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Kerry folk artist Junior Brother announces Tralee concert scheduled after release of upcoming album

Kerry folk artist Junior Brother announces Tralee concert scheduled after release of upcoming album

The Kilcummin native, who recently signed with the Strap Originals label founded by English rocker Pete Doherty, will play at venues across Ireland, the UK and Europe in celebration of his upcoming release.
The lyricist will play at Tralee Lasta Festival at Síamsa Tire on Friday, October 10 as part of the upcoming string of shows.
Junior Brother's new album, titled The End, is due out on Friday, September 5.
The work has been described as a deeply instinctive yet carefully considered response to the chaos of modern life.
'The sound of the album is supposed to take the organic instruments of Irish traditional music and lift them somewhere else, like the otherworldly Irish music sometimes heard from Fairy Forts at twilight on country roads, impossible to recreate upon hearing,' the artist said.
Much of the album's inspiration was drawn from UCD's Folklore Collection on duchas.ie.
'I delved into the manuscripts—endless eyewitness accounts of Fairy Forts being stepped into and the land altering, the familiar mutating,' Junior Brother explained.
'Farmers, teachers, the sober, the smart—all losing their way home one way or the other.'
In these tales of displacement and confusion, the artist said found striking parallels to the instability and distortion of contemporary life.
The End is said to explore forces that work against nature, the rise of the far-right and confrontations with mortality.
'The title The End represents the moment after being led astray, when the grip of madness releases you and you suddenly see your way home. It may reflect the doom of a world gone mad, but it also represents the end of darkness, and the start of a new road,' Junior Brother said.
The upcoming work will include his renowned single from last September 'Take Guilt' and his latest offering 'Small Violence', billed as a track which addresses the growing influence of misinformation and the escalating wave of conspiracy-fuelled hatred.
The singer/songwriter said the song follows a character pulled in by a small few who enjoy using violent words to stoke real violence further down the line.
'The intro riff was heavily inspired by the opening titles of The Blood on Satan's Claw, a folk horror from 1971 which I highly recommend to anyone except the sensible,' Junior Brother said.
The new song is available on popular streaming platforms and the music video for the track, directed by Ellius Grace and Junior Brother, can be watched on the artist's YouTube channel.
Tickets for Junior Brother's upcoming concerts are available at https://www.juniorbrother.com/tour
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The Weir reveals the ‘beauty of community' says star of McPherson's revival Seán McGinley
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The Weir reveals the ‘beauty of community' says star of McPherson's revival Seán McGinley

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You were recently in McPherson's The Brightening Air. How do the two productions compare for you? It's two in a row - we just finished The Brightening Air three weeks before we started rehearsal with this. So it was a seamless transition. Working on a new play is always a very exciting thing as The Brightening Air was also directed by Conor. We had an amazing cast and Conor in the room giving us these little beautiful presents every now and then. With new bits from his observation of what we were doing, he was feeding back and giving notes related to that. There was a lovely feeling in the room. When did you realise you wanted to pursue acting as a career and where did you train? I didn't train, we didn't have training in Ireland at the time I started. I was in college in Galway. I'd just done a degree, and I was doing my teaching diploma. I got involved in a one act play with the drama group in college and Druid Theatre Company had just started the year before. 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I've worked there before. I worked in the National and Royal Court. A lot of my first cousins were there so they would come and visit us, and we used to go and visit them. I've always found London a happy place. I've always liked it. What can the audience expect from the show? I think there's a great cast and it's going to be a great production because we have a great director. It's the quality of the writing and the storytelling in it, and it's about storytelling and it reveals things about what's important in the simple things in life and how people look after each other and regard each other and relate to each other on a daily basis. It reveals more than you might you know, it's heightened and laid bare, and it's very funny. It's a perfect evening in the theatre. The Weir runs at the 3Olympia Theatre until September 6. It transfers to London's Harold Pinter Theatre from September 12 to December 6. Tickets for the West End run are on sale here See More: Conor McPherson, Harold Pinter Theatre, Sean McGinley, The Weir

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Award-winning Irish film A Want in Her opens in October
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