Five Potentially Huge Irish Acts

By Bill O'Sullivan
17th Mar 2015

In honour of St. Patrick’s Day, Spotify yesterday released the top twenty most streamed songs ever by Irish artists. Topping the bill of course was the main man Hozier with Take Me To Church. The rest of the list contains seven songs from The Script, five from U2, two from Damien Rice and one each from Enya, Snow Patrol, Sin?ad O’Connor, The Cranberries and Van Morrison.

With that in mind, we decided to bring to you five Irish acts who we feel could well feature on that list in years to come.

Gavin James

Move over Ed Sheeran! Ireland has a new favourite red-headed singer songwriter and his name is Gavin James. Gavin won the Meteor Choice Music Prize award for Song of the Year for 2012 for his song Say Hello and has gone from strength to strength since then. This Friday the 20th of March, he will become the first ever act to headline the Olympia Theatre having not yet released a debut album. Not only that, but Gavin is hotly tipped to support the aforementioned Ed Sheeran at his upcoming two night salvo at Croke Park in July.

Catch him before he goes global!

Orla Gartland

Youtube sensation Orla Gartland is currently one of Ireland’s most successful pop acts. Having made her name performing covers on her Youtube channel, which now has almost 100,000 subscribers and almost 11.5 million video views, Orla set about writing and performing her own songs in the last two years and has been hugely successful. So much so that she has just completed a tour for her most recent Lonely People EP which included sold out shows across Ireland, the UK and most impressively the US.

Orla is currently representing Ireland at South By Southwest Festival in Texas but she’ll undoubtedly be back playing in Ireland soon.

The Eskies

The Eskies first made an appearance on the Irish music scene almost a decade ago now. Various changes in personnel and style later, the latest incarnation are ready to finally make their mark. Frontman Ian Bermingham and drummer Steven Kearney are the only remaining members from the original line-up and it’s the two of them who drive home The Eskies? philosophy of bringing to the masses a unique brand of folk noir/gypsy jazz/sea shanty and swaggering stage spectacle. It does exactly what it says on the tin.

The Eskies have just finished recording their debut album After The Sherry Went ‘Round which they are launching in Whelan’s on the 16th of May. It promises to be an absolute barnstormer!

Bitch Falcon

Probably one of the best-named bands in the country today, Bitch Falcon are as loud and in your face as the name suggests. The four piece, made up of Lizzie Fitzpatrick,?Fia Kavanagh,?Naomi Macleod and?Nigel Kenny, are?only newbies to the Irish music scene but their reputation as a live act has sky-rocketed since an attention-grabbing performance in the Oxjam tent at Electric Picnic last year. They released their debut single, Wolfstooth, on the 16th of January and will release their second single, TMJ, recorded by Marc Carolan (Muse) in March.

They played the Sugar Club alongside Fight Like Apes last night where they announced they’ll be going into hibernation to finish recording some material. Alongside Mongoose, they’ve also been announced for this year’s Knockanstockan at the end of July.

Loah

Hotly tipped by pretty much every Irish music journalist this year, Loah has more than lived up to the hype so far this year. A stunning performance at the State Faces 2015 launch gig as well as a beautiful support slot for Wyvern Lingo in the Sugar Club last month have put the Sierra Leone native, who has spent the majority of her life growing up in Maynooth, firmly on the Irish musical map. She also co-wrote man of the moment Hozier’s latest single Someone New.

Loah will headline the first anniversary of GoldenBeck at the Workman’s Club on Thursday the 26th of March.