Glen Hansard Returns With A 22 Song Career Retrospective Captured Live At Berlin’s Historic Funkhaus Across Two Volumes, Beginning With Transmissions East (Vol. 1) This April
by Paul Cashmere
Glen Hansard has mapped out an ambitious new chapter with Don’t Settle – Transmissions East & West, a 22 song live retrospective spanning his solo catalogue, his work with The Frames and recordings from The Swell Season. The first instalment, Transmissions East (Vol. 1), arrives on 24 April 2026 via Plateau/Secretly Distribution, with Transmissions West (Vol. 2) to follow later in the year.
Recorded across two nights in April 2025 at Berlin’s historic Funkhaus Berlin, the project captures Hansard and his band in front of a devoted audience inside the vast former East German radio complex. The sessions were presented without vocal overdubs, second takes, autotune or studio correction. The result is positioned as both a career survey and a definitive live document, while also functioning as a fresh statement from a songwriter now 55 and still pushing forward.
The spark for the album came from a rain-lashed performance at Zuiderpark Theatre in The Hague during the European summer of 2024. As a storm rolled in, Hansard invited members of the audience onto the stage, transforming the concert into a communal gathering. That sense of shared space, audience and performer on equal footing, underpins the Transmissions concept.
Hansard has previewed the release with a new live recording of Didn’t He Ramble, a song that has carried personal weight since its original appearance on his 2015 solo album of the same name. The track was written in memory of his father, who died at 62. Hansard has spoken candidly about his father’s loyalty to family and to Dublin’s Ramble Inn, and of the years spent driving The Frames’ gear from venue to venue, often loading out long after the encore had finished. The new version, recorded at Funkhaus, reframes the song as both tribute and celebration.
Hansard’s career has consistently bridged film, theatre and music. He first reached an international audience in The Commitments, directed by Alan Parker, before global recognition arrived with Once in 2007. Co-starring Markéta Irglová, the modestly budgeted Irish music drama became an unexpected international success, grossing more than $23 million worldwide. The pair won the Academy Award for Best Original Song for Falling Slowly and later toured extensively as The Swell Season.
As a solo artist, Hansard launched with Rhythm And Repose in 2012, followed by Didn’t He Ramble in 2015, which earned a Grammy nomination for Best Folk Album. Between Two Shores in 2018, This Wild Willing in 2019 and All That Was East Is West Of Me Now in 2023 broadened his sonic palette, blending folk, soul and expansive rock arrangements.
Across his career he has shared stages and studio moments with figures including Bob Dylan, Bruce Springsteen and Joni Mitchell, artists he has long cited among his formative influences alongside Leonard Cohen and Van Morrison.
The track listing for Transmissions East (Vol. 1) is:
Don’t Settle
Down On Our Knees
Back Broke
My Little Ruin
Didn’t He Ramble
Fitzcarraldo
Carrickfergus
Lonely Deserter
The Feast Of St John
Wreckless Heart
In framing the two volumes as transmissions, Hansard positions the recordings as signals sent both backward and forward, an acknowledgement of the road travelled and a commitment to what comes next. For an artist who began busking on Dublin streets at 13 and built an international career from persistence and craft, Don’t Settle serves as both summary and statement of intent.
Transmissions East (Vol. 1) is released 24 April 2026. Transmissions West (Vol. 2) will follow later in 2026.
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