{"id":353598,"date":"2026-03-19T02:28:11","date_gmt":"2026-03-19T02:28:11","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/353598\/"},"modified":"2026-03-19T02:28:11","modified_gmt":"2026-03-19T02:28:11","slug":"an-alternative-history-of-ireland-in-six-albums","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/353598\/","title":{"rendered":"An alternative history of Ireland in six albums\u00a0"},"content":{"rendered":"

With the winning of Oscars becoming quite commonplace in Cork and Kerry these days and Saint Patrick\u2019s Day as usual giving us an opportunity to marvel at ourselves, I thought it might be useful to point out something: It was not always thus. Trust me, baby, we\u2019ve come a long way.<\/p>\n

And whilst the road to this new reality was a complex one and involved education, improved economics and the support and guidance of parents, educators and myriad other talented selfless people, I, as usual, want to highlight one thing. Music, the gateway drug and catalyst to so much.<\/p>\n

It is no accident Jessie Buckley\u2019s and Cillian Murphy\u2019s initial steps into the arts world were via music. It\u2019s the easiest thing to try your hand at and it surrounds you from day one. But the Irish music universe as it exists was driven by some prime movers. This be they.<\/p>\n

1. Horslips,\u00a0 The T\u00e1in (1972)\u00a0<\/p>\n

Prior to their arrival: 650 showbands and only three International standard original artists, Van, Rory and Gilbert. By the time Horslips spilt, it is a parallel universe with a sea of original bands, one of whom will become the biggest group in the world. It wasn\u2019t St Patrick that drove the snakes out of Ireland, it was Horslips.<\/p>\n

How did they do this? Simple. They played regularly in every venue in Ireland. People who had never before seen an original Irish band got to see one. The effect was transformative. People at the gigs went into writing (Pat McCabe) or formed bands (U2). They ignited a flame of creativity.<\/p>\n

2. The Boomtown Rats, Tonic for the Troops (1979)\u00a0<\/p>\n

While post-Horslips Ireland was now generating numerous brilliant original bands and Thin Lizzy were becoming ascendent, nothing had quite the same transformative effect as The Rats. No one had ever seen an arrogant Irish man before, a man apoplectic with anger at what he called the \u201cbanana republic\u201d.<\/p>\n

But seeing Geldof shape that anger into songs like Rat Trap and (I Don\u2019t Like) Mondays was another thing entirely. The Rats at No 1 on Top of the Pops ripping up a picture of John Travolta and Olivia Newton John was our Beatles\/ Ed Sullivan moment, and would later inspire Sinead to rip up a picture of the Pope on Saturday Night Live.\n <\/p>\n

3. U2, The Joshua Tree (1987)<\/p>\n

\"TheThe Joshua Tree, U2.\u00a0<\/p>\n

\u00a0I may never be able to explain adequately what it was like for people in bands in Ireland to see U2 on the cover of Time magazine. The band we\u2019d seen in McGonagle\u2019s, the band whose singles we had collected paraded as \u201cRock\u2019s Hottest Ticket\u201d. Blimey.<\/p>\n

Rehearsal rooms were rebooked, lesser committed band members sidelined, demo tapes recorded and potential managers interviewed. A career in music suddenly looked like a possibility, a real possibility, something the CAO should think about. It wasn\u2019t that crazy after all.<\/p>\n

4. The Cranberries, Everybody Else is Doing it Why Can\u2019t We (1993)\u00a0<\/p>\n

\" Everybody Else is Doing it Why Can\u2019t We, The Cranberries.<\/p>\n

The title said a lot. It came just after the explosion of the F\u00e9ile gigs. The idea the U2 weren\u2019t a one-off and others now had a blueprint with which to take on that world \u2013 real talent, your own voice, the right producer, tour support \u2013 suddenly took hold. And it wasn\u2019t just Dublin; it was Cork, Limerick or anywhere. Why not us indeed?<\/p>\n

5. Fontaines DC, Dogrel (2019)\u00a0<\/p>\n

\"Dogrel,Dogrel, Fontaines DC.\u00a0<\/p>\n

This is quite a jump in time. I\u2019ve gone past albums by people like Damien Rice because the story after 1995 became more complicated. We had more commercial success than ever, but bands inspired to form because of Take That didn\u2019t tick quite as many boxes in the original material stakes.<\/p>\n

But behind those record sales the \u201ccredible\u201d the music scene was deepening its roots, with brilliant albums from people like The Frames and Bell X1. There were new specialist music shows, new venues and the opening of BIMM Music Institute.<\/p>\n

A college specializing in modern music education that focuses on industry connections, performance, and a creative career would have seemed weird to Horslips fans. You no longer had to stand around the indie section in your local record shop and hope for the best!<\/p>\n

6. CMAT,\u00a0 Euro-Country (2025)<\/p>\n

\u00a0I can\u2019t help but suspect that all roads were leading to this place. If you were only allowed one album to represent Ireland Today it would be this. This is why Horslips donned the green alligator suits. It\u2019s the sound of freedom. Long may it live. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"With the winning of Oscars becoming quite commonplace in Cork and Kerry these days and Saint Patrick\u2019s Day…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":353599,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[61,60,6405,43],"class_list":["post-353598","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-ireland","tag-ie","tag-ireland","tag-music-movies-reviews-munster","tag-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/353598","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=353598"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/353598\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/353599"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=353598"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=353598"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/ie\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=353598"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}