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SOUND FAB FAD FIVE There’s a certain satellite to
wn sensibility being brought to bear on Silverbacks sound. We venture beyond the pale. words Danny Wilson photo Phil Smithies Silverbacks’ route towards the limelight was more than a little circuitous. The art-rock five piece, as we know them today, represent the fruit of two established breeding grounds for domestic indie rock excellence; Maynooth University’s Music Technology department and the bounteous gig scene of Newbridge, Co.Kildare. Sitting with guitarist Kilian O’Kelly and bassist/vocalist Emma Hanlon, the pair jokingly ask how upfront they should be about the Dublin-adjacent nature of their point of origin, in light of the geographical specificity of this publication’s moniker. It only gets worse from there, Kilian and his brother Daniel (Vocals/guitar) grew up in Belgium! “Daniel and I moved over from Brussels for college,” explains O’Kelly, “just because it seemed easier to study music in English rather than through French, that’s how it is done over there.” Joking aside, there is no small amount of irony to the fact these ‘90’s enamoured alt-rock sweethearts are more barely than totally Dublin. The spate of breathless press that preceded their debut LP invariably viewed the group through the lens of the purportedly booming Dublin scene. With a certain sliver of Irish guitar music currently enjoying almost-unheard-of international attention, Silverbacks – distinct as their sound may be – have found themselves in the somewhat odd position of having their name uttered in the same breath as the same two or three other bands almost without fail. Who’d have thunk that two brothers sending demos back and forth between their respective Belgian boyhood bedrooms would end up anointed as musical standard-bearers for the Hibernian Metropolis. None of the peculiarity of their current situation is lost on Hanlon and O’Kelly, especially considering they aren’t nearly as new to the game as the phrase “debut album” might suggest. In fact, Hanlon herself was an early Silverbacks fan, back in their aforementioned bedroom iteration. “When I started in Maynooth – I followed Daniel over, he is two years older – we had already been putting stuff up on Soundcloud for ages. I met Emma when I started in college and she was like ‘oh! I really like Silverbacks’, she actually thought we were covering bands in our early demos,” laughs O’Kelly. Emma continues, “I was really impressed! We were only 18 at the time and I really thought there was no way they could come up with songs that good by themselves.” The nascent full band Silverbacks line-up took shape in the months that followed the O’Kelly’s reunion in Kildare, the Maynooth music department proving the perfect petri dish. “When Daniel arrived, he told me he’d landed in this cool town where you can kinda party with whoever you meet and it’s small enough that you constantly run into people so it’s easy to make friends,” says O’Kelly. “I said fuck it, I’ll come over. I got on that music course and met Emma. Before I even went to Maynooth, Peadar [Kearney, Guitar] and Dan already had their own little duo, making recordings together and putting them on Garageband. Peadar went to France for a while to teach. Dan and I were still putting out music on Soundcloud and Emma was, of course, involved in the songwriting process then too. When Peadar got back, we were kind of like, why don’t we give Silverbacks more of a go?” The final line-up was completed with the arrival of Gary Wickham on drums, a longtime friend of Kearney from the previously mentioned thriving Newbridge gig scene. And with that, the key players were established. In a sense, what sets Silverbacks aside from the contemporaries can be best explained by what they have in common. Silverbacks’ Maynooth origins bear a certain contrast to the music program that brought us The Murder Capital and Fontaines D.C. [uninvoked for over 600 words. Surely a new record]. Where BIMM – the Liberties based music college that boasts Fontaines and Murder Capital members amongst its alumni – has produced a class of bands distinctly urban in their preoccupation with appearing urbane, Silverbacks, on the other hand, bring a certain satellite town sensibility to their approach. This Anywhereseville suburban bent might not furnish the band with quite as hard an edge, but leaves plenty of room for comedy. Thankfully, O’Kelly, Hanlon and Co. are concerned with expressing frustration in hues beyond the furious or smoulderingly morose. I wonder if they ever talked about it, the scope for goofiness that comes with already being. “I think if we were to present ourselves in any other way it wouldn’t be truthful to us,” explains Hanlon. “We’re all from more suburban areas. We’re all from different towns. I’m from Drogheda, the lads are from Newbridge and Kilian and Dan grew up in a completely different country.” 54