Lockdown inspires Tullamore musician to discover new sound
Tullamore-based singer and musician Hubert Murray will release his new single next month which was written during lockdown.
Speaking about his new song, ‘Arrow’ Hubert said: “I was trying to write something that was completely different to what I was doing before which was mainly folk, bluegrass, Americana sort of world.
In order to try and write outside of his usual music genres, Hubert decided to get involved with an online writing group with a guitarist from the Late Late Show House Band.
“He was just giving us tasks every week to try and write new songs and new material. It was just a totally new way of approaching writing."
As a result, Hubert took inspiration from the poem ‘Arrow’ and put melody to words. “What the post was writing about was kind of embodying that idea that sometimes you can let an arrow into the world and you don’t know where it’s going to land or how it’s going to land.”
“I joined up with Joe Egan in Clara and we ended up just putting guitar, a lead vocal and then two harmonies around that. I really like the sort of imagery and metaphor of kind of pushing words out into the world and seeing where they land. It could be interpreted positively; it could be interpreted negatively.”
Hubert continued: "For this project I was lucky enough to receive a small arts grant from Offaly Arts Office, so I was able to collaborate with some fantastic local creatives. For the artwork I collaborated with painter and sculptor Claire Guinan. She also runs the Paints 'n' Pints event at Dead Centre Brewing in Athlone. The track was laid down to digital tape at Clara's Nutshed recording studios and produced by Joe Egan."
This is the second time Hubert has collaborated with Claire on some artwork. Hubert explained: “I basically just told her the idea of how I interpreted the lyrics and then she would just come back with these amazing paintings.”
According to Hubert, the transition from working as part of a team in a band to performing solo is “very scary". "Before there was a sense of camaraderie. When you're playing with a gang of people on stage there's someone always there. as a solo musician it's a lot more daunting.”
The plan is to get the singles out, get back into gigging in venues again, and then just kind of build up my profile over the next year.”
“The new sound is very much me with a mix of an acoustic guitar and the electric guitar. Instead of just singing a song with one voice, one guitar, I’d add new textures, new loops, new pedals kind of making it a total soundscape as opposed to a singer songwriter sort of American sort of style.”
Hubert first started performing live as a teenager and played classic rock gigs in pubs for many years. I went to college to nursing and then I went over to London. I was really trying to get away from the sort of Irish pub circuit that I was playing when I was in college. I tried to just immerse myself in the London music scene.
Hubert also was a member of the bands Land End and The Hot Rock Pilgrims, the latter of which toured around the UK and Ireland for five years. They released three LPs and one album.
“We just toured around the UK and Ireland on the festival circuit and the folk club circuit. Then Covid hit so it was back to nursing. I’m trying to get back on my feet again, playing music and writing new music. Hubert currently works part-time in the operating theatre in Portlaoise Hospital.
The Galway native describes his sound as folk with a mix of distortion. "What I'm trying to do now is more creates an emotion as opposed to creating a storyline."
One of Hubert's new songs, 'Rabbit Hole' focuses on the different rabbit holes people can pursue online. Speaking about the inspiration behind the song Hubert explained: "One of the songs is called Rabbit Hole. You could have these sections of society totally isolated in their views and the two places will never meet. There was this weird thing that was happening during Covid where you could have two people that would be very good friends but totally different views when it came to being online."
Another song, 'Riots' was inspired by events in the US during the Black Lives Matter movement. “During the time of all the riots that were going on in the US, I was kind of heavily influenced by that. There's kind of a riot where the riot online turns into reality.”
Hubert's new song 'Arrow' will be released on Spotify and iTunes on Friday, November 11.