What do a hazelnut spread jar, a baby accordion and a drum machine have in common? They are the unlikely ingredients in a recipe for genius. Originally from Glendalough, Co. Wicklow, Patrick Kelleher’s music is ceaselessly experimental and startlingly original, but it’s happily never inaccessible either. Now resident in a house on the South Circular Road where Dublin’s closest imitation of a “happening” occurs most Sunday afternoons, Kelleher literally could not be closer to the heart of the underground. He’s an unassuming gent, though, and you’d almost never suspect that he could create music as powerful and tense as that compiled on his debut album, You Look Cold.
So how did you get together with Osaka Records to do the album?
Thomas Haugh, who records as Hulk, heard a song on Phantom and played it for Patrick Henry, who runs the label. I had 90% of it recorded when they approached me. I had a self-released EP on CD-R, 75 copies, earlier that year, and six of the songs on the album were on that EP, but I hadn’t tweaked them very much, they were very rough sounding.
Everything on the recordings is you. Is there a reason for that?
It’s just how it happened. I got into the buzz of recording on my own. I play with a band, Children Under Hoof, and I do record with the band as well, but it’s just a different thing. I was living with three guys, and two of them were working on a building site and one was in college so they’d be gone all day. So I just had the house to myself, to go mad.
Is it a conscious thing to try and get music from as many different sources as possible?
Yeah, I’m really into cheap instruments. We go to charity shops all the time and pick up things. I don’t have many hi-fi things yet, but if I had money I’d probably be buying them. On a couple of songs you can hear doors opening and closing actually, but particularly on Wintertime’s Doll. It just so happened that I was recording one of the violin parts, and my dad came up and told me it was dinner time, He didn’t even speak, he just sort of mouthed the words to me and then closed the door. It sounded perfect, so I left it in.
When did you start playing live with the band?
About May 2008. It coincided with when I did the CD-R. Our first gig, we just showed up at the venue with all our instruments, with nothing to plug them into, and just an ironing board as a keyboard stand. It was quite stressful. It’s a lot better now though. We enjoy being on stage now. Which is good.
Can you explain the idea behind the Box Social, the gigs at your house?
One of the main reasons I moved into the house on the South Circular Road was that it had a shed to rehearse in. It was full of junk, but once we started playing in there, we realised it was a great little place and thought “why not put gigs on here?” I suppose there are so many great bands that there needs to be as many venues to put them on.
Patrick Kelleher’s really-quite-warm You Look Cold is out on Osaka Records now.
