Launch party for the debut Strawboy album ‘Tidal Islands’, featuring support from Butter and Damian Hillan.

strawboymusic.bandcamp.com

Doors 8pm
Entry €5

Strawboy is the new musical project of producer, songwriter and multi-instrumentalist Ciarán O’Rourke. He began his musical path as a student of jazz, world and folk music in Dublin and Boston, before heading to London to delve deeper into these styles.

Before long, while working at legendary indie label Ninja Tune, he caught the attention of their top artist Bonobo, and was recruited to play keyboards on an upcoming world tour. It was during this adventure that O’Rourke became interested in songwriting with a pop sensibility, while at the same time amassing a collection of folklorist vinyl unearthed in the many vintage record stores visited on his travels. From these seeds, Strawboy was born.

The Strawboy in bygone Irish culture was a rogue dressed in elaborate straw costume, who would crash wedding parties and cause good-natured mayhem. It is this mischievous spirit and old-world charm that is shot through Strawboy’s debut album ‘Tidal Islands’, as in the opener ‘The Trickster Speaks’ where we hear from the patron saint of vagabonds everywhere; and the closing track ‘Live & Breathe’ which is a hymn to carnivals, festivals and feasts of all kinds.

In between we have encounters with mystical sirens, a song of advice to a child destined for greatness, and a seaside lullaby to scare you to sleep. The textures are lush and expansive, with grooves that might have come from a slum in Kinshasa, and lilting melodies that might have been sung in a country pub at midnight. A tidal island is one that can be reached by land for a certain part of the day. But if the tide closes behind you, you may never return…