Drive All Night Glen Hansard

• 1 Drive All Night (feat. Eddie Vedder & Jake Clemons) 08:37
• 2 Pennies in the Fountain 04:56
• 3 Renata 04:13
• 4 Step out of the Shadows 02:14
• Total Runtime 20:00

Info for Drive All Night

Drive All Night follows the release of his first ever solo album, Rhythm and Repose, the four-song EP includes three original tracks and a cover of Bruce Springsteen’s classic song “Drive All Night” featuring Hansard’s friends and fellow musicians Eddie Vedder, Jake Clemons and Joe Henry.

While the bones of the release date back to sessions for Rhythm and Repose, the recording of “Drive All Night” was largely inspired by Hansard’s relationship with Jake Clemons, nephew of Clarence Clemons aka “The Big Man,” who was a prominent member of Bruce Springsteen’s E Street Band playing the tenor saxophone.

„If Bruce Springsteen’s The River taught us anything, it’s that The Boss is one of the best ballad writers the U.S. has ever known. Glen Hansard of The Frames and Once fame understands this well, having just released his own version of Springsteen’s show-stopper “Drive All Night.” Extending to the original’s nearly 9-minute running time, Hansard’s version has a gorgeous arrangement of its own, his raspy, Springsteen-esque growl backed by acoustic guitar, piano, and sax from the E Street Band’s Jake Clemons. Pearl Jam’s Eddie Vedder also adds his own backing vocals, lending a bassy counterpoint to Hansard’s own emotional lead, but it’s still very much Hansard that’s the focal point here — channeling the spirit of Springsteen’s original performance. The track is featured on a new EP, titled Drive All Night, which features three original tracks in addition to this one. But Hansard’s performance is strong enough to warrant an entire album’s worth of Boss covers.“ (Jeff Terich, AmericanSongwriter.com)

Glen Hansard
With a host of real-life songs and lilting vocals that reflect a passion for his influences (particularly Van Morrison, Leonard Cohen, and Bob Dylan), Glen Hansard is best known for his work with the Frames and the Swell Season. Born to a working-class Dublin family during the spring of 1970, he left school at age 13 in search of making music his career. He began busking in the streets of Dublin, laying the groundwork for his engaging stage persona and, ironically, mimicking the plot line of Once, the movie that would later make him a star in multiple countries. By his late teens, Hansard had recorded his first demo with the help of his Mum, who'd lent him some money for the project. One of the 50 tapes he pressed landed in the hands of Island Records' Denny Cordell, a former producer who'd previously helped bring Tom Petty and Joe Cocker to the Island roster. Upon a meeting at Cordell's flat, the 17-year-old Hansard also met Ron Wood, Marianne Faithfull, and Stewart Copeland. The meeting, to say the least, left a lasting impression on Hansard, and in the end, Cordell signed him with the approval of Island founder Chris Blackwell.

From there, Hansard quickly gathered a group of fellow buskers and formed the Frames. Unfortunately, quick accolades proved daunting for Hansard and the Frames, whose grunge-influenced release Another Love Song came and went without selling much. Island Records responded by dropping the group. To distract himself from the disappointment, Hansard took on the role of Outspan Foster, a guitarist in the famed Alan Parker film The Commitments. He would later admit that he shouldn't have taken the role, as it merely placated his struggle with making music. But a trip to New York gave Hansard the space and time to dream it all up again, and with a newfound focus, he wrote the guitar-blazing anthem "Revelate" and "Say It to Me Now." Both songs eventually landed on the Frames' proper debut album, Fitzcarraldo, which was released in 1996 and helped make the Frames a popular group in Ireland.

Over the next decade, Hansard and the Frames continued releasing albums while also becoming one of Ireland's finest live acts. In 2003, Hansard played host to Other Voices: Songs from a Room, a popular television show featuring Ireland's best in new music. Three years later, while the Frames readied the release of their sixth effort, The Cost, Hansard unveiled a new side project called the Swell Season. The acoustic-based group featured his collaborations with Czech songstress Markéta Irglová. He and Irglová also appeared as working-class immigrants in the Irish movie Once, which debuted at the Sundance Film Festival in 2007 and won an Oscar later that year. Thanks to the movie's success (not to mention its popular soundtrack, Once: Music from the Motion Picture, which featured the band's music), the Swell Season became a popular act in Ireland and abroad, leading to the release of a mature sophomore album in 2009. 2012's Anti-released Rhythm and Repose, the solo debut from Hansard, was produced by Thomas Bartlett (the National, Antony & the Johnsons) and inspired by the singer/songwriter's year-and-a-half spent as a denizen of New York City. Later in 2012 Hansard's track "Take the Heartland" appeared on the Hunger Games soundtrack, and the following year he recorded a cover of Bruce Springsteen's "Drive All Night" with Pearl Jam's Eddie Vedder, which was included on an Anti-issued EP of same name in November in aid of music education charity Little Kids Rock.

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