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Fionn Regan (2007)

Fionn Regan

Signed to label: Bella Union
From: Ireland

'Be Good Or Be Gone' video here

Fionn Regan delivers his songs with bruising powerful abandon, bringing to mind such musical luminaries as Woody Guthrie, John Lennon, and Neil Young. For a young songwriter his musical apprenticeship has already been a fascinating and detailed journey. Writing songs and poems, that shift from what he calls; "old head on young shoulders to young head on old shoulders".

Since the release of his acclaimed limited edition 'Hotel Room' and 'Reservoir' EP's Fionn's DIY approach has won him an army of dedicated fans that have been multiplying at an ever-increasing rate. Talks are now underway with a number of labels, regarding his debut album, which will be released as soon as the right home is found for it.

"There is so much of his own soul and grittiness on display, to make his a truly original voice, in both senses of the word. Purely in singing terms he recalls a very early Plant at his most keening and raw." - Dan Cairns THE SUNDAY TIMES

"Fionn Regan's capacity for engaging with his audience is so compelling that you feel instantly at home...genuinely special." - HOTPRESS

"One of Ireland's most valuable diamonds in the rough." - IRISH INDEPENDENT

Fionn was born on the coastal outskirts of Dublin to an artist mother and a musician/composer father. "I remember clearly the day I was born, the patterns and folds of skin worn on the nurses hands and neck… her gold plated wrist watch, made in Korea… An expanse of solid white cloud outside the narrow uniform windows, looking down on earth through the barrel of a telescope, beyond Van Halen’s shield, a fish caught on a line pushed through the oceans ceiling. Then, my first two years were spent living in a staff room, at a hotel. I communicated with the world, age two by blocking sinks, turning on taps, and running naked through the hotel dining room."

"We moved on to our own place. Our house had an energy to it,electrical pulses running along the floorboards, birds in the attic. Passers-by always stopped to stare up at it. Always an audience. There were train tracks at the rear and the sea out front, reminders for the isolated, that the world was out there. My first stage was the space that the bay window afforded, my brother opened the musty curtains, "action!" I performed improvised songs and monologues, wearing a 'map of the world' print waistcoat, bowler hat and clutching a walking cane. Outside the sea swelling, careering over the iron railings onto the promenade and homeless people in the bandstand passing around a bottle. The heavy quantities of sea salt in the air proved a terrible foundation for a future sodium addict"

"Our landlord filled the cracks in the windows with newspaper. I pulled a piece loose one day to find an article from The Wicklow Times on cowboy builders. He poured buckets of tar down the double A frame roof in an attempt to stop the 14 leaks, which I secretly loved; any interaction with a rainstorm made a bulb in my chest light up".

"There wasn't a stereo but I fell asleep every night to the sound of traditional Irish music, folk, bluegrass and country. Banjos, uillean pipes, guitars, flutes and bodhrans, vibrating the walls, losing it and winning it back. The last stragglers arguing out the front, while the chukka rhythm of the diesel train grew thinner, winding around the mountain until there was a hollow space left in the air. The local community drug alert people peered and sneered at the house because a junkie was living in the basement. All they found was a poppy growing in the garden which they placed into a transparent plastic bag."

"At school I made spines out of silver paper, collected leaves, acorns, conkers. My first report simply read "colour blind". We spent many periods of time with no electricity. Our landlord would turn up, shout, take instruments, furniture, toys or anything else by way of payment. We'd stand on the steps and chant 'Fuck-off-Paddy-Mears-where's-your-cap' he'd give us the fingers and drive south."

"In the morning I would lie on the carpet in the path of sun below the glass fanlights in the front door, resume sleeping and dream about fossils, old buildings and concerts, my mother had a hard time getting me to school".

"In the hall stood an old piano, which i hammered out my first songs on. In the garden we had an open topped canoe, it held pockets of frog spawn like bags of glue, in later years we rowed it down the strand road when the tail end of hurricane Charlie hit. Once, I traveled for what seemed like days to pick up a violin from a old man in a garage. Shortly into the lessons I cracked the bow using it as a make shift sword. It wasn't too long after that i began to play my old man's guitar...."

"We called the back garden Jamaica, set up a a tree-stump table surrounded by cast-off ghost train carriages from the amusement arcade. We'd sit up playing guitars, building mind benders. My father often dropped by to join in the music or just stand on his hands. We often wound up on the mountain playing anything from trad to pop songs. My first public performance fronting a band, was in a barn, at a party, out in the stick's. It went well, I felt good. After the show I drank some whiskey, and saw a ghost."

"There were different groups and by the time I was 15 or 16, I was rounding up the troops, rehearsing in the now near derelict hotel staff quarters, surrounded by old bathtubs, sinks, hundreds of old telephones and mirrors. Until, one day I realised I was the only one left in the band.

"Fionn has been taking a characteristically low key approach to recording his debut record, choosing analogue equipment, recording in houses, sheds and a barn, capturing songs in a live capacity, introducing percussion, piano, and strings to mesmeric effect. The highly anticipated debut album is in the pipeline, the future is wide open............

"We've toured with Fionn and fallen deeply in love with his luminous songs of memory, loss and hope. His ability to paint weighty and sublime imagery with words is untouchable and very rare, yet it's combined with a sweet charm that renders all cynicism impotent. All I can do when he sings is to shut up and keep breathing." - Olly Knights of TURIN BRAKES for THE INDEPENDENT

"The combination of fluid, sparkling guitar and soulful angelic vocals, sounds fresh and unique... superb songwriting skills and musicianship" - DAY&NIGHT (Irish Independent)

"Overwhelmingly lovely, Regan is one of our most precious commodities. He has integrity and it's not for sale." - THE FLY

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