"Wicklow Hills"
It was in the middle of a hot, humid New York July, my band had just split up, a partnership of many years. I felt lost, directionless. I had an anxiety attack out on First Avenue, I couldn't breathe! In my mind I heard the words "Tell everybody I'm gone away for ten years.."

"Thunderstorm"
After you live with someone for eleven years and you break up there has to be a Thunderstorm.

"How it Shone"
Home for a rare Summer visit, I usually went home at Christmas. We lived on the quayside and on this day, the water reflected the boats and the clouds like a mirror. Innocent memories came pouring in - and they wrote this song.

"The Sky and the Ground"
This place where I had breakfast every morning was frequented by a family of junkies. They would be so nice to each other and the waitress, I was fascinated at how they held their lives together. Going off to pay their phone bills etc. They would have casts on their arms and scratches on their heads from falling around, but there were mothers and sons juggling the Sky and the Ground getting high, but holding it together.

"Surface In Heaven"
Avoiding change at all cost, this lover says he won't go under even for heaven.

"Moonbeam Josephine"
A relative, who, in the final days of his life constantly paid homage to his wife.

"Zero Here"
I saw a heroin addict standing outside St. Marks church with a shoe in one hand and a dog chain in the other, he was constantly threatening to fall, but never quite did, I guessed his story.

"Mayhem"
When my mother first heard the saying "the shit hits the fan" she replied, "you could always pull the plug". Well writing this song pulled the plug for me, written right in the middle of my passage between the ex and the new. Incidentally, it was written in London, hence some of the English imagery.

"Manana in Manhattan"
One morning at 6.00am after leaving an after hours bar on 9th street and Avenue C I was in top form and the golden early morning sun made the windows appear on fire. The title came from a Puerto Rican radio show.

"The Answer"

"Orange Coloured Sun"
I When I was sixteen, living in Ireland, I used to ride my bike down to the beach to see my girlfriend; we would go down to the reeds and kiss in the evening orange sun, it was love, I thought, it certainly wasn't sex. Over the years this memory inhabited my dreams and became exaggerated, but not much.

"I set you up to shake"
This song was written about a painful phone call I had to make, "What's worse the giver or the getter?" n.b. Shawn Colvin sang backing vocals alongside Joy Askew and Finnghuala Leahy on this song.

"Have you looked at the sun"
I rarely write a song when extremely happy. This was in a state of pure bliss, the middle was actually written on a plane flying out of Waterford, Ireland, flying to see Clare.

"All Messed Up"

"You can never know"
Written about how difficult it is to put someone else in your place, unless they have lived through all your experiences, major and minor. How can they possibly agree!

"Jem"