Dublin, Ireland-born Glen Hansard has had a long and varied career. He’s led the Irish indie rock group The Frames, won an Oscar for the soundtrack to the film Once in the mostly acoustic duo The Swell Season (with Markéta Irglová), and had a string of highly regarded solo albums that have ranged from his take on ’70s singer-songwriter sounds (2015’s Didn’t He Ramble) to throwback soul (2018’s Between Two Shores) and muscular rock (2019’s This Wild Willing and 2023’s All That Was East Is West of Me Now).
In his recent appearance at the 9:30 Club, backed by a band that rocked hard and emphatically, his set drew from all these phases of his career.
At 9:30 Club on April 12, Glen chose to open with a song from This Wild Willing, “Don’t Settle.” He followed that with a Frames number, “Fitzcarraldo,” inspired by the film of the same name by German director Werner Herzog, which is infamous for its troubled (to put it mildly) production, paralleling the disastrous trek over the Andes Mountains it chronicles.
Later in the set, he came back to The Frames, playing “Revelate.” Hansard threw us a bit of curveball then by covering Interference’s “Say Ito Me Now / Gold.” That was one of two covers in the set, along with Pete Seeger’s “Passing Through,” which closed the main set. He leaned into his Irish roots in the encore with Them’s classic “Gloria.”
Most of the material this evening came from Hansard’s solo catalogue (“One of Us Must Lose,” “Grace Beneath the Pines,” “Her Mercy,” “This Gift,” “The Feast of St. John,” “My Little Ruin,” “Didn’t He Ramble,” “Down On Our Knees,” and “Song of Good Hope”), but he included some favorites from The Swell Season: “Falling Slowly,” the song that won them an Oscar, “When Your Mind’s Made Up,” and “Great Weight”) (from the album they reunited on last year, Forward).
Watch Glen Hansard perform “My Little Ruin” live at Funkhaus on YouTube:
Glen also treated the audience to what seems to be a new song, and there was a solo song from pianist Rose Gold.
Margaret Glaspy opened the show, kicking things with the Magnetic Fields’ “The Book of Love,” a song she recorded on her covers album, The Golden Heart Protector. Her set featured a couple more songs from that record, her favorite Lucinda Williams tune, “The Fruits of My Labor,” and her take on Creedence Clearwater Revival’s “Have You Ever Seen the Rain?” which sounds very different from the original. She mentioned she has a new album coming out this summer, and I think one of her songs (possibly called “I’m In Michigan”) will be on it. She also played a song about and dedicated to her hero, Martin Luther King, Jr. She said she’ll back in DC this fall, which I’m looking forward to.
I’ve seen Margaret several times, both solo acoustic and with a full band, in both opening slots and as a headliner, and she’s always great. This was my first time seeing Glen, though I’ve been a fan of his music for some time. I was pleasantly surprised by the force and energy Hansard and his band played with. The songs were great, and the punch behind them took them to another level, making for an exciting, engaging show.
Here are some photos of Glen Hansard — and later, opener Margaret Glaspy — performing live at 9:30 Club on April 12, 2026. All pictures copyright and courtesy of Casey Vock. All black and white photos below are film stills hand developed in Casey’s home studio!
