The Head Villager

A look back at a classic interview from 2008 with Conor J O'Brien conducted months before he embarked on a successful solo career

“I wrote my first song when I was twelve and it was called ‘Psychic’ and it had the line; ‘when I’m walking down these streets I feel like a monkey in the arctic’. I could play six chords back then.” Says Conor proudly. You can tell straight away that Conor O’Brien is a person who was set on his rightful path from the start. Now 13 years after his school boy music days he is a professional musician at every sense of the word. Around the comfortable living room a Vintage made acoustic guitar stands up straight, ever ready in case inspiration hits. “This is what I always wanted to do”, Conor continues, “My parents weren’t musical at all but they let me play music very loud from a young age. I think because I was the youngest of three in our house in Dun Laoighre that I got away with it At one stage I had a full blown band with drums and all in our bungalow, I shudder to think what the neighbours thought.”

After receiving a coveted nomination for the Choice Music Award with his band ‘The Immediate’ in 2006, Conor has now found himself responsible for another nomination this year as lead guitarist and joint song writer with the successful Irish artist Cathy Davey. Conor had been writing the album ‘Tales of Silversleeve’ with Cathy while he was still touring with The Immediate. At the time he managed to help write a top selling album with Cathy, and still drive his own band ever forward towards success. The band split in early 2007 due to musical differences. “Back then I didn’t think the band was going to end at all”, explains Conor, “I reckoned we (The Immediate) would go back touring and she’d (Cathy) be doing her own thing”. He sits relaxed and casual when answering questions of ‘what could have been’ if the band had stayed together. He has no bitter feelings and assures me that there are no personal problems among the band members as a result of the split. 

The current tour with Cathy Davey is going well, with tour dates sold out across the country in Cypress Avenue in Cork and Whelan’s in Dublin. Although he’s not the front man in this band his song writing and guitar playing skills are currently being displayed on a national level as he performs with the lovely Cathy Davey. 

Conor has already had a busy new year representing the Irish music industry in Holland at Eurosonic, the European music exchange alongside Cathy Davey. The choice music award is not the only De-Ja-Vu for Conor this year. Once again he finds himself performing at the Meteor Awards show in Dublin. “Ireland seems to be a bank for some of the world’s biggest musicians” he shares “The Meteors has great marketing potential to release albums and acts”. As Conor answers my questions, a content and peaceful expression stays on his face. He isn’t afraid to admit he doesn’t know the answers to some questions, and offers as much of an explanation as possible to every open ended question I throw at him. He willingly talks about The Immediate, despite  his band  coming under spotlight again before Christmas when a former band mate wrote an article in The Irish Independent detailing his reasons why the band split.     

Even though The Immediate dissolved without any hate or bloodshed its hard not to imagine what level of success they would have now. The band were a long time in the making starting back when David Hedderman, Conor O'Brien, Peter Toomey, and Barra Heavey attended St Conleth’s College in Ballsbridge. While Conor and fellow Immediate front man Dave were at school, their knowledge and taste of music was influenced by their school care-taker who taught them about ‘The Kinks’, ‘The Velvet Underground” and ‘Pink Floyd’. “At lunch time me and two of the other guys would organise concerts and stuff in empty classes”, Conor reminisces. It’s clear that developing The Immediate was a full time job. The band thrived on the idea of ‘making it’ and attempted various methods including throwing their demo up onstage at a Manic Street Preachers gig, as well as dropping a copy into Folk rapping legend Beck Hanson’s shopping bag while he visited Dublin. The Immediate released their first single ‘Never Seen/Say This’ on Fierce Panda Records in 2005. The single was picked up by famous English rock stations BBC Radio One and XFM. Television spots on Channel 4’s show: “Road to V Festival” and a place on Hotpress’ ‘Murphy’s live tour CD’, showed progression in the right direction. The lads entered Jacobs Studios in Surrey to record their debut LP with US producer Chris Shaw a talented music guru who has worked with the likes of Wilco, Super Furry Animals, Public Enemy, and Bob Dylan. The first recordings from this session were released in April 2006 as the acclaimed ‘Make our Devils Flow’, which was a four track EP on CD and 7" double-pack. The album In ‘Towers & Clouds’, released in the same year, was nominated for the Choice Music Prize. The band famously swapped instruments during shows. Everyone did their part. “At the start we all wrote a bit. When the band progressed Dave and I wrote more and more, but we kept the template or formula of swapping instruments, just because we always did. For years we had to make up reasons why we did it in when asked in interviews.” reveals Conor.

 Conor bounced back well from the split of the band many DJ’s said to have ‘unlimited potential’. He is still touring and working closely with Cathy. Despite this new exciting partnership in music, he admits that some tedious aspects of being a professional musician never change. “The worst is after a sound-check in a random place and you have to fill blank hours before the gig.” Conor’s smile drifts for a millisecond as he no doubt remembers a time when he forgot to bring an I-pod or a book on tour. As we discuss directions of music and formats of song release, the impression that Conor is an old soul, wise beyond his years is ever present. “It seems that as the technology gets better with mp3 etc. the quality of the music compared to the old 12 inch records seems to go down.” He continues; “but at the same time we can listen to more music and transport even more music with us but that’s kind of bad too, ‘because you won’t be obsessed with one band like you used to be when you were a kid.”

      

  With Cathy’s album ‘Tales Of Silversleeve’ released this year, Conor spent his time between tour dates, home, and travelling to various media and press outings as well as  radio slots on Ray Darcy, Ryan Tubridy, and Rick O’Shea. 2007 was a busy year for albums and Conor admits that he was taken aback by an artist called ‘Grizzly Bear’. “I respect bands like this really making a specific sound purely ‘because they feel they need to make it, as opposed to chasing after album sales. I also love Cathy’s album, even if I didn’t help write it I’d still love it.” He jokes about cult bands sacrificing good song-writing when they make it onto mainstream labels, (namely Arcade Fire and Kings of Leon’s 2007 releases), but then admits that he may have prematurely judged both respectively because he; “recently heard some songs of the new albums that blew me away”.

    

     The topic of travel arises and Conor hopes that one day his music will take him to Africa and explains how a taxi driver recently set him up with a huge list of bands to check out for when he makes it that far. “I’d love to experience that complete opposite end of music”, despite his old soul these words hint that he has many years of travel and musical adventures ahead.