Sea Swimming, Jack O’Rourke (Dan Keaney)

Words and Music - Jack O’Rourke
Video directed by Daniel Keaney (featuring an array of sea swimmers and mermaids)
Vocals and piano - Jack O’Rourke
Guitar - Hugh Dillon
Fiddle and Viola - Clare Sands
Cello - Aisling Fitzpatrick
Recording and Production - Davie Ryan and Jack O’Rourke
Mixing - Ber Quinn (Villagers, John Grant, Cathy Davey)
Mastering - Philip Shaw Bova (Feist, Father John Misty, Matt Berninger (The National), Angel Olson)
Recorded at The Triskel, Cork
Lyrics
Sea swimming
Martha took her time, like the perfect crime
Pale Toes glistening on cool water
Caressing little waves and drowning sin
Confessing raw desire, then diving in
I made a bea line for the brine
Didn’t think of the ice cold - upper or lower
Healing all that pain, in green and blue
Me and Martha, sun coming through
Sea swimming - heart willing - I’ll dive with you into the dawn
Cured and renewed in the tide, reborn
Sea swimming - it’s fitting - with sunlight dancing on your skin
Naked as a morning - with you again and again
Sea weed and musk, like blind mans buff
Feeling all the feels without warning
REM on your speaker phone
Cockles and clams make undertones
The Meeting of our water signs
Laughing in the tide with no motive
Waves that hurl us into one
Something brewing, nearly begun
Sea swimming - heart willing - I’ll dive with you into the dawn
Cured and renewed in the tide, reborn
Sea swimming - it’s fitting - with sunlight dancing on your skin
Naked as a morning - with you again and again
Martha took her time, like the perfect crime
Pale Toes glistening on cool water
Caressing little waves and drowning sin
Confessing raw desire, then diving in
“This tune came very late. The melody, I heard in my head, coming out of the ocean after starting sea swimming during lockdown . It’s inspired by my roots of Irish traditional music. The Gloaming and Muireann Nic Amhlaoibh were the soundtrack on trips to the sea. It might have Rubbed off. It’s a song of hope and renewal and being intimate - with yourself and your soul mate,” explains O’Rourke, of the origin story of the track which will surely resonate with the many people who took up sea swimming over the last two years.
“The ocean brings out that. Martha represents our inner child, “laughing in the tide with no motive.” Hugh Dillon on guitar, channels Steve Cooney and Clare Sands added fiddle which brings the song back to a roots feel. Aisling’s cello is integral. I was asked to play this for Departures, a film by Luke McManus - emphasising the connection between landscape and songwriting.”
The video for Sea Swimming was shot by Daniel Keaney on various beaches in Cork with additional fan footage Some of my fans sent in clips of themselves sea swimming, “Dan’s style really captures the mystery and power of connecting with the ocean.” adds O’Rourke.