Tag: music

post-launch gigs roundup

Firstly, thanks so much to everyone who turned out on the wet, windy night in Galway last Wednesday, and everyone who showed up in Dublin on Thursday for the gig in the gorgeous, intimate venue upstairs in Twisted Pepper. It brought a smile to my face to see so many familiar and unfamiliar faces coming out to help celebrate the album getting out into the world.

Secondly, thank you to “The Meadhbhs” and “The Sullivans” for adding their voices to the shows. I named the two little groups after Meadhbh Sullivan, who provides most of the additional vocals on the album, but unfortunately wasn’t able to be a part of the launch gigs due to a show she is acting in this week in Cork. (It’s in The Granary in Cork all this week. Go see it.)

The Meadhbhs (Galway choir): Deirbhile Ni Bhrolchain, Elise Karlsson, Fionnuala Connolly, Kevin Brett.

The Sullivans (Dublin choir): Jo McNamarra, Dearbhla Kelly, Sally O’Dunlaigh.

That idea worked out pretty well. I had one rehearsal with each group before the show, and I’d emailed them the parts and the tracks they were singing, and I was just hoping that it would come together pretty easily. But it really did, and they added so much to the songs they were singing on.

The album got a little mention in The Ticket section of The Irish Times today, and yesterday on Jim Carroll’s “On The Record” blog too, which was rather lovely to see, to be honest. I nicked a copy of The Ticket from a café today after I spotted it.

Little mention in the Irish Times.

Today my album went live on iTunes

I’m not gonna lie – that brought a big smile to my face. It’s about €1 more expensive than it is to buy it direct from Bandcamp, but iPhone users can download it direct to their phones through the iTunes store, if that’s something that you wanna do, whereas with Bandcamp, you do really need to be at your computer, and not on your phone, to download it.

If you are enjoying the record, and use iTunes, then please consider rating the album and writing a little review that people can read on the iTunes store page. That would make me very happy indeed.

There are delays with the physical CD, and it’s looking more and more like it won’t be ready for the actual launch days. But sure, I’ll still play the gigs and celebrate this album going out into the world. If you’re around Galway or Dublin next week, drop in and listen to me playing songs from this record live.

At each of the gigs, there’ll be a small little choir group singing with me for a few of the songs. It’s different people in each city, and they’re basically friends and acquaintances, and strangers and twitter followers, who all said yes when I asked if they’d like to sing with me. I’m really looking forward to getting them up on stage with me. It should be a lot of fun.

I’ll also be playing some songs that aren’t on the new album, which I held over for the next one, or which have been written since this summer. And I’ve reworked some of my favourite covers too.

mister ebby on RTE Radio 1 – Arena arts & culture programme

Tune into RTE Radio 1 tomorrow from 7:30pm GMT, as I’ll be playing a song live in studio as part of the Arena arts & culture programme. You can stream it online from the website or you should be able to listen back to the show later as well if you miss it live.

I’m playing along with a few other performers who are going to be involved with the Trash Culture Revue diy festival in Cork the following weekend. I’m playing as part of the Mutant Cabaret night on Friday 25th.

So, tune into the radio/stream tomorrow evening, and if you’re in Cork, come along on Friday week to the Mutant Cabaret.

The Bliss Returns – live at Charlie Byrne’s

This is a video that was shot before I even found the studio that I ended up recording the album in. The morning of this shoot the camera assist, Yvonne Ryan, mentioned Charthouse Studios to me, and gave me the contact info of Ian McNulty, who ended up engineering and mixing the record. The band Yvonne is in, Ambience Affair, had recorded at that studio, and she knew that they had recently put a piano in.

The video was shot by Mark Willis of Bluestack Records, who also very kindly did my promo video for my fundit campaign, and my brother Phil Brett was taking care of the sound. The video was intended for a larger project the two guys had in mind, but I’m told there’s been problems with the external hard drive Mark had stored the footage on. I hope they didn’t lose all that work. Hard drive failures are annoying as hell, as I recently was reminded myself.

However, this one long shot take survives, and the guys put it together for me, for which I’m very grateful.

This song is on the album, in a more fleshed out version with drums, bass and cello, but in this video it’s just me and a piano in Charlie Byrne’s Bookshop in Galway.

Post-Jazz Festival review.

I had an absolute blast of a time at the Cork Jazz Festival. Definitely a weekend to spend in Cork – there was so much music everywhere. From buskers on the street, to free gigs in venues around town, to the ticketed gigs each day too. I spent the day times wandering the streets enjoying the food stalls and listening to some great jazz bands playing for free in the outdoor stage set up beside the Opera House. Found some great places for coffee, but none better than Cork Coffee Roasters, which also boasted the hottest barista I saw all weekend too as a special bonus.

Méadhbh was working every day over the weekend, which was a pity, but we got to hang out in the evenings instead. She was singing with me at the gig in the Legends Suite of the Festival club, and we got to the venue early to grab some food and a glass of wine before soundchecking. I don’t think I’ve met nicer people than the folk we had to deal with that evening – everyone from the Guinness contact to the sound guy to the waitress. Despite the fact that it was right in the middle of a weekend of long working days for them, everyone was warm, welcoming, friendly and professional. It made me feel completely relaxed and at ease before the gig.

The piano they had in the venue was a gorgeous Yamaha grand piano – between that and the Yamaha I recorded the album on in the studio, I think my opinion of Yamaha pianos has been completely changed this year. Gorgeous sound from both the upright and the grand piano, and those bass notes on the grand were an absolute thrill.

This is the only photo I have of the gig – which was taken just before we went soundchecking. I think Méadhbh has a few more though. But at least you can see the most important thing – how beautiful that piano looks:

This was our set list:

  • The Bliss Returns
  • Codail Sámh
  • Keep Me Here (new song. not on the album)
  • Romance
  • Phoenix
  • Comfort Of The Keys (non-album track)
  • The Score (Sarah Slean cover sharing lead vocals with Méadhbh)
  • Galway Rain
  • Strive (new song. Not on the album)
  • Glory Box / Wannabe (Portishead / Spice Girls cover. Méadhbh on lead vocals)
  • Helen

It was originally this:

I had a few others lined up that I skipped on the night, as we had just about an hour of a set, and I wanted to try out some of the newer songs as well as singing stuff off the record. “Wet Feet”, “Rerun” and non-album track “House On My Back Door” were all on the list too but got kicked off for time.

I’m back in Galway now, and back working on the last little things I need to sort to get a physical Cd into my hands, and then into your hands, and I’ll let you know how you can do that in a later update, but it will be available in some of the wonderful new indie record shops that have been popping up around the country.

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