Ed Hamell steps out of the shadows

Ed Hamell has been hiding in plain sight. "I haven’t released an album in six years. But I’ve been on YouTube. I decided that I would write a song every day for a year and put it online."

His motive was practical rather than artistic. “I was trying to stay sober,” say the songwriter, who performs punk and “anti-folk” as Hamell on Trial. “I needed a way not to be idle. This was the best method.”

Hamell, a sardonic writer compared to everyone from The Moldy Peaches to iconic stand-up Lenny Bruce, has been through a period of crisis and still bears the scars. In 2011 his wife of 23 years left him. He was devastated — too shocked to tour or record.

“In the end, I think my wife just fell out of love with me,” says the upstate New Yorker. “We remain good friends. We have a 12-year-old son and talk about him every day. There were a lot of supposed reasons for the split — I definitely had to question my life’s path. Had I made the right decision? I’d had limited success with my music. Maybe I should be doing something else?”

Hamell’s income had teetered after the economy imploded in 2008. His bookings declined precipitously, his record sales collapsed. It is clear the tensions contributed to the breakdown of his marriage. He was forced to ask the question: had his entire life in music been a waste of energy?

With the dust settled, he and his ex-wife still have a relationship. Hamell seems a little confused as to the trajectory of their dynamic — and perhaps hasn’t entirely given up on a reconciliation.

“If I’m to be completely unemotional about it, the break-up can’t have been easy for her either. There was a kid involved. The fact she still calls and talks to me every day — I don’t understand it really. There’s a lot about the situation I don’t understand.”

Hamell’s comeback album is called The Happiest Man in the World. Many have taken the title to be tongue in cheek — that it could more accurately be called The Most Miserable Man in the World. But that’s not the case at all. “People seem to think I’m being ironic with that title,” says Hamell. “Let me tell you, irony is the last thing on my mind. Where I am in my life, I don’t have the luxury of irony. I wrote a lot of songs about the end of my marriage. In the end, I chose to put on this album the ones that were most redemptive or hopeful. I don’t have it in me to do anything that is dark at the moment. I eventually went through a spiritual reawakening. That’s what the record is about.”

Hamell is slightly puzzled by his reputation as an angry songwriter — a red-eyed speaker of truth to power. Yes, he’s penned some fiery, politicised tunes. But not many — they make up only a tiny percentage of his catalogue.

“It’s funny — Lou Reed got accused of the same thing. I get annoyed by this. You can go to the airport and pick up any paperback novel and you have swear words, mention of drug dealing whatever. And you shrug your shoulders and move on. And yet, writing about that sort of stuff in music is still considered a big deal. Truly, I’m baffled by that.”

The Happiest Man in the World is out now. Hamell on Trial plays Cyprus Avenue Cork, Saturday