Seamus Delaney is cut from the cloth when country was real country. The Armagh man has just launched his first album in almost a decade and it is suitably entitled Back on Track.

They have known for a long time around the northeast that Seamus knows how to deliver a country song. Earlier albums such as You’re The Reason and Your Memory Came to Stay mark out his territory in style. Songs like Carmelita, Was The Pleasure Worth The Pain, Newfoundland to Nashville, and many others left no one in any doubt as to his calibre when it came to singing his heart out.

The 14-track compilation, recorded and produced by William Mawhinney at Studio 19 in Co Down, swings softly between pure country and two or three in the Irish ballad tradition. One listen to The Day Merle Haggard Dies from the new album and you will be convinced that it will take a very good singer and song to better this one this year.

Somewhere In Texas, Get Back to the Country, Mary with the Golden Hair, Across the Bridge and I Missed You are handled with consummate ease by Seamus. So too are his excellent renditions of The Beautiful Western Waltz, Sometimes It Isn’t Easy Being Me, Made of Gold, I Turned Her To Country, Life Is a River and Home to Donegal.

Seamus Delaney brings a touch of class to this album. Traditional country show presenters will love it and so will audiences around Ireland.

Here is a singer who is comfortable with what he does. The songs are from the heart and it shows. Well done, Seamus. CL

• Further information about the album and others from Seamus can be had from his website at www.seamusdelaney.com