Aoife O’Donovan’s “Age of Apathy” Inspires Empathy

Aoife O’Donovan, who won a Grammy as a member of I’m With Her in 2019, is in contention for her first such award as a solo artist with this year’s Age of Apathy. One listen was all it took for Brooklyn Roads to concur that the Best Folk Album nomination is well deserved.

Aoife O’Donovan – Guitar In Hand /© photo by Omar Cruz/ courtesy of Yeproc Music Group

She invites comparisons to Joni Mitchell (specifically her seminal album Blue) with her phrasing and guitar work on “Phoenix” and, in the title song, “Age of Apathy,” which not only references Mitchell’s “My O

Age of Apathy album cover  courtesy of Yeproc Music Group

ld Man” but also quotes verbatim the line, “We don’t need no piece of paper from the city hall.”

The song’s inspiration, however, is O’Donovan’s memories of 9/11, with poignant lines such as “Hold me like you held me on the day the towers fell” and the refrain “Oh, to be born in the age of apathy / When nothing’s got a hold on you.”

Throughout the album, O’Donovan appears to be moving between dark and light, either traveling on the road in songs like “Elevators,” “Lucky Star,” and the title track, or going back in time, seeking, for example, “to be what I wanted to be in 1993,” as she sings in “What Do You Want From Yourself.”

A Pensive Aoife O’Donovan / © photo by Omar Cruz/ courtesy of Yeproc Music Group

While COVID and other concerns led O’Donovan to relocate to Florida, she didn’t leave her longtime home borough completely behind. “B61” takes its title and inspiration for the Brooklyn bus route that runs through Red Hook and Cobble Hill.

The album’s centerpiece, “Prodigal Daughter,” up for both Best American Roots Song and Performance Grammys, features another Grammy nominee, Allison Russell sharing vocals. It shifts between confrontation and reconciliation: “Look at the child upon my knee … She resembles me resembling you.”

Other standouts include “Galahad,” a tale of love with no strings attached, and “Sister Starling,” the beautiful opening track that sets the tone for the rest of the album, musically and lyrically. It all wraps up neatly and brightly in the final track, the catchy celestial journey, “Passengers.”

All in all, we thoroughly enjoyed being a passenger on the musical ride that Age of Apathy has taken us on.