CYBER CELT is the debut album by Chasing Abbey, a trio from Tullamore, Ireland. Although this is their first full-length record, they already have a worldwide fanbase, built over a decade of releasing singles and EPs, as well as a reputation for their live shows.
The band consists of multi-instrumentalists, producers and vocalists Ronan Bell, Jonathan Byrne and Ted Conway. Their music draws inspiration from fellow Irish artists such as Kneecap, Lankum and The Mary Wallopers.
The album contains thirteen tracks, and the opening song, GORTA, is a particularly interesting introduction to what follows. It brings together traditional Celtic instrumentation with modern electronic production. I honestly can’t remember hearing anything quite like this before. Add the use of the ancient Irish language Gaeilge, and you have a genuinely intriguing package.
The second track, TAL, has a frantic energy, energetic vocals and an electronic beat intertwined with Irish folk influences. The album is also deeply political, which I can only welcome. At a time when the supposedly “apolitical” Ed Sheeran is dropping support acts over their support for Palestine, it feels more important than ever that music with mainstream reach can still have sharp edges.
“We have a moral code that we live by – you have to, in these times,” says Conway. “It’s pretty crazy out there and you’ve got a lot of racism, a lot of hatred, bigotry, sexism, the whole fucking shebang. It feels rampant at the moment. So everybody has a duty to try and stand against it, because we can’t just let it go. This is the purpose of music, of being an artist.”
From the first half of the album, I’d highlight the single Greedy Pigs, which was inspired by Conway’s time working as a butcher alongside his uncles and grandfather. “There was always one pig that bullied the rest and ate all the food; its greed could never be satisfied. It would eat and eat until it became enormous,” he recalls. “But the thing about that was, he was fast-tracking himself to the slaughterhouse.”
Beyond the message and the story behind it, the song is also incredibly catchy and feels like a genuine hit, despite its dark undertones. I think this is one of the things Chasing Abbey do so well: the chorus is dark, but it still gets lodged firmly in your head. The following Seachain works just as well, with a chorus that genuinely sends shivers down my spine.
The second half of the album brought some joy to my indie-folk-loving soul with the eighth track, Culchie. It’s a very simple song with the vocals pushed right to the front, and it carries something of a Fontaines D.C. or Oasis vibe. A beat gradually enters the picture, but everything remains gentle and subtle. The whole thing evokes a pleasant late-summer atmosphere for me. It reminds me of spending a few weeks in Berlin the autumn before last, and the song brought back something of that beautiful time.
Overall, the combination of Celtic music and electronic production is genuinely unusual. The electronics may draw from mainstream sounds, but they are often dark, abrasive and occasionally even industrial in character. This is also true of Saoirse Saoirse, which has an almost medieval quality to it.
The penultimate track, Colonised Minds, opens with something that sounds like a harmonium, before a heavy beat enters the picture. In its second half, the song develops into another powerful combination of traditional and electronic elements. Musically, I feel like Chasing Abbey saved some of their best material for the very end. The final track, Is Rud Crua, has incredible energy, a fantastic flow and an undeniably catchy quality. I wouldn’t be surprised if it becomes one of the album’s biggest hits.
CYBER CELT is an album that manages to bring together traditional Irish music, electronic production and a strong political voice without sounding like a forced experiment. It is strange, catchy, dark and full of energy, and it feels like something that could take Chasing Abbey well beyond their existing audience.
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