Christmas came early this year for me. Never did I think that Me First and the Gimme Gimmes would be playing Dublin, and never did I ever think I'd get to shoot one of their shows! Well, that all changed last week when they played the Academy in Dublin on a cold, damp, Monday night! I've been a fan since 1997, when one of the lads I worked with, brought in a copy of Have a Ball . It was love at first listen! I did manage to catch them live back in 2019 when they played the O2 Forum in Kentish Town , London, and it was every bit as good as I'd hoped, but it paled in comparison to Monday night in Dublin. So, how did it come about? Well, back in 2013, I interviewed the band for a now defunct Irish website called Chunk.ie . Over the years, I've stayed on their PR roster, so I took a chance and emailed my contact there. Lo and behold, a few emails later and all was sorted, I was down to photograph the show. How was it? Brilliant, amazing, fantastic,...
It's been a quiet January, not many gigs lined up due to getting the latest version of man flu!
Thankfully, on Thursday night, I got to go to my first gig of 2023, and to make things even better, it was in my local theatre, the Moat.
So, local producer and studio owner Willie Headon (Poppyhill Studios) runs a night called Willie's Folk Night. I think tonight was its first time in the Moat Theatre and featured Willie, Johnny Gleeson, Pete Kavanagh, Eleanor Shanley and Mike Hanrahan.
The show lasted over 2 hours with Willie, Johnny and Pete playing the first hour with Eleanor and Mike playing the second.
It was a great night of music, I managed to catch up with some other local musicians and talk about future plans. So yeah, a great night!
Anyway, on to the photos: