An Open Kitchen on Princes Street, eh?
This is Hank Wedel - born in Dayton, Ohio in 1963, raised in Queens, New York City 'til age 11.and then moved to MALLOW, Co. Cork.and having been bouncing back and forth and elsewhere between Cork City and New York City ever since.I'm here to tell ya b'out An Open Kitchen on Princes Street.
Y'see, I started out in Cork City, Ireland with a band called PRINCES STREET.first busking on Princes Street in 1984sensational times.huge crowds on the streets every Thursday and Saturday nites.Free music on the streets, man.What abuncha young city hippies we were!
THEN 4 years later, in 1988 right thru to 1990, it was Princes Street as a Rock'n'Roll band - that made records, tapes, played club gigs, toured and did radio and TV.and helped establish The (late, lamented) LOBBY BAR in Cork City as a serious live venue.and played huge concerts in fields. for free. manys the time in that period.What a buncha muso deadhead Hippies!
In BETWEEN all that, from mid- '86 thru '87, I got d'Open Kitchen together in New York City with Billy Attridge (school chum from Mallow).THEN in 1990, when PRINCES STREET stopped functioning, I got together with Billy Attridge AGAINbut this time in Cork City.and called the band OPEN KITCHEN.THAT version Open Kitchen started up up a three-year residency in The Lobby in Cork '90 - '93.and the band has been evolving and revolving ever since! If you REALLY wanna sense of the history and biography of the band, just glance over at the list of members it has employed over the years.
If you wanna know 'bout the band and it's music, tho', then just listen to the tracks that are available here on myspace.The songs "Once Beaten" (recorded by Princes Street in 1989 but previously unreleased) and
"Chance Meetin'" (recorded by Princes Street at the very last gig ever at The Lobby Bar in Cork City in 2005 and released on the Lobby Sessions album in 2006) are the latest additions to our tack listing here.
"Global America" is all around us, of course.and thanks to it being on MySpace, "Global America" reached No. 40 on Neil Young's "Living with War Today " song chart- THANX to all of you who voted for it.
In 2009 the great CHRISTY MOORE, recorded and released a song called "Listen" written by Hank Wedel, after a trip to The Frozen Northern Swedish town of Gallivere-"Listen" became the title track of Christy's 2009 album on Sony Records, which went to No.1 in Ireland for 4 weeks in April 2009 and has since been awarded platinum sales status in Ireland.
Here's a video of Christy singing "Listen" accompanied by Declan Sinnott, who, as many of you reading this already know, has cooked in D'Open Kitchen manys the time and produced Princes Street recordings back in the day.Declan, along with Hank and Open Kitchen Alummni, Martin Leahy and Eleanor Healy, are currently working and recording together as
"SMALL TOWN TALK".
You can Check "Smal Town Talk" gigs and Happenings on the Blogspot of this site.
For any more info: get in touch via myspace or email me at kitchen@iol.ie
