A TRIP TO MALIBU

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‘Malibu Stacey’ is the latest single to be released from the new album by Irish singer-songwriter Eileen Gogan. All lip gloss and Latin swagger, the infectious song gets its title from a Barbie doll parodied in a 1994 episode of The Simpsons and has a lyric that is ostensibly about skimpily dressed adolescent girls seen hanging around outside late night clubs and bars. Gogan herself describes it as “a song about being young and getting drunk and thinking you have all the time in the world.”

A video loop for the song has been created by fellow musician and solo artist Marry Waterson (of the Waterson folk family dynasty), who explains that it “is an animated illustration that visualises the central themes of the story, in this case depicting a drunk party girl wishing for the moon as time looks on and the night flies by.”

Released in mid-June, ‘Under Moving Skies’ is the second album by Dublin based singer-songwriter Eileen Gogan. Featuring guest appearances from luminaries such as Sean O’Hagan, Cathal Coughlan, Damian O’Neill, Terry Edwards and Stephen Ryan, the record is self-produced by Gogan and showcases the multi-faceted skills of this talented artist.

The follow-up to her acclaimed debut, the concise and sparkling ‘Spirit Of Oberlin’, the new record is drawn from a wider sound palette. And, clearly relishing her role at the mixing desk, Gogan has written a collection of songs that take her far beyond previous boundaries. Among eight self-penned songs are acoustic based pop nuggets such as the sprightly ‘Malibu Stacey’, dreamily wistful ‘More Time’, doughty ‘I Don’t Mind’ and mandolin-adorned ‘Yes, Music Does Have the Right To Children’, as well as ventures into spatial, widescreen territory with the evocative and eerie ‘San Fran 1997’, spectral ‘Sweet Alice’ and ‘Don’t Let Me Sleep’, a classic soul update. By contrast, ‘Echo’ is a bare-boned meditation on a troubled and troubling relationship, while adding further variety is a glistening instrumental by Undertones legend O’Neill and album closer ‘Celebration’, an a cappella version of a Nuala Ni Dhomhnaill poem for which Gogan has created a haunting air, providing the perfect showcase for her pure and unaffected singing style.

Gogan’s voice has been compared to the likes of Sandy Denny, Natalie Merchant and Kirsty MacColl, but her music – a beguiling blend of glistening guitar and vintage keyboards – draws on a range of influences such as Richard and Linda Thompson, Neil Young, Can, Patti Smith, REM and Yo La Tengo. Her first album, ‘The Spirit of Oberlin’, was recorded with The Instructions and released in late 2015. It received widespread praise and was subsequently performed live at Longitude Festival, The Electric Picnic, Whelans, The Grand Social bar and Bello bar. Outside of her solo work, she has also sung with The Would Bes’, The Revenants and The Drays and performed with Microdisney at their 2018-19 reunion concerts in Dublin (The National Concert Hall), London (Barbican Centre) and Cork (Cypress Avenue).

UNDER MOVING SKIES
TRACKLISTING
1  More Time
2  Don’t Let Me Sleep
3  Echo
4  I Don’t Mind
5  Sweet Alice
6  Malibu Stacey
7  Friday Tune
8  Yes, Music Does Have The Right To Children
9  San Fran 1997
10  Celebration

eileengogan.com

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