ADRIAN CROWLEY | photo by Mathieu Zazzo
new single
out 10th July 2026
(Dimple Discs/Bring Your Own Hammer)
The Dublin-based musician Adrian Crowley has released a new single entitled ‘Quinn The Adventurer’ today (10th July) on Dimple Discs in association with Bring Your Own Hammer.
The distinctive song tells the story of James Quinn (alias Tim O’Brien), a young Irishman who left Belfast in 1920 and spent the next four years travelling in both North and South America. By 1924 he was in Hollywood, working as an extra in silent films alongside Charlie Chaplin, but was front page news that spring after being arrested by LA Police while displaying a collection of shrunken heads from the Amazon at a seaside amusement arcade and giving a lecture about them.
Accused of stealing the shrunken heads and other artefacts, Quinn was charged with burglary. Although he pled his innocence, he was found guilty and sentenced to prison in San Quentin, but skipped bail and was later seen in Colón, Panama.
Adrian Crowley is an award-winning songwriter, singer and composer who has created a deeply affecting body of work stretching back over two decades. Renowned for his darkly poetic sensibility and arrestingly resonant voice, he has been described as a master storyteller and the rich tapestry of his expansive recorded output is proof that he is an endlessly inspired and inspiring artist.
Crowley’s latest album, ‘Measure Of Joy’ (2025), was produced by John Parish and received acclaim from publications such as Uncut, who described him as “a gothic Leonard Cohen – leaving you aching for more.” His powerfully emotive, complex and contemplative songs have also been compared to Scott Walker, Lou Reed, Nick Cave and even Ivor Cutler, but the potency of his rich baritone voice and haunting lyrical narratives – amid settings that alternate sweeping sonic majesty with ghostly starkness – is uniquely his own.
‘Quinn The Adventurer’ will be included on an upcoming BYOH label compilation entitled ‘From The Tombs’, a barnstorming double album featuring 21 songs that take the listener on a journey through the history of crime, law and order in Ireland and its diaspora in the 19th and early 20th centuries.
Other participants include Sean O’Hagan (Microdisney, High Llamas), Luke Haines (The Auteurs, Baader Meinhof, Black Box Recorder), DamianO’Neill (The Undertones), Michael J. Sheehy, Kelsey Michael, Brigid MaePower, SJ McArdle, Miriam Ingram, Fergal Lawler (The Cranberries), June Miles-Kingston (the Mo-dettes, Everything But The Girl, Fun Boy Three, the Communards), Marcus Holdaway (High Llamas), Bernard Butler (Suede, McAlmont & Butler, The Tears), Terry Edwards (The Higsons, The Near Jazz Experience), Hugh Bunker (Fatima Mansions), Lavinia Blackwall (Trembling Bells), Anne Gilpin (Morton Valence), Neil Farrell (Toasted Heretic), Audrey Riley, Lisa Lambe, Tony Higgins, Michael Walsh, Linda Buckley, Cian Nugent, Inni-K and NQL.
