IRISH ARTIST SISTER GHOST ANNOUNCES ALBUM LAUNCH SHOW FOR HER DEBUT LP ‘BEYOND THE WATER’ AT DERRY’S NERVE CENTRE ON HALLOWE’EN NIGHT – OCTOBER 31ST
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DEBUT ALBUM ‘BEYOND THE WATER’, OUT OCTOBER 31ST
WATCH THE NEW VIDEO FOR “DARK MATTER” HERE
“Feels authentic, from the era of Pixies, Breeders and Hole. Brilliant music, beautifully made.”
– Tom Robinson, BBC 6 Music
“Absolutely massive!” – Jack Saunders, BBC Radio 1
“Big guitar hooks! I’m obsessed!” – Gemma Bradley, BBC Radio 1
With her long-awaited debut album ‘Beyond The Water’ arriving on October 31st, Irish artist Sister Ghost has now announced her plans for a special launch show at the world famous Derry Hallowe’en Festival that very same night.
Taking place at Derry’s Nerve Centre on October 31st, Sister Ghost will take to the stage as part of a one-off headline performance, bringing her newest material to eager fans live for the very first time. To celebrate this announcement, she has also dropped the new video for her latest single “Dark Matter”, which can now be watched HERE.
Speaking about her upcoming show, she said, “I’m so delighted that I’m going to be launching my album at the world famous Derry Hallowe’en festival in my home city this October. Not only that but it’s in the Nerve Centre – the venue where I first played a show as a kid and fell in love with performing.
“I’m very happy to have Monday’s Child opening the show as they are a fantastic example of powerful & fierce young women, very in line with Sister Ghost and my work through the Girls Rock movement. It’s going to be spooktacular, we can even watch the fireworks together before the ceremony begins…”
While adding about the new video, “The video for Dark Matter was shot in various locations around Southern California, including Ojai, Ventura & Casitas Springs. As the song is inspired by the film Portrait of a Lady on Fire, I made sure to have little references to some of my favourite shots in the movie, avid film fans can have fun trying to pick those out.
“I’m super proud of what myself and Alice (who also plays bass in my live band) have made here, the two of us did this totally DIY with no budget and I’m excited to finally share it!”
Recorded in Los Angeles in summer of 2022 with the producer Brad Wood (known for his work on Liz Phair’s ‘Exile on Guyville’ and Veruca Salt’s ‘American Thighs’), ‘Beyond The Water’ is the culmination of years of toil and grit across the underground scene in recent years. The record also features Jeff Friedl on drums, who has also played with A Perfect Circle and is currently the drummer with DEVO. Highlighted by its stellar new offering “Dark Matter”, her latest material offers a new era within her sound, one focusing on her progressive songwriting and empowering lyricism throughout.
‘Beyond The Water’ is an amalgam of sorts, a portrait of Sister Ghost’s 20s as a queer woman from a tiny village in rural Ireland, and her experiences both near and far beyond the waters of home.
Derry based artist Shannon Delores O’Neill is Sister Ghost. With a background playing in bands from the age of 12, O’Neill saw Sister Ghost as an opportunity to do things her way for the first time. She began writing and demoing in her attic – singing and playing everything herself on an 8-track recorder.
Playing noisy, spectral art-rock with a pop & literary heart, Sister Ghost marshals a diverse set of influences in a singular way – from the ‘Seattle sound’ to the likes of Sonic Youth, Veruca Salt, Patti Smith and Kate Bush. Sister Ghost built a reputation as one of Northern Ireland’s most rousing new rock bands, winning Best Live Act at the NI Music Prize in 2019. O’Neill has also been recognised for mentoring and encouraging other female and gender expansive musicians to perform in the Northern Irish scene, having set up the Girls Rock! NI chapter in 2016.
Her lyrics are a mixture of highs and lows, of the lessons life shoves in our face and what we do with that. This album should take you on a little tour, with love, heartbreak, death, but mostly growth and resilience. Tinged with wistfulness and nostalgia at points but also looking forward. Of frustration and pain, to wonder, and the wistful curiosity that travels and goes through young adulthood. Whilst also fictional elements or those from art and film that I may have identified with, for example she wrote Dark Matter after being moved by watching the french film Portrait of a Lady on Fire as it echoes some of her own queer experiences.
Whilst one of the songs (album closer ‘Scent’) was written 10 years ago, most were written in the dusty attic of her childhood home in rural Ireland during the Covid-19 pandemic lockdown of spring 2020. She would spend those strange lockdown days writing and recording demos after long walks or cycling around the local area, soaking up inspiration drawn from the nature around her, memories and wanderlust for the travel that couldn’t be at that time, reading books, watching films and sifting through 10 years worth of notebooks and journals.
Sister Ghost has had press in The Guardian, garnered high profile support slots with the likes of We Are Scientists, Ratboys, Shellac, Pussy Riot, Fontaines DC & more, as well as airplay on KEXP, BBC 6 Music and BBC Radio 1.
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