The Dubliners' 1988 album, originally called
The Dubliner's Dublin and, in a later reissue, simply
Dublin, was intended to help commemorate the millennium of the city that gave the group its name. That organizing principle provided the band with a rationale for mixing new songs with re-recordings of a batch of their older songs that referred to Dublin. So, the album contains fresh versions of such old favorites as "Finnegan's Wake," "Raglan Road," "The Monto," "Dicey Reilly," "The Ragman's Ball," "Seven Drunken Nights," "The Spanish Lady," and "The Rare Oul' Times," titles that longtime fans will recognize as dating back, in some cases, to the Dubliners' first few albums. They sound a little different now, and not only because the lineup has changed over the years. By 1988, the group consisted of original members
Ronnie Drew and
Barney McKenna, plus
John Sheahan,
Seán Cannon, and
Eamonn Campbell (who also doubled as their record producer). They were not quite as rough and ready as they had been a quarter-century earlier, but they performed the songs with professionalism and affection, and the newer material had much the same traditional feel. A tour of Dublin in song, the album provided a sense of the city's history and geography, and a feel for the kinds of people who had lived there over such a long time, including the members of the band.