THE PRAYER BOAT : OCEANIC FEELING

THE PRAYER BOAT : OCEANIC FEELING

Stopping The World
Oceanic Feeling
Millionaire Hero
Don't Make Me Breathe You In
Love and Possession
Upside Down
Out of Mind
Still Only One
Hunger For The Beautiful
Mercy
Among Madmen

Label : BMG/RCA

Release Date : 1991

Length : 56:30

Review (Wikipedia) : Oceanic Feeling is The Prayer Boat's first full-length album, released in 1991 on BMG/RCA records. The term "oceanic feeling" is a psychoanalytic term for the spiritual feeling of limitlessness.

Review (Rate Your Music) : I know that some form of copyright exists when it comes to band names. Before Suede were allowed to tour America they had to change their moniker to the incredibly clumsy London Suede because a band of complete no-hopers had already bagged their name. So I presume The Prayer Boat, who released an album in 2000, are the same band that released Oceanic Feeling in 1991. But, if it is, where the hell had they been hiding for the last nine years? I ask, not because of any desire to catch up on other material, but more from the curiosity value of a band who could either release albums without causing so much as a ripple or being able to afford such a protracted sabbatical. Comparing one band to another is really the easy way out when it comes to reviewing but with The Prayer Boat there's no other choice: they are sub-standard Waterboys. Even vocalist Emmett Tinley has the sound of Mike Scott. But it's the vocals and lyrics where Oceanic Feeling ultimately stumbles and falls. Tinley has a voice which is swamped by anything above a whisper so opening the album with "Stopping The World" is a mistake. Then the lyrics are so full of platitudes and spiritual triteness they become clumsy and unmanageable ("Upside Down"). Still there is enough here - particularly "Don't Make Me Breathe You In" and the title track - to suggest with a little housekeeping and The Prayer Boat could clean up nicely.

Review (Friday's Forgotten Favourites) : The Prayer Boat were formed in 1987 in Blessington, Co. Wicklow. After a short period of playing in local bars and clubs, The Prayer Boat attracted a cult following in Dublin and two years of touring in Ireland culminated in the release of the band's first single Beautiful History on their own label, Stem Records. The band were eventually signed to RCA in 1989 and released their debut 'Oceanic Feeling' in 1991. Dark Green, released in 1995 became a chart hit in Ireland and also featured in the Top 20 Singles of the Year in Hot Press.

Review (RTE) : The first (and least known) album from Wicklow's The Prayer Boat. Released in 1991 on BMG Records, it became a little over-shadowed by its follow-up – Polichinelle - some years later. The latter is also a great record, and tends to show up on 'Greatest Irish' lists, but I always had a soft-spot for Oceanic Feeling. The Prayer Boat came out of that late 80s / early 90's scene, which could at worst be described as 'Celtic rock' (before the kind of negative connotations we might apply to it now were popular), but might best be understood if we consider their contemporaries such as The Waterboys and Hothouse Flowers. The aforementioned Tinley is the driving force for this record, his vocals a joy to listen to as he paints lyrical pictures of mythical goddesses, beautiful and beguiling as he utilizes the trope of nature to describe his feelings and desires. The album is poetic and beautiful, with an up-tempo, driving rhythm section that underscores the swirling mix of instruments, perfectly encapsulating a genre that was all our own and which should have made bands such as The Prayer Boat much more commercially successful than they were. The stand out track for me is the title song - today it reminds me of My Morning Jacket at their best, and along with Upside Down is the finest example of what the band were trying to achieve with this album, at least with Side A. For those of you that don't understand what that means, I'm speaking of vinyl, and when I listened to this album again last week, I had to go and flip it over to Side B to hear the second half. It was magical. In fact, in many ways Oceanic Feeling is an album of two sides, both equally mesmerizing, but whereas Side A is driving and upbeat, the second side is slower and a tad more trippy. I'll assume this is exactly what the band wanted when working out the running order, as there are six songs on the first side and only four on the reverse. As the album closes, elements of Van Morrison circa his Moondance era (an album I prefer to Astral Weeks) can be heard in Hunger for the Beautiful, driven in the whole by beautiful, melodic bass lines from Tony Byrne. Celtic mysticism, but not as you know it.