MacD on Music: Vapour Trails and Alpine Skies

First albums can be tricky. Getting your music out there when you’ve yet to build a name for yourself isn’t always easy, but sometimes it just takes one song getting into the right hands. The Undertones had that moment when John Peel first played ‘Teenage Kicks’, and this week I’m talking to a group who have had a similar moment.

Dublin-based Alpine Skies have, earlier this month, released their debut album ‘Inspired Conflicts’ and have so far built up an impressive fanbase that includes Duran Duran frontman Simon Le Bon. The group, made up of Kevin Homan and Darren Farrell, are tonight launching the album with a gig in Whelan’s. I caught up with them to discuss the album and how the group came together.

Kevin: “It’s the age old story. The coming together was a serendipitous happening, if you will. A mutual friend brought us together to try and form a covers band, because both of us had been playing music for a long time. My lasting thought with music is, I always want to be creative and do my own material, as opposed to covers.”

“When our friend brought us together, Darren had done covers bands before and wasn’t overly keen on getting back into it, and had the nice proposition of not having delved into the originals world too heavily previously, that when I approached him with the thought of doing originals, I think he got bitten and was kind of like ‘Maybe this could be something interesting’.”

Darren: “Around that time I was dabbling with my friend Al. At the time he was doing a lot of stuff on his side and I was just playing along with it. I wasn’t really contributing, but that was kind of in that time frame. I was starting to get burnt out from the covers and the politics that came with the covers bands and I thought ‘Yeah, maybe I’ll give this a shot’.

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"I had a lot of stuff that I had built up over the years and never shared with anyone, that I didn’t think was any good, that classic ‘It’s not good for anyone’. This kind of opened that up in me. It was like a Pandora’s Box and it hasn’t stopped. That’s all I do now when I pick the guitar up, trying to create. I had an arsenal at one stage of around a hundred songs and I can’t play one of them. I can’t even remember ‘Wonderwall’ because I just don’t play them. I try to create all the time, and that’s thanks to Mr. Homan here.”

Kevin: “So we’re screwed if anybody ever asks us to do a tribute album.”

Asked how they describe their sound, Kevin said: “I think that’s the most difficult question to answer. I listen to a lot of different music. I love a lot of different things, so there’s a little bit of that sprinkled on when it comes to being creative. My background is staunchly based in the Britpop era. I grew up when Oasis hit in ‘93-‘94, and the societal impact that they had made so much of an impression on me as a young teen. Prior to that, I was listening to dance music, rave music. Before that it would’ve been Guns N’Roses, rock music. It’s just a very broad scope. I’m not saying we sound like any of these bands, but there’s an indie rock foundation in what we’re trying to do. It’s shaped the way I write and I guess it rubbed off on Darren.”

Speaking about Simon Le Bon’s praise for their debut single ‘By Your Side’, Kevin tells me: “That was wild. We’d already put it out into Spotify with no PR or anything like that. That first song we put up gained some traction with Simon Le Bon and his co-presenter on his radio show in LA. It got airtime and he said he really enjoyed it. It’s not your standard verse/chorus/verse, it sort of translates into a breakdown at the end. We enjoy it and he appreciated that which is amazing. Half the battle is trying to get it to the people who are somewhat considered knowledgable in music to like it.”

And that’s it from Alpine Skies. Their debut album ‘Inspired Conflicts’ is out now and they’ll be launching it in Whelan’s in Dublin tonight.

Now, onto other business. First up, big news from Growing Pains, who have just been announced as the opening act for IDLES and Chalk on August 26th as part of Custom House Square’s series of open-air concerts in Belfast. I’ll have more about this one closer to the time so keep an eye out.

Also, this Sunday (May 3rd) will see Declan McLaughlin, one of our city’s finest songwriters, playing upstairs in the Derby with his band the Hi-Flats and special guests Tillie & Henderson. Admission is £5 and doors are at 7.30.

Declan has also just released his latest single ‘Factory Queen’ from his latest album ‘Shadows’ (available now in Cool Discs). The track can be found on all good streaming sights.

Lastly, Belfast-based REFLECT will be releasing their new song ‘Listen’ tomorrow (May 1st). The track, the latest from their upcoming EP, was written by the group’s guitarist Thomas O’Leary and explores the feeling and frustrations that come from not being taken seriously.

REFLECT are, without a doubt, one of the best up-and-coming groups of recent times so make sure to check it out on all good streaming services.

Finally, time for the socials. REFLECT can be found on Instagram @reflectbelfast, Declan McLaughlin @declanmclaughlin_derry, Growing Pains @growingpains_derry and Alpine Skies @wearealpineskies.