“A deeply personal set of songs for me back then, and they still are, for many reasons, and we never for one minute realised the reach and the impact it would have as a record. Throughout it we stayed true to it, were brave with it, let it become the quiet spaces that it did, let the Angelus’ bells of the Blessington Street church fade out over the end of the opening track. It was meant to stay there. Joe has revisited it and brought a beautiful shine back to its corners. My memories of Donagh and Kevin playing and devotion to details with it are sharpened, and awakened once more.”
Patrick M. Barrett, 2023

On this episode I’m joined by Patrick Barrett for a deep dive into The Hedge Schools’ second album At the End of a Winding Day originally released 2014 and reissued on vinyl in 2024.

In this episode Pat and I have a chat about the writing and recording of of the second Hedge Schools’ album and in a long conversation we also touch on: the closure of vinyl manufacturer Dublin Vinyl, Musiczone Records in Cork, the late Willie Meighan and Rollercoaster Records in Kilkenny, Sub Assembly supporting The Fall in the Mean Fiddler in 1997, Ten Speed Racer, Reverb Records, Nina Hynes, Red Flag Recording Company, record producer and mixing engineer Darren Allison, Dave Murphy’s singer-songwriter nights in the International Bar, Brian Mooney of The Idiots and The Next New Low, Pat surviving a brain aneurysm, collaborating with Joe Chester on The Hedge Schools, Dave O’Grady’s Independent Records, the credibility of landmark indie labels, Cauldron Studios on Blessington Street, recording with trumpeter Donagh Molloy and cellist Kevin Murphy, quiet records and the albums of Talk Talk and Mark Hollis, bespoke handmade independent releases, the impetus to create art, Paul Page’s Between the Bars website, end-of-life care services and end-of-life dignity, the Arrivalists two albums - Last of the Written Pages and It’s Own Time, and the inadvertent recording of the Angelus’ bells on the title track of At the End of a Winding Day. It was a brilliant chat.

In a review of The Hedge Schools debut album, 2008’s Never Leave Anywhere, journalist, author, and Horslips’ drummer Eamon Carr wrote:

“There are no 120bpm headbangers here. Wisely. Instead, Patrick and Joe create a stately hymnal that oozes atmospheric introspection. A search for acoustic purity lies at the heart of the vision of The Hedge Schools. Each arrangement unfolds like a mini-symphony.”

The Patrick and Joe are Patrick Barrett and Joe Chester and that review was in the Evening Herald and the headline at the top of page read “Living on the hedge” (Carr’s full review is archived below).

The sub-editor deserved a good kicking for that abomination.

Carr is writing about the first Hedge Schools’ album but he could just as easily be describing the band’s second album, At the End of a Winding Day, which came out 6 years later in 2014.

Prior to The Hedge Schools Pat and Joe were both members of Dublin indie-rockers Ten Speed Racer. In that band the lads were joined by Pat’s two brothers Dermot and John and Terry Cullen.

Ten Speed Racer toured the US with their Reverb labelmate Nina Hynes. Joe Chester played guitar in Nina Hynes’ band and had produced Creation her debut mini-album in 1999. After the tour he joined Ten Speed Racer. Nina talks about those days in Episode 13 of the podcast.

Ten Speed Racer released two highly regarded albums, Eskimo Beach Boy in 2000 and their self-titled second album in 2003.  Tom Robinson once wrote in The Guardian that, “No one with a pulse can fail to be moved by Dublin’s Ten Speed Racer.”

Earlier this year, in an email correspondence with Dermot I told him that, “I only ever saw 10SR live once, we stumbled into a bar in Killarney late one night and the band were going on stage. It was quiet enough and you would have been entirely justified to have been pissed off considering the long journey down, but my memory is that you all absolutely gave it 100%. It was great, I thought fair play lads!”

Dermot responded that in their time Ten Speed Racer had played their share of “Quiet” rooms. “BUT,” Dermot said, “we always, always PLAYED.” He continued: 

“We once did a gig in a massive room on campus of one of the big colleges in Boston to ONE GUY! The guy booking the show didn’t realise it was mid-term and only one guy arrived. We played, and had a great laugh. The guy, who, fairplay, did stick around sat very far away in the comfy seats. I was messing with him throughout saying what a great “Audient” he was. Before the last song, I said, “Thank you, you have been our best Audient ever!” Turned out that he was the music reviewer from the Boston Globe and he wrote an amazing review.”

Ten Speed Racer eventually called it a day in 2004 after a final gig in Dublin’s Temple Bar Music Centre. The band’s entire output has recently been digitised and it’s all available on Bandcamp including that final gig (links below).

After Ten Speed Racer Pat reconvened with Joe as The Hedge Schools and they’ve put out three albums, the most recent of which was 2018’s Magnificent Birds.

Since Ten Speed Racer Joe has released a number of great albums under his own name, not least his debut solo record, 2004’s A Murder of Crows, and since 2014 he’s also been a member of A Lazarus Soul.

Since Magnificent Birds Pat has released two albums under the name Arrivalists, the most recent of which is It’s Own Time from 2023.

But it’s back to the second Hedge Schools’ album for the focus of this episode. An album that upon its release Killian Laher in his review for No More Workhorse, wrote:

“It’s one of those rare albums that when you put it on, everything else seems to recede into the background.”

Killian wasn’t alone in recognising the beauty of this album. Paul Page, of Whipping Boy, picked the album as his favourite Irish album of 2015 and wrote on his old website Between the Bars (Page’s full review is archived below), that:

“It is a record that knows the value of space and silence, there is a total absence of clutter and distracting superfluous noise.”

For Further Listening/Viewing/Reading:

The Hedge Schools: Never Leave Anywhere, At the End of a Winding Day and Magnificent Birds are available on Bandcamp.

Arrivalists: Last of the Written Pages and It’s Own time are available on Bandcamp.

Ten Speed Racer: Eskimo Beach Boy, 10SR and Live in Dublin 2004 are available on Bandcamp.

In 2015 Niall Crumlish interviewed Pat, Joe and Donagh Molloy for State magazine upon the release of At the End of a Winding Day. In June 2024 Niall spoke to Pat again, revisiting some of the themes discussed in their original interview. The original 2015 interview and the recent interview are on Niall’s website Psychiatry and Songs.

Below: Various reviews, click on each image to enlarge.