Unique love letter captures passion for the Waterboys

There are fans – and then there are fans. To describe Dutchman Erwin Rademaker as a fan of the Waterboys would be akin to calling the Pope a Catholic or the Queen a royalist.

Erwin is the author of the book, A Letter to Mr Scott, in which he deconstructs the lyrics of the Waterboys’ songs by writing an open letter to the band’s founder and main man, Mike Scott. While the book is addressed to Mike Scott, it’s really about the band and the music, as Erwin explains over coffee in McCambridge’s during a flying visit to Galway.

Erwin was here to donate €1,200 from sales of the book to the Circle of Life Garden in Salthill which commemorates the lives of organ donors. Circle of Life marks its second birthday this Friday and among those who supported the fundraising drive to establish it were the Waterboys who played two intimate reunion concerts in Spiddal in September 2013. These special shows saw them return to the village where they recorded their seminal Fisherman’s Blues album in 1986.

Naturally Erwin was there – attending both concerts. And he was so moved by the cause that he wanted to make his own contribution.

The first time Erwin ever saw the Waterboys was in 1985, when they were the opening act for Simple Minds during a series of concerts in his home town of Ahoy near Rotterdam.

Erwin went on the third night, by which time the Waterboys’ performance was the talk of the town.

“Simple Minds were great but there was a buzz going on that the opening act were incredible,” recalls Erwin.

On the night he was there, Jim Kerr of Simple Minds came on at the end of the concert and invited them on for the encore.

That was a memorable gig, but life moved on for Erwin. He went to college, got a job in the Port of Rotterdam, where he is Programme Manager, got married and had children.

That 1985 concert might have remained just a memory but for a friend who invited him to a concert in Utrecht on March 17, 2012, when the Waterboys were presenting their much-praised An Appointment with Mr Yeats.

“I was blown away,” says Erwin. “I had read all about Yeats but I didn’t know his poems until then.”

For more, read this week’s Galway City Tribune.