RUM, SODOMY & THE LASH delivers on the brash promise of its predecessor, RED ROSES FOR ME, mixing the band’s unique brand of traditional Irish instrumentation and composition with Shane MacGowan’s timeless poetry. As the mythic introduction of the album’s opener, “The Sickbed Of Cuchulainn” crashes into its heaving, breakneck-speed verse, RUM, SODOMY & THE LASH is a hurtling juggernaut of Celtic soul, fierce and unrelenting. Its lyrics are the very stuff of Irish song and story: cruelty, human suffering, poverty– and more than a few whiskeys along the way. Produced by none other than Elvis Costello (who here met his future wife, bassist Cait O’Riordan), this album boasts a feel that is close-up enough to be intimidating. Though on slower numbers such as O’Riordan’s enchanting take on the traditional “I’m A Man You don’t Meet Every Day”, this closeness perfectly captures the vulnerability of both song and singer. With lyrical references to drug addiction, vagrancy and prostitution (“The Old Main Drag”), MacGowan touches on themes usually left out of the Clancy Brothers’ songbook. This frank, realistic and ultimately reverent take on the Irish musical tradition lends the Pogues a refreshing modernity.