Legendary singer-songwriter Paul Brady has just released the most challenging album of his career. Andrew Hamilton chats to the Strabane songsmith about changing direction, growing old and the freedom that comes when you just stop caring.
Giving up and not caring are very different things. When you give up and resign yourself to defeat, sooner or later you must entertain the idea that maybe, just maybe, you were wrong all along. And that can be a bitter pill to swallow. But to just stop caring, to decide that the argument is no longer worth having, and retreat - ethical football in hand - to the safety of your own convictions, well, that can be an altogether more fulfilling exercise. Over his long and varied career, Paul Brady has never been afraid to experiment. But somewhere between the dulcet tones of 2005’s Say What You Feel and the re-entering the studio last year, something happened. He stopped caring. The freedom that came from finally telling his critics and those who direct his musical career to take a walk has proved to be the driving force behind his tenth and most experimental record, Hooba Dooba, which was released earlier this month. “I don’t really care anymore which is why I can go out there and make an album like Hooba Dooba. I feel sorry for artists who are still in the clutches of a record company. Once the accounting and marketing men moved into the record business it was really the end of creative spontaneity and everyone then started looking over their shoulders trying to focus their brand," he said.
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