Gearing Up For The Party

By Joe Kavanagh

Not so long ago, Irish rock music suffered from an identity crisis, but not in the conventional sense of the term, whereby it did not know what it wanted to be. Rather, Irish rock music was simply too Irish, immediately identifiable as an Irish product, and therefore of limited appeal to markets outside of Ireland.

Indeed, there are those that would argue that much of what constituted Irish rock music throughout the 90s carried a limited appeal in the home market.

Formulaic, predictable and jaded, it threatened to become a parody of itself until the turn of the millennium, when Ireland's original music scene underwent a mini-renaissance of sorts, as a plethora of new acts arrived, armed with big ideas and a wildly diverse musical agenda.

Initially, they made little impact outside the underground scene, hardly surprising given the slow-moving apathy and cynicism of much of Irish radio when it comes to exhibiting anything like an interest in the national music scene.

In fact, when compared to the amount of homegrown talent that has been on display over the past few years - talent that stacks up nicely against any competition - Irish acts have still not received a fair shake, with much of their originality and innovation ironically being a hindrance to their progress in their home country.

There have been some success stories, most notably Republic Of Loose, whose soul/funk/hop touched a nerve with Irish music buyers when given an equitable deal on national radio, but resistance to change remained strong, until a rather remarkable result in last year's Choice Music Prize, a kind of Irish Mercury Music Prize.

Chosen by a selection of industry insiders, the award is based upon artistic integrity rather than commerciality but outside of the 12 judges, and perhaps their own families, absolutely nobody saw electro-rockers, Super Extra Bonus Party, winning the awards last year.

The result sent shockwaves through the Irish music scene, as Irish artists across the spectrum were given reason to hope that innovative, original music finally had a chance in the home market.

Their victory was viewed as a victory for contemporary Irish bands and many viewed the moment as a long overdue changing of the guards.

The origins of the quirky Kildare collective on whose shoulders such hopes lie occurred when friends, Cormac Brady and Mike Donnelly, began toying around with synths, samplers and turntables, as teenagers in Newbridge, County Kildare.

Giving themselves the moniker, Illegal Kids, the pair were essentially a studio outfit whose tracks appeared on a couple of Irish underground albums titled, Eklectra and Wooden Educational.

In November of 2005, the duo, along with friend, Stephen 'Fatz' Fahey, decided to play at a local open-mic night under the name Super Extra Bonus Party, a moniker they came upon specifically for their "one-off" performance.

With all three jumping between samplers, guitars, bass, a toy drum kit and a cheesy Casio keyboard, the band rated the appearance as little more than a shambles, due in no small part to nerves and faulty equipment, but the crowd's reaction to the three songs they performed was of a far more positive nature, as they lapped up the act, instilling sufficient belief in the trio to continue their project beyond one outing.

Not wishing to limit their creativity they initially referred to themselves as a "collective", as opposed to a "band", as their plan was to team up with a range of musicians, depending on what kind of track they wanted to produce.

After a time, however, they saw the value of having regular collaborators, particularly when it came time for live shows, so they absorbed guitarist/drummer, Gavin Elsted, and Brazilian MC, Rodrigo Teles, into their ranks, giving them greater sonic scope and a front man par excellence.

Shortly afterwards, their numbers swelled up to eight strong as they took on more multi-instrumentalists and a person dedicated entirely to creating visual effects to run in tandem with their music.

With a firm foundation in place and a fix on the direction on which they wanted to travel in a musical sense, the group set about recording their debut album in late 2006 and early 2007.

With a tiny budget, the band essentially wrote, recorded and produced the album in its entirety in a house they shared together in Terenure, County Dublin, often "bouncing" the different tracks between computers, giving each member the chance to offer their input or even wrestle with the material themselves.

Still committed to the notion of being a collective, they brought in a series of collaborators such as vocalists, Nina Hynes, Channel One's, Paul O'Reilly and fellow Kildare act, Kill City Defectors, in order to create particular moods or textures that they felt would add to the overall wholeness of the album.

On 13 April 2007 Super Extra Bonus Party's self-titled debut was released to the Irish public with very little fanfare, although it did make an immediate impact with the more discerning music journalists who could appreciate its content.

Whipping together ingredients such as hip hop, indie, trip hop, ambient and even jazz, the 13-track collection is packed with imagination, innovation and the kind of chutzpah that can only be good for the Irish music scene.

From the beautiful brass opener, Adventures, through the zany dance-floor filler, Favorite Things (which incorporates a wicked sample of Rodgers and Hammerstein's tune of the same name) to the blissful indie of Everything Flows, the album is a veritable smorgasbord of invention and a work that will undoubtedly viewed as one of the seminal albums in Irish music in years to come, if it does not already own this honor.

In essence, Super Extra Bonus Party produced an album that manages to retain a simplicity of purpose and warm, engaging disposition, with a sufficient satisfaction of bells and whistles to give it a definite edge over many other contemporary Irish acts.

It was only when the album was completed and released that they realized the entire process meant that they were no longer a collective, but rather a band in the traditional sense, a notion that was fully forged when they took their act on the road, in the immediate weeks and months after the album launch.

Slogging it out on the Irish circuit, they played gigs in virtually any venue that would have them, the length and breadth of the country and, having been lucky enough to catch them live several times, I can testify to the type of frantic energy they bring right from the offset.

Given their numbers, the stage often looks more crowded than a platform in Grand Central on a Friday evening, but this only serves to add to the intensity of the experience, as each member gives their absolute all in a physical and musical sense.

If it were not for the exuberant smiles fixed on their faces throughout, you would be tempted to think that Phil Spector is standing off stage somewhere with one of his trusty .45s pointed menacingly at them throughout their performance, saying: "Play it like you mean it kids".

With visuals keeping perfect time with the songs, members jumping between instruments and ideas, and MC Rodrigo stalking the stage, they are undeniably one of the most exhilarating - and flat out fun - live acts that Ireland has produced in recent times, a fact that has not been lost on local promoters.

In 2007 they were called upon to open for international acts like Alec Empire and The Go! Team (a band that is similar to them in a musical sense and certainly one that shares a similar stage presence).

In the wake of their stunning victory at the Choice Music Prize, the band spent much of last year consolidating their position at the top of the Irish music chain, issuing a 12" single of Everything Flows and going out on an Irish tour and a handful of dates in the UK and the continent.

They followed this up with a 16-track album featuring remixes of all the songs from their debut album, which is still available for free download on their website.

With the eyes of the Irish music media now firmly fixed on them, they retired to a house in scenic Ardmore, County Waterford, where they began work on their sophomore effort, which will be titled Night Horses.

That work is now reaching a conclusion and the band has showcased some of their new material at a handful of gigs around the country in recent months, including the pumping, punk-edged Eamonn.

Night Horses arrives in stores later this month and will be led off by the single, Radar, which features the contribution of Canadian rapper, Cadence Weapon. The release will certainly go some way toward showing whether the Choice Music Prize actually means anything. Super Extra Bonus Party and the Choice Music Prize may not live and die with each other, but their fates are now inextricably bound together and success by the former would certain validate the latter.