Danny O’Reilly, lead singer of The Coronas told David Hennessy about the band’s new album, having to record his vocal to compete with Gabrielle Aplin’s and his experiences of working with the late Sinead O’Connor, Christy Dignam and Mark Sheehan of The Script.
The Coronas are about to release their eighth studio album, Thoughts & Observations.
The album has been preceded by the singles Speak Up, That’s Exactly What Love Is (featuring Gabrielle Aplin), Confirmation (with Jamie Duffy) and Ghosting.
The band came to prominence with their debut album Heroes or Ghosts in 2007 with the title track and San Diego song becoming immediate anthems.
The 2009 follow-up Tony was an Ex-Con beat U2 and Snow Patrol to take Best Irish Album at the Meteor Awards.
Thoughts & Observations follows three number one albums for the band.
Renowned for being one of the best live acts Ireland has, the band have been headlining big shows and festivals in Ireland for almost 15 years, and their regular Christmas shows in The Olympia are massive occasions. Recent highlights include being voted Hot Press #1 Live Act of the Year 2023, performing for President Biden in Co. Mayo and supporting Bruce Springsteen at BST Hyde Park.
The band has been the three piece since the 2019 departure of guitarist Dave McPhillips but one the road, it has expanded with Lar Kaye (All Tvvins), Cian MacSweeney (True Tides) and Danny’s sister Róisín O joining Danny, Graham Knox (bass) and Conor Egan (drums).
We caught up with lead singer and guitarist Danny O’Reilly ahead of the album’s release.
How does it feel, album number eight? “It’s hard to believe we’re at album number eight.
“I say that every time but definitely the longer we do this, the more we’re proud of our longevity.
“We’re still getting away with it.”
There definitely seems to be a theme of heartbreak and moving on..
“Yeah, 100%.
“It wasn’t even on purpose. It was only when we finished off, I realised that the first half of the album is about going through a break up and a tough time.
“You’ve got songs like If You’re Going and Confirmation and even That’s Exactly What Love Is, it’s the end of something, and then from Ghosting onwards, I think it’s a much more positive album. It’s more about the start of something and the future and also about us as a band.
“A song like Singing Just For You (On Occasion) is really about us trying to be the best band we can be.
“That’s a theme that I’ve written about a lot over the years, even going back to Addicted to Progress. It’s about us trying to be a good band.”
I was reminded of early Coronas with this album, is it a bit of a return for you?
“Yeah, well, it definitely wasn’t something we set out to do.
“We did decide to not go too synth heavy.
“We wanted the instrumentation to be more organic.
“I’d say it mirrors the early Corona stuff because we didn’t really use much synths back then as well.”
You do have such a back catalogue. I’m sure, to this day, you can’t do a show without playing San Deigo Song, your debut single, and Heroes or Ghosts, the title track off your first album.
“Yeah, and we have no problem playing them.
“They are moments in the set and we’re lucky to have a few of them and we always look forward to playing the big songs.
“As long as the crowd wants to hear them, we’ll do that.
“We love the challenge of building the set list and putting in new songs and old songs.”
Did you know what you had when you first wrote those tracks? Did you know writing San Diego Song or Heroes or Ghosts what fan favourites they would be?
“Absolutely not. I’d love to go, ‘I knew exactly when I wrote this song’, but we didn’t have a clue, even the band.
“I had Heroes or Ghosts written (with Dave McPhillips) in a batch of other songs at the time, and I remember playing two or three songs to the boys and they were like, ‘Oh, that one, there’s something in that’.
“And I was like, ‘Really?’ I just thought it was a nice song but hey spotted it with that one, but with San Diego Song, even they didn’t spot it.
“We wrote that song half tongue in cheek, you know?
“We wrote it on a beach when we were on our J1 and we started playing it when we were in San Diego.
“By the end of the holiday, there was a few people coming down who we didn’t really know and they would go, ‘Play that song that you were singing there the other night’.
“And even then we got back and it was only when we actually played it live, then you could see the reaction.
“By the time we got to the last chorus, they were already singing along.
“They were with it and that’s when we started looking at each other going, ‘Oh, there’s something happening here’.
“So no, we didn’t. We didn’t have a clue and we still weren’t even sure if we should release it.
“We released it and a couple of months later, it was getting played as the last song in Copperface Jacks at the end of a night, and we were in Copperface Jacks going, ‘This is crazy’.
“And to this day, it still connects to people.
“It’s funny because it’s such a student song and now the people who are singing it aren’t really students.
“They’re thinking about when they used to be students but it’s great because we do have a new generation coming to the shows who are singing it.
“We played it in San Diego last summer and that was the first time we had been back since and there were so many J1ers at the show singing it.
“Then it was a real, ‘This is crazy’, because it’s 15 years since we were that age and doing that stuff, even longer.
“It’s mad to think that it’s still there in the ether.
“One of the lyrics on the new album is, ‘If I could be remembered as your man from that band, that would give me such pleasure’.
“We are proud of those things.
“If all we’re remembered for is Heroes or Ghosts or San Diego Song, there could be worse things than that.
“We’ve loved the journey and we love still playing them.”
You are known for doing Heroes or Ghosts As Gaeilge as well as in English. Seems like you were ahead of a curve there with everything that has been going on with the Irish language in recent years…
“Often times if I don’t do even a little snippet As Gaeilge, people in the crowd are disappointed so I tend to do a verse As Gaeilge and it goes down really well.
“People sing the Irish as loud as the English.
“It’s something that we can be proud of: That we have a bit of Gaeilge in our set that connects with people.
“It’s funny. The further you go away from Ireland, the more people feel connected.
“When we play in Sydney, you’ll see loads of Irish flags and people screaming for it in Irish.
“We’re lucky that we have that.
“It just reminds people of home, I think.”
Back to this new record you have of course already shared the single That’s Exactly What Love Is featuring Gabrielle Aplin. It is your second time to have her guest on one of your songs (the first being 2020’s Lost in the Thick of It), what a great singer to be able to call on..
“Yeah, as soon as I wrote it, I had Gabrielle in mind.
“And she was just so good.
“In just two takes she had it nailed.
“We were sitting in the control room listening to her and I’d already done my vocal, or what I thought was the vocal, and during her second take, I turned to George, our producer like, ‘George, I’m gonna have to re-sing my part, it’s not holding up next to hers. I’m going to have to do it better’.
“And he was like, ‘I was thinking the same thing, Danny’.
“So after she left, I went in and spent ages trying to get my vocal a little bit better to stand up beside hers.
“But she’s so lovely, so talented and we were so happy to have her.
“She’s just so cool and we’re lucky to have her as a friend and also as a collaborator.
“It’s great to have her on the album.”
What happens with doing it live because, of course, you won’t always have Gabrielle but I guess that’s where having a sister like Róisín comes in handy..
“Absolutely, Róisín has been doing Lost in the Thick of It at our live shows and it goes down really well.
“The feedback I’ve had from our shows in the last two years is, ‘You should get Roisin to sing another song’.
“So it’s actually worked out really well, now she’ll have two songs in the set that she can sing and have her little moment.
“We’re blessed to have such an established singer-songwriter in her own right.
“She is really good at harmonising.
“I think we have that natural sort of sibling harmony where she knows when I’m scooping up to a note and she follows me.
“She doesn’t just sing the right note, she knows when I’m out of tune and follows me.
“It’s sort of adding a new a new lease of life to some of the old songs.
“It’s great to have her.”
Of course Gabrielle is not the only guest on the album. Jamie Duffy features on Confirmation. How did he come to your attention? He’s a real talent…
“Real talent.
“He’s a lovely fella.
“I was slagging him last time we hung out because he’s only 23.
“I was like, ‘Oh my god, you’re a baby. When our first album came out, you were eight or something. It’s just crazy’.
“I’m jealous of his youth, but it’s great to have him involved.”
We were talking about the sound of the album before. Do you feel you have found who you are as a band now? Dave left in 2019 so there was some adjustment, I’m sure, but it seems like you really know who you are now, would you agree?
“100%, I think that’s a really good way of putting it.
“We are just more assured of what we’re doing.
“We’re not saying we’re the best band of all time, but we do feel like we have something to say and we have something to offer.
“We believe in our live shows and we believe in our music and we’re in a really privileged position in that we’re our own record label.
“There’s no one breathing down our necks.
“We can record whatever music we want and we have an amazing following that means we can put things out and we have found if we follow our own instincts, they tend to be the songs that connect with people more as opposed to thinking, ‘Will people like this? Do we need to write another single? Should we try and write a song like San Diego Song? Should we try and write a song like something else?’
“When we started, we would be thinking about singles, ‘What song is going to get played? Let’s try to write poppy songs’.
“And now we’re just like, ‘Let’s just release the songs that we like, it doesn’t matter if they’re slow or fast’.
“It’s taken us nearly eight albums to get to that position, to realise that we only have to impress ourselves.
“I remember we had a song for the Closer to You album, all the labels and everything loved, and we didn’t it. It didn’t even make the album in the end, because we didn’t like it.
“Everyone was like, ‘Oh, that could be a single, that could be a big song’.
“And we were just never happy with it, and I was really glad that we stuck to our guns and didn’t put it on because going back to it now, we still don’t like it. It just didn’t feel like us.
“But we find if we just worry about impressing ourselves and liking the music ourselves, they’re the ones that that connect most to people so we’re in a good spot.
“We seem to have a lease of life in the last couple of albums and we’re just enjoying it and we don’t want it to end anytime soon.”
You recorded the album in London at Eastcote Studios, was it good to be back? “Absolutely.
“We lived in London for four or five years and we loved it over there.
“We just love getting back to London, any excuse to get back.
“In January we went over and we were there for three weeks and we had a great time just walking down to Portobello and Notting Hill and Kensal Rise, and having the craic.
“We worked really hard but it was nice to have a Sunday off and seeing the old haunts.
“We’re looking forward to getting back in May.”
And of course you played GAA in London with North London Shamrocks..
“That was such a good time in my life, those few years of making those friends for life and playing football at a decent level when I probably didn’t think I would again because the band had been so busy.
“Getting a good team together and going on a run and getting to the All- Britain Intermediate championship final was a big thing for me.
“When we moved back to Dublin, then there was no doubt my mind that I wanted to keep playing. I’m still playing now junior football back here in Dublin when I can.
“I want to keep playing as long as I can but I don’t know how many more years I’ll be clinging to the wreckage. I love it.”
You were one of those to pay tribute to Eoin French, known as Talos, who passed away recently.
“So sad, so sad and such a talent.
“I didn’t really know him personally to be honest.
“I’d come across the music a couple of times and we had a lot of friends in common.
“A lot of people that I know spoke really, really highly of him.
“It was a shock.
“A couple of my friends who knew him really well were really, really rattled by it.
“So sad, so young.
“He won’t be forgotten.”
It was also last year that Mark Sheehan of The Script, a band you supported several times and toured with, passed away.
“Mark was always so good to us and so encouraging to us when we started.
“Brought us on tour not just Ireland but around Europe with them, and always sort of looked out for us a little bit.
“That was really sad as well.
“I remember hearing the news. It was just shocking.”
And of course last year was such a bad year for Irish music in that we lost Christy Dignam, Shane MacGowan and Sinead O’Connor, did you cross paths with those at times?
“Yeah, I’ve been lucky enough to meet all three of those.
“In the early days, we used to support Aslan or play on the same bills at college gigs or whatever.
“They were always lovely and encouraging to us.
“They actually spoke very highly of us when we started out which meant a lot to us at the time.
“I also met Sinead one time.
“I actually recorded a Christmas song with her for RTE, and we spent all day together working on this song.
“She was lovely and easy to get along with.
“She was just so talented. It was really, really amazing to see her work and just to be around her because she had that sort of aura.
“Then I met Shane just briefly once. I just briefly said hello to him and shook his hand and that was it. But another legend.
“What a songwriter, what a man.
“They won’t be forgotten.
“It has been a sad time for Irish music the last couple of years.”
Thoughts & Observations is out on 27 September.
The Coronas come to the UK next May.
For more information, go to thecoronas.net.
