{"id":374393,"date":"2026-04-04T08:27:14","date_gmt":"2026-04-04T08:27:14","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/374393\/"},"modified":"2026-04-04T08:27:14","modified_gmt":"2026-04-04T08:27:14","slug":"i-was-freaking-out-about-my-voice-i-did-two-weeks-where-i-didnt-speak-the-irish-times","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/374393\/","title":{"rendered":"\u2018I was freaking out about my voice. I did two weeks where I didn\u2019t speak\u2019 \u2013 The Irish Times"},"content":{"rendered":"

Dermot Kennedy<\/a> once had a sneak peek at how awful global stardom could be. He was in Manila in the Philippines on tour. \u201cI had to have a security guard the whole time,\u201d he says. \u201cHe was just waiting outside the room. Even if I went down the road to get a coffee he had to come with me.\u201d <\/p>\n

That memory is on Kennedy\u2019s mind when we speak, as he gears up to release his third album The Weight of the Woods, and embark on a European and UK tour that includes London\u2019s O2 and two nights at Dublin\u2019s Aviva Stadium<\/a>. <\/p>\n

\u201cI like to think I can play Madison Square Garden and the O2 and still walk around and not have my life changed,\u201d he says, a comment that in 2026 sounds closer to a dim hope than a realistic expectation for the 34-year-old singer-songwriter. <\/p>\n

Kennedy is one of the most successful artists ever to have emerged from Ireland. His Spotify<\/a> streams number in the hundreds of millions, for hits including Outnumbered, Better Days<\/a> and Giants. He has duetted with Paul Mescal<\/a>, been quoted by Leo Varadkar in a pandemic speech, and singled out for praise by Taylor Swift<\/a>. A charismatic live performer, his 2019 set at Electric Picnic was introduced by then president Michael D Higgins<\/a> in a bespoke audio recording. His Aviva dates are a record-breaker: he\u2019s the first Irish solo artist ever to perform two dates there. <\/p>\n

The singer from Rathcoole<\/a>, on the outskirts of Dublin, is naturally shy, private and reserved. He loves home, football, and his family and friends. He wants to stay true to himself. \u201cBeing such a homebird can be difficult,\u201d he says. \u201cThere\u2019s varying levels of how much of yourself you\u2019re willing to give away.\u201d<\/p>\n

Kennedy is calling from London, where he arrived the previous night for his promotional schedule, having just days before played an invite-only gig for fans at Beyond the Trees Avondale<\/a> in Co Wicklow, on their 38-metre high viewing tower, surrounded by thickets of trees. \u201cI think people appreciated it, it was nice.\u201d He explains that he\u2019s going to sign autographs while talking. \u201cI\u2019ve signed a billion things for this album. I\u2019m on the last of them now.\u201d <\/p>\n

The autographs are a distraction technique for him, a way to take his mind off the experience of being interviewed \u2013 a bit like a patient in a doctor\u2019s surgery turning their head to gaze at a colourful animal chart on a wall or out the window at cars, when the injection pinch comes. \u201cI feel like I\u2019m better at chatting if I\u2019m doing something else. My thoughts are clearer.\u201d<\/p>\n

Kennedy\u2019s new record is a declaration of his allegiance to home. He has jettisoned the phalanx of songwriters that often accompany global releases of this nature, in favour of working largely with one trusted collaborator: Gabe Simon, producer of Noah Kahan<\/a>\u2019s Stick Season. Simon brought his family from Nashville to Rathcoole for six weeks so he could understand Kennedy\u2019s literal maps of inspiration: the forest behind his home, near his parents\u2019 place; the paths he\u2019d take his dog, a rescue terrier named Tom, for walks; the jotted-down lyrics in his journals. <\/p>\n

[\u00a0Noah Kahan in Dublin: \u2018I love this city so much\u2019 as Dermot Kennedy joins singer on stage leading to near-pandemonium in venueOpens in new window<\/a>\u00a0]<\/p>\n

The title track is a moving paean to where Kennedy wants to be buried: \u201cIf I should fall down … get me back to my home ground,\u201d he sings. \u201cTether my bones tight, in view of this coastline. Bury this soul of mine, give it back to the weight of the woods.\u201d <\/p>\n

\"DermotDermot Kennedy treats fans to a sunset performance at Beyond The Trees, Avondale,
\nwith the Maynooth University Chamber Choir, ahead of the release of his album The Weight of the Woods. Photograph: Greg Purcell <\/p>\n

Support on the record comes not from Ed Sheeran or Taylor Swift, but the Maynooth University<\/a> Chamber Choir, along with Cormac Begley<\/a>, who plays a few bars, and Muireann N\u00ed Sh\u00e9 on uilleann pipes. The record harnesses gentle touches to convey humanity: the scrape of fingers across a fretboard, the joining together of disparate choral voices, the subtle pleasures of hushed vocals against plucked guitar, and drum thumps on Blue Eyes.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s not this perfect, polished thing,\u201d says Kennedy. The (relative) looseness is intentional, an antidote to the sometimes sterile studio sessions he has suffered through in the past decade, where well-meaning, top-class collaborators have asked him to spit out his emotions into a nicely packaged pop format, and he hasn\u2019t felt comfortable.<\/p>\n

\u201cI\u2019ve done so much co-writing, going around LA and London, trying stuff, and it can be demoralising and deflating,\u201d says Kennedy, who was first inspired as a kid to pick up a guitar by artists such as Damien Rice, Ray LaMontagne and David Gray. <\/p>\n

\u201cSo many times, you\u2019re faced with: \u2018What\u2019s cool at the moment? Will this be well received?\u2019 It\u2019s important to come back to centre. What do I feel like doing? Whether it succeeds or fails? What will make me happiest as an artist?<\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s so many ways you can go viral, and I don\u2019t claim to be any good at that. One thing I know I\u2019m half-decent at is playing to people, so I do that a lot,\u201d he says. \u201cHalf-decent\u201d is a very Kennedy term: it\u2019s as close as the intensely self-critical singer gets to giving himself a compliment. <\/p>\n

So often on record, Kennedy sounds daunted: like he\u2019s trying to find the courage to speak and the confidence to make his own way. <\/p>\n

\"DermotDermot Kennedy on stage at Electric Picnic in 2025. Photograph: Alan Betson <\/p>\n

Certain words predominate in the Kennedy lexicon \u2013 the title of his first album Without Fear reads less like self-description than personal instruction. His Irish-artists-led festival Misneach, which he created in 2025 in Sydney and Boston and plans to return to (\u201cIt\u2019s not a one-and-done\u201d), literally means courage. Kennedy writes about pain, vulnerability, frailty, hurt, darkness, trepidation (it\u2019s a song title on the new record) and death. None of this seems like shamming or vamping for the sake of a song. <\/p>\n

In school, first at Scoil Chr\u00f3n\u00e1in in Rathcoole and then the Holy Family Community School, Kennedy was so shy he developed a method to duck social interactions. Instead of swapping his books in and out of his locker in secondary school, he would lift the entire stack around with him all day, so he didn\u2019t need to talk to anyone.<\/p>\n

[\u00a0Dermot Kennedy: Without Fear review \u2013 Deeply personal and high on emotionOpens in new window<\/a>\u00a0]<\/p>\n

He loved playing football, finding it mentally freeing, but guitar gave him a pathway to communicate and a rare sense of calm. \u201cIt was this lovely source of confidence,\u201d he says. \u201cFor someone who is very shy, it was a way to click with people.\u201d<\/p>\n

When he first started as a busker on Grafton Street (\u201cI didn\u2019t have an amp: it was disastrous\u201d), he could see the reaction his grainy, reverberant baritone \u2013 a supple, marvellous instrument \u2013 would get. <\/p>\n

It was addictive. \u201cImmediately you\u2019re given this feeling of, \u2018Oh I\u2019m half-decent at it.\u2019 I would sit around waiting for the phone to ring and trying to get a gig in Whelan\u2019s or Eamonn Doran\u2019s. The street is there all day. It\u2019s the best way to get a musical education.\u201d<\/p>\n

There were early signs that Kennedy would become successful \u2013 talented, handsome, ambitious, it was no surprise that in Dublin, Simon Cowell<\/a> tapped him on the shoulder in the street and suggested he audition for Britain\u2019s Got Talent (he bailed out after a successful first audition, realising the fame show circuit wasn\u2019t for him). <\/p>\n

\"DermotDermot Kennedy at Valentia Lighthouse, Co Kerry. Photograph: Silken Weinberg <\/p>\n

As an independent artist, Kennedy started releasing his music on Spotify. In 2016, Spotify\u2019s Discover Weekly algorithm picked up An Evening I Will Not Forget, pushing it to listeners worldwide.<\/p>\n

When Kennedy signed to Universal and released his debut album Without Fear in 2019, it was helmed by industry heavyweights confident they had a global artist on their hands. Taylor Swift called his lyrics \u201cpoetic\u201d in an interview with Entertainment Weekly. <\/p>\n

At home, there was some understanding of what a life in music and media might entail: Dermot\u2019s aunt Deirdre Ni Chinn\u00e9ide is a musician, his aunt Mary Kennedy is the well-known presenter, formerly of Nationwide. But Kennedy hadn\u2019t trained for a career in singing. <\/p>\n

A reluctant student \u2013 once christened \u201cminimalist Kennedy\u201d by his English teacher for doing the bare minimum \u2013 he had undertaken a classical music degree in Maynooth, but vocally he was just doing what came naturally. \u201cI was an untrained singer and I took foolish pride in that,\u201d he says now. \u201cNobody ever taught me how to sing in a way that protected my voice. I was singing incorrectly for years.\u201d<\/p>\n

When his career began to take off, he was suddenly faced with going from a \u201ca couple of gigs every month to playing 200 shows a year\u201d. The effects were cataclysmic. \u201cWe did a festival in Finland where, no matter how hard I tried, it was as if someone was pushing my head back down and pushing the note back down. I just couldn\u2019t get it and I was so confused.\u201d <\/p>\n

Over the space of a few days, Kennedy\u2019s top note \u201ckept getting lower and lower until I couldn\u2019t sing above a low C almost\u201d. When Kennedy went to a vocal doctor in France, he was told he needed surgery. \u201cHe\u2019s in my bad books forever, he was woeful.\u201d<\/p>\n

After cancelling a number of festivals and gigs, Kennedy took further measures. \u201cI was freaking out. I did two weeks where I didn\u2019t speak. As a singer, the number one thing you\u2019re terrified of is your vocal cords being damaged.\u201d <\/p>\n

A light came on when he went to Dr Mark Rafferty, a specialist at Vincent\u2019s Hospital in Dublin. Rafferty told him his vocal cords were fine. \u201cBut I\u2019d been singing with so much tension in my chest and neck for such a long time that I was essentially strangling myself.\u201d <\/p>\n

Kennedy worked with the late vocal coach Judith Mok on the recommendation of Glen Hansard<\/a>, to \u201crelearn how to breathe properly\u201d and to use his diaphragm. Other musician friends checked in, seeing his hectic touring schedule, and wondering how he was managing. \u201cIn Paris, I got a message from Hozier<\/a>. Some years had passed since Take Me To Church. I was in the thick of it. He said, \u2018This schedule looks quite familiar, I hope you\u2019re doing okay.\u2019 I really appreciated that.\u201d<\/p>\n

Did he do any cognitive behavioural therapy, to help deal with the stress? \u201cNo,\u201d he says. \u201cBut I would love to. I definitely should. I think CBT would be very valuable just to retrain your brain and how you approach things.\u201d<\/p>\n

Before gigs, Kennedy knows he needs to \u201crelax completely, keep my shoulders down\u201d. It\u2019s a battle to keep himself in the right state. \u201cMy perspective on stage is awful. When you\u2019re on stage you\u2019re so intensely critical of yourself. You can literally tighten the muscles just with your thoughts.\u201d He\u2019s much better thanks to Mok \u2013 \u201cI generally walk out on stage feeling confident\u201d \u2013 but it\u2019s not a given. \u201cIt\u2019s an ongoing thing,\u201d he says. \u201cI sing in such a way that it\u2019s challenging and taxing.\u201d <\/p>\n

\"DermotDermot Kennedy says the guitar gave him a way to communicate, and a sense of calm. Photograph: Silken Weinberg <\/p>\n

We talk a little about Sam Fender<\/a>, the intensely shy, Mercury Prize-winning artist who has supported Kennedy in the past, and how there\u2019s something inherently crazy about the fact that a person who writes a song can wind up a quasi-spokesman for a generation. <\/p>\n

Kennedy feels that acutely. \u201cWe\u2019re people who sit at home and sit with our thoughts, and then a song shows up, and then you become this public-facing person who\u2019s on stage. I would be the exact same as Sam. You just want to be sitting somewhere, chilling out.\u201d<\/p>\n

I\u2019m reminded of a line from REM\u2019s Peter Buck, who said the group broke up in 2011, not because of any lack of joy in recording or playing music, but because of everyday big band hardships, like \u201chaving to meet new people 24 hours a day\u201d. <\/p>\n

Solitude is important to Kennedy. \u201cI\u2019m generally quite a loner,\u201d he says. \u201cThere\u2019s plenty of nights on tour, and travelling, when I would much rather be by myself. Music is full on because you\u2019re all essentially living on a bus together.\u201d <\/p>\n

What helps him with his emotional health? Being \u201cdisciplined\u201d for a start. Running. Staying off his phone. Playing football. Staying connected to his friends from home. \u201cWe don\u2019t really discuss music. It\u2019s one of the things I\u2019m most proud of, about my normal life not changing. If those friends weren\u2019t there for me, I think I would struggle.\u201d He talks about making sure he doesn\u2019t get \u201clocked into a cycle of doubt about the album\u201d. <\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s about me trying to control my thoughts,\u201d he says. <\/p>\n

Another well known musician-turned-runner, Harry Styles<\/a>, gave an interview recently to Runner\u2019s World, where he sat down with Haruki Murakami, author of What I Talk About When I Talk About Running, for a discussion on running, art and making sense of a surreal life. <\/p>\n

Kennedy has read Murakami\u2019s book and admires Styles\u2019 endeavours in relation to the 2025 Berlin marathon. \u201cI find it very inspiring, he ran that marathon in less than three hours. That\u2019s nuts to me.\u201d <\/p>\n

Musical inspiration might come from anywhere \u2013 in Styles\u2019 case, it\u2019s often the 1970s \u2013 but physically, pop stars are taking their lessons from athletes. \u201cYou have to take your health seriously,\u201d Kennedy says. \u201cIf you\u2019re playing four nights in a row, it\u2019s different nowadays. There will be videos everywhere of every single show. And so, if you\u2019re hanging and don\u2019t do a good job, that will exist forever.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"DermotDermot Kennedy performs on RT\u00c9’s Other Voices <\/p>\n

At 34, Kennedy tries to find balance in all things. He still drinks, for example. \u201cIf you are on tour for two months, you do come away from it being like, Jesus, I did actually drink whiskey every day for the last two months. But I don\u2019t find it too hard to find balance. You might drink a little bit on stage, but then I make sure I go for a run the following day. And then don\u2019t drink on a day off. I\u2019m not trying to take all the joy out of my life.\u201d<\/p>\n

[\u00a0New Irish albums reviewed and rated: Basciville, Chalk, How I Became a Wave, Ellie O\u2019Neill and Gerr WalshOpens in new window<\/a>\u00a0]<\/p>\n

Speaking of small moments of joy, before this interview I had a look at his social media, and noticed that he follows Paddington Bear, Eminem and Damien Rice. Would he consider this a fair representation of his social media interests? He laughs. \u201cThey\u2019re my heroes. That\u2019s the trifecta. Paddington and Eminem, there is crossover there.\u201d<\/p>\n

Who\u2019s most likely to come up on his Instagram feed? \u201cWhat I do lately is save cooking videos. Tyler Butt: I\u2019m a fan of his. His stuff is simple and achievable and you don\u2019t have to spend three grand in Avoca to do it.\u201d Kennedy doesn\u2019t have a favourite dish to prepare. It\u2019s more about the act of watching the cooking, allowing it to help bring him back to ordinary life. \u201cCertain things ground you when you do this for a job. I\u2019m very determined to live in the real world.\u201d<\/p>\n

For Kennedy, the real world is always about being home, even if, he says, \u201cbeing so tied to home can put strain on certain relationships\u201d. (He doesn\u2019t elaborate further, and Kennedy\u2019s publicist has requested that The Irish Times not ask him questions about his significant others: he is married with a young daughter.)<\/p>\n

Notably, his favourite book is The Hobbit, the story of Bilbo Baggins, the respectable hobbit who must leave the Shire and his comfortable hobbit hole to go on exciting adventures.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s harder and harder as you\u2019re older to feel like you\u2019re living in The Hobbit. When I was a kid I found that quite easy, but that sense of wonder is something I\u2019m trying to hold on to all the time.\u201d Out in the world, then, on his important quest, but longing to head back to the woods? \u201cThe woods represent home.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Weight of the Woods is out now. Dermot Kennedy plays The Aviva Stadium on July 11th and 12th; for tickets, see ticketmaster.ie.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Dermot Kennedy once had a sneak peek at how awful global stardom could be. He was in Manila…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":374394,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[32],"tags":[179665,458,179666,178795,146,143751,1851,114195,85,46,1619,109508,13009,17404,59062,28395,9828,2070],"class_list":{"0":"post-374393","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-celebrities","8":"tag-aviva-stadium","9":"tag-celebrities","10":"tag-cormac-begley","11":"tag-dermot-kennedy","12":"tag-entertainment","13":"tag-glen-hansard","14":"tag-harry-styles","15":"tag-hozier","16":"tag-il","17":"tag-israel","18":"tag-magazine","19":"tag-maynooth-university","20":"tag-michael-d-higgins","21":"tag-paul-mescal","22":"tag-sam-fender","23":"tag-simon-cowell","24":"tag-spotify","25":"tag-taylor-swift"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/374393","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=374393"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/374393\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/374394"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=374393"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=374393"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/il\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=374393"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}