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Rory and the Island Releases Brand New Summer Single

August 6, 2021

Irish artist Rory and the Island has just released his brand new summer single ‘Donna Don’t Take My Summer’ out today.

This colourful upbeat retro pop tune is a huge departure for Rory and the Island with nods to the New York Disco scene of the late 1970s, channeling artists such as Quincy Jones, KC and the Sunshine Band and Nile Rogers.

The single is released one week ahead of Rory and the Island returning to the live music scene with two sold out shows in the Dublin Castle Camden, London on 13th and 14th August, and follows his two most recent singles hitting the Number 1 spot on iTunes Ireland in 2021.

Speaking of the single Rory and the Island said: “After releasing two quite introverted melancholic songs during the pandemic I decided that with a bit of light at the end of the tunnel to just go crazy with a feel good bubblegum pop summer song!”

Recorded in Distant City Studios in Yorkshire, ‘Donna Don’t Take My Summer’ was mixed by Joss Worthington and Paul Gallagher, then remastered by John Davies who has received huge acclaim for his recent work with The Killers, U2 and Years & Years.

Donegal singer/songwriter Rory Gallagher, who has been releasing and producing his own music since 2011 under the project name Rory and the Island has had quite the 17 months since the global pandemic began. After moving his family to Edinburgh in Scotland to open a brand new live music bar in the city called “The Wildcat” in March 2020, the venue never saw it’s official opening night due to Covid19 and Rory Gallagher found himself locked down in a new city and very very lost.

Like most musicians Rory and the Island began live Facebook gigs every week and opted for “escapism” in his shows making them very colorful, upbeat and quirky as opposed to holding a mirror up to the depressing situation. Rory and the Island gradually built up 30,000 Facebook followers with some of his shows averaging up to 50k views on FB watch playback during the week during the spring.

As he has done all of his life, Rory and the Island decided to keep playing original music in among all the requests he was getting from the public, and two of his new songs ‘When the Lights Go Down’  and ‘Miss This’ both then charted at Number 1 on iTunes Ireland in the past year.

This huge outpouring of new interest has led to Rory and the Island having seven sold out shows coming up in Ireland and the UK, with his Dublin and Belfast shows in Opium and the Blackbox selling out in less than 48 hours.

Rory Gallagher was previously the lead singer and bass player with Donegal indie-Pop Punk trio The Revs – 20 years ago in the summer of 2001 The Revs had a huge hit with their debut single ‘Wired To The Moon’ which stayed in the Irish charts for 9 weeks and led to the band winning best newcomer at the Meteor and HotPress awards in Dublin and saw the band go on to sell over 20,000 albums and play Slane Castle, Oxygen and the Reading and Leeds festivals in England.

‘Donna Don’t Take My Summer’ the brand new single from Rory & The Island is out now across all digital platforms.

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