CMAT at All Together Now: Singer performs politically charged single name-checking ‘All the Berties'
'I don't think of myself as a political songwriter, ' Thompson said to the thousands of festival attendees gathered in front of the main stage, but there are things the artist stands for, and she's not afraid to champion them.
On the 'agenda' for the evening: trans rights (with a t-shirt on sale that will have its proceeds donated to Teni) and 'as always, Free Palestine' as she led the crowd into 'free free Palestine' chants. But the debut of Euro-Country is no afterthought.
The performance came on the same day that Bertie Ahern emerged as the preferred Fianna Fáil candidate in the presidential election in November. The Sunday Independent/Ireland Thinks poll showed 12pc of people believe that the former Taoiseach should be a contender to replace Michael D Higgins in the Áras.
'I'm so sorry that this has struck a chord with so many of you,' the Dunboyne native said to a heaving main stage crowd.
She launched into the song, which includes lyrics that reference the former Taoiseach: 'All the big boys/ All the Berties/ All the envelopes, yeah they hurt me/I was 12 when the das started killing themselves all around me.'
There were more cases of suicide during the bust period, according to the National Suicide Research Foundation, who cite 476 more male suicides than had there not been a recession.
Thompson also makes a call back to the lack of public infrastructure and perpetual struggle with access to housing among those in their twenties and thirties: 'And it was normal/Building houses/They stay empty even now.'
'Nobody I grew up with basically lives here anymore, everyone has had to emigrate. Nobody can afford to live here, everybody is leaving home. And everyone who is left behind is left with less and less public services, healthcare and security in everything that you need to live a life not in danger,' said Thompson.
'I believe this is directly the fault of the Irish government that we had 20 - 25 years ago. And I can't explain to you the politic [sic] of what happened back then, I can only explain to you my memories of growing up as a kid during the crash that we all experienced, and it was a horrible, horrible time for the entire country.'
'I believe that people in their 20s and 30s have been really adversely affected by it. And the personal, emotional effects of it are something that I am interested in as a songwriter, because I think that we can learn from it.'
'All of that is to say, we've never performed this song live before, and I wanted to debut it here because I thought it was important.'
When all was said and done, there was one more track to enjoy. 'I was wondering if after all that trauma you wouldn't mind doing me one more favour' she quipped, as she introduced Stay For Something, and gave the audience a melody to sing back.
The crowd dutifully channelled a shared grief into a stirring rendition before lights out.
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