The solemnity and sadness of Lisa O’Neill’s song is matched to a mournful melody that reminds me of a hymn – or a Christmas carol.

It’s not just worth listening carefully to the words; it’s essential. This is a song that takes a personal experience – a dream of an old friend dying – and transforms it into a lament for man’s inhumanity to man.

O’Neill’s devastating critique of the men in power – the Trumps and Putins in particular – calls out “the power of money and lies” used to put fear into the people, but soothes us with the hopeful message that “the wind doesn’t blow this far right.”

The sympathetically sparse accompaniment comes from quite a team of musicians, from Lisa herself (guitar) to Brian Leach (hammered dulcimer and bass drum), Joseph Doyle (double bass), Mic Geraghty (harmonium), Seamas Hyland (accordion), Jordon O’Leary (electric guitar), Ruth O’Mahony Brady (piano) and Iona Zajac (backing vocals).

As my music-writing pal Ged Babey observed in his review, the song has a religious, hymnal quality, filled with soul and compassion; a view shared in many of the comments beneath Ellius Grace and cameraman Aidan Gault’s stunning monochrome video.

“She is divinely connected to the human soul,” says one. “Beauty and art calling out ugly truth,” says another. “A powerful distillation of the emotional wildfires sweeping through our collective consciousness right now,” sums up a third.

Lisa O’Neill is a unique artist and one to be cherished. This may be her most important song yet – and, though there are many others, the one for which she should be remembered if there’s only one.

It’s worth watching again and again, and while you do you can see how many of the faces in that video you recognise from the line-up, which starts off with Lisa herself but also includes Kae Tempest, Kevin Rowland and Spider Stacy.

And try not to cry.