode Notes

Episode 33 of To Here Knows When - Great Irish Albums Revisited focuses on Little Dark Mansion by The Harvest Ministers released in 1993 on Sarah Records.

Will Merriman joins me to discuss Little Dark Mansion by his band The Harvest Ministers. In a long conversation we discuss: the band’s history; self-releasing their debut single in 1991; its reissue by Sarah Records in 1992; the release of two more singles on Sarah; recording their debut album; signing to Setanta records; releasing two more albums before the end of the 90s; touring with Edwyn Collins in Europe; and recording and releasing three more albums since the millennium and much, much more. Little Dark Mansion has just been reissued on vinyl for the first time since its original 1993 release.

In a 1997 Sunday Times interview with Will Merriman, around the time his band, The Harvest Ministers’ released their third album Orbit, journalist Mick Heaney wrote, “For all the lofty pretensions of rock ‘n’ roll, few of its practitioners conform to the stereotype of the introverted tortured artist, generally opting for the party animal or prima donna image. If that is the rule, however, Will Merriman, singer and songwriter with the Dublin band The Harvest Ministers, truly is the exception. With his relaxed but hesitant and slightly awkward manner and his other-worldly intensity, Merriman is mercuriality personified.”

The Harvest Ministers were formed in 1987 by Merriman and in 1992 released their debut single, ‘You Do My World the World of Good’, on their own imprint, Crayon Records. This was brought to the attention of Sarah Records who reissued it the following year. Two more singles followed on Sarah: ‘Six O’Clock is Rosary’ (Sarah 68), and John Peel favourite ‘If It Kills Me and It Will’ (Sarah 84).

Such was the abundance of great songs that Merriman could even leave these three singles off their debut album Little Dark Mansion when it arrived later in 1993.

In State magazine, around the time of the Harvest Ministers’ retrospective compilation from 2014 You Can See Everything From Here, Niall Crumlish reiterated this very point, writing that, “During a ridiculous run of form in the 1990s, the Ministers were one of those bands, like the Pixies or The Smiths the decade before them, so overburdened with great songs that they could leave masterpieces off albums. ‘Six O’Clock is Rosary’ is utterly exquisite: a song so sparse and taut and elegant and lush with feeling that it would be the peak of almost any other band’s career.” That’s a good piece by Niall and he republished it on his Psychiatry and Songs blog a few years back, you can read it here.

The band were picked up by Setanta records and released two more albums, A Feeling Mission and Orbit before the end of the 90s. Since the millennium three more albums and a number of EPs have been issued, all released on the Crayon imprint. Will keeps going, he’s currently writing songs for the next Harvest Ministers albums. As he told Mick Heaney back in 1997: “I don't think anyone who’s truly artistically inclined can quit - they don’t have a choice really. The songwriting thing is too strong for me. At the end of the day, if nobody hears your song, so what, the catharsis is there.”

 When he reviewed You Can See Everything From Here, the aforementioned Harvest Ministers compilation from 2014, in The Irish Times, my old friend Pádraig Collins wrote: “Harvest Ministers Mainstay Will Merriman is a gifted song-writer but if you know the band then you already know that. If not, now is the perfect time to find out.” (Pádraig’s review can be read in the press cuttings gallery below.)

So I’ll paraphrase Pádraig: if you’re not familiar with the story of The Harvest Ministers and the beautiful songs they’ve recorded since the early 90s – now is the perfect time to find out.

Below:
Gallery 1 – 7” singles
Gallery 2 – albums
Click on images to enlarge.

For Further Listening/Reading:

To Here Knows When column in The Goo on Little Dark Mansion…

The Harvest Ministers’ back catalogue is available on Bandcamp.

As mentioned in the episode a 30th anniversary reissue of Little Dark Mansion has recently been reissued on vinyl. Two editions are available on Bandcamp:

• A signed limited edition that comes with sheet music to the title track;

• A bespoke version of the above edition that also comes with a soft copy book containing lyrics of every song, insights and anecdotes on recordings. Each copy book is individually hand written by singer songwriter Will Merriman.

Below: Press cuttings from various UK and US music publications, click on each image to enlarge.

Books

Two books have been published to date about Sarah Records, details below.