The Frames

Glen Hansard, the Dublin-based singer/songwriter heading the Frames, left school at 13 to perform as a street musician around town. At 17 he obtained a parental loan to cut a demo, 50 copies of which were manufactured and passed along to relatives and acquaintances. One copy reached Island Records executive Denny Cordell, who persuaded founder Chris Blackwell to place Hansard on the label roster. With the major-label contract secured, Hansard formed the Frames, naming the group after his boyhood preoccupation with bicycles; he routinely fixed his friends’ bikes, leaving frames strewn across the family yard and prompting locals to refer to the Hansard residence as “the house with the frames.”

The alternative pop ensemble—featuring guitarist Dave Odlum, vocalist Noreen O’Donnell, bassist John Carney, violinist Colm Mac Con Iomaire, and drummer Paul Brennan—first appeared onstage at an Irish music festival in September 1990. Following a short pause that allowed Hansard to appear in Alan Parker’s hit film The Commitments, the band issued its debut single, “The Dancer,” in early 1992. Working with producer Gil Norton, whose Pixies productions shaped the sound of the sessions, the Frames (occasionally billed as the Frames D.C. to distinguish them from a similarly named American act) finished their first album, Another Love Song. A planned U.S. tour fell through after Mac Con Iomaire became ill and Carney departed; although bassist Graham Downey joined quickly, Island’s roster changes dropped the band from the label. O’Donnell exited during the making of the second album, Fitzcarraldo, released in 1994. Bassist Joe Doyle soon replaced Downey, while Dave Hingerty took over Brennan’s drumming role for the group’s third album, the lo-fi 1999 release Dance the Devil.

The Frames moved to Chicago indie Overcoat and recorded their fourth album, For the Birds. Earlier records had often been hampered by excessive production, yet the 2001 album, partly tracked by Steve Albini at Electrical Audio Studios, displayed an intimacy and fragility that suited Hansard’s emotionally charged songs. Despite widespread critical praise, Odlum exited in November 2001 to concentrate on production work, with Simon Goode assuming lead-guitar duties. A U.S. tour scheduled for the following month was postponed after the death of Hansard’s close friend and occasional collaborator Mic Christopher, onetime frontman of the Mary Janes. The Frames finally reached the States in 2002, supporting the New Pornographers, and issued their first live album, Breadcrumb Trail, that same year. Their next release, the nine-track collection of studio outtakes The Roads Outgrown, appeared in 2003, followed in February 2004 by their Anti debut, Set List.

While the Frames continued to issue new material, including Burn the Maps and the 2007 album The Cost, Hansard devoted comparable attention to the Swell Season, a side project that grew into an internationally successful band after he and collaborator Markéta Irglová were cast in the independent film Once, which also incorporated their songs. Several Frames members were enlisted to back the Swell Season, preserving portions of the original lineup. In 2015, amid Hansard’s primary focus on solo work, he compiled Longitude (An Introduction to the Frames), an anthology of favored tracks from the band’s catalog that also contained three new recordings.