Thor Christensen

Before he won an Oscar, Glen Hansard was just one more Irish rocker who couldn't get a break in the U.S.

GUY REYNOLDS/DMN

Marketa Irglova and Glen Hansard, who shared screen time in Once, share the stage at the Palladium Ballroom.

"I remember coming to Dallas a few years ago and it definitely wasn't a crowd like this," he said Monday night to several thousand cheering fans – most of whom discovered him in the 2007 film Once and had never heard of his long-running band, the Frames.

But he wasn't knocking the Johnny-come-latelies. Judging from his wonderfully hammy performance at the Palladium Ballroom, he'd be happy to sing for anyone with a pulse.

Mr. Hansard was fronting Swell Season, a band made up of members of the Frames and Czech musician Marketa Irglova, his romantic interest in Once who has since become his real-life lover. The duo had equal screen time in the movie and shared the best original song Oscar for co-writing "Falling Slowly." But onstage, Ms. Irglova was a bit player in The Glen Hansard Show.

That arrangement worked out just fine. Ms. Irglova, 20, lacked a commanding singing voice and seemed nervous talking to fans, while Mr. Hansard, 38, thrived in the spotlight. He peppered the two-hour set with stories, jokes and theatrics – acting like a mad conductor one moment and playing his acoustic guitar like a jackhammer the next. For the encore, he remade Justin Timberlake's "Cry Me a River" into a wacky sturm und drang epic.

"If that goes up on YouTube, I'm dead," he said, though surely he knows the site already has clips of him singing "River" at previous shows.

Perhaps fans will post video of the show's other remakes, which were even better. The concert opened with a roaring take on Van Morrison's "Into the Mystic" and later, Mr. Hansard recast another Van the Man tune, "Astral Weeks," as a solo folk-punk anthem.

But the high point arrived during an orchestral-rock version of Daniel Johnston's "Life in Vain." Mr. Hansard may be Swell Season's comic leader, but the show didn't really get dramatic until the violin started up and the whole band kicked into high gear.

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