Following on from recent singles ‘The Deepest Breath’ and ‘Anáil na hOíche’, Eoghan Ó Ceannabháin shares ‘Only the Earth’, the final song release ahead of his highly anticipated debut solo album ‘The Deepest Breath’, coming November 10th.
The accompanying video was filmed and produced by Ruth Clinton (Landless), assisted by Cormac Mac Diarmada (Lankum) and Lisa Austin. It was shot mainly around Magherow in Sligo, where the barnacle geese spend their winter days, flying to Inismurray every night. According to Ruth, they graciously arrived in time for the filming, after a few weeks of a literal wild goose chase around Magherow.
‘Only the Earth’
Speaking about the song, Eoghan says:
“The lyrics for Only the Earth make it fairly self-explanatory, I think. It goes on a bit of a journey from climate anxiety to more of a spirit of fightback, which more or less captures the mixed feelings I have about where we’re at right now.
The outro is from a song written by James Connolly – he obviously didn’t have environmental breakdown in mind, but I think it really suits the time we’re in now:
“Some men, faint-hearted, ever seek
Our programme to retouch,
And will insist, whene’er they speak
That we demand too much.
’Tis passing strange, yet I declare
Such statements give me mirth,
For our demands most moderate are,
We only want the earth.”
I wrote the whole song around the concertina loop that runs through. We built it up in the studio then with a lot of different sounds. I really wanted whales on it, and I’m very grateful to Mark Franklin of the Oceania Project in Australia for the use of his recordings, which are very beautiful.
This song, and record, was recorded, mixed, and produced by Alex Borwick at Hellfire Studios and at his own studio. Only the Earth features Eoghan on vocals, concertina, and clarinet; Alex on keyboards, vocals, trombone; Ultan O’Brien on fiddle and vocals; Conor Lyons on bódhrán and vocals, and Kaitlin Cullen-Verhauz and Ian Kinsella also on vocals.
Eoghan Ó Ceannabháin is a Dublin-based singer, songwriter and multi-instrumentalist. His musical roots are in sean-nós singing – the style of his father – and he grew up listening to the likes of Sorcha Ní Ghuairim, Seán ‘ac Dhonncha, Colm Ó Caoidheáin and other greats from the tradition. He is also influenced by folk singers from the English language tradition such as Liam Weldon, Luke Kelly, Anne Briggs, Margaret Barry and Thomas McCarthy.
Eoghan is a member of the Dublin-based band Skipper’s Alley, he has worked with Mary Ann Kennedy from Scotland, and Ruth Keggin from the Isle of Man on their Aon Teanga: Un Chengey album (2015). He has performed with folk/electronica band Jiggy, and has featured on both their albums, Translate (2017) and Hypernova (2020). He also collaborates with Clare fiddle and viola player Ultan O’Brien, their debut album Solas an Lae won best album at the RTÉ Folk Awards in 2021.
Over the past few years Eoghan has come into his own as a solo artist and songwriter. His songs – written in both English and Irish – build on his sean-nós singing foundations, yet combine hard-hitting lyrics with other musical influences to create a rich, contemporary sound.
Eoghan’s forthcoming album, ‘The Deepest Breath’ coming November 10th, is a collection of songs he written over the past few years, both in English and in Irish. “Writing them has been quite a cathartic experience for me – many of them were songs that I probably wanted to write for a while before I got there. They brewed and stewed for quite a bit before they emerged. The writing process is often like this for me – something bubbles under the surface for a while, but ultimately when I sit down to write, most of it just comes out in a kind of a flow.
The Deepest Breath is not really a sean-nós album, but sean-nós singing is the foundation for my singing and I think it affects my writing too, in both languages. I learned my singing language as a child from my father first, then as a teenager and young adult listening to lots of different singers. Now in the last few years I feel as though I am able to build with it and develop my own melodies and songs.”
The Deepest Breath, the debut album from Eoghan Ó Ceannabháin comes out November 10th 2022.
