Jamie O’Donoghue begins the Heliopause story for me: “Myself, Sean and Damien have known each other since we were in secondary school. Sean and Damien were playing in a metal band and I played in a punk band with another few of our friends. We had similar style and taste in music.” It all sounds rather familiar. Three Killarney lads form an instrumental band in the Music Management and Sound course at Colaiste Stiofain Naofa in Cork. Isn’t that exactly the same story I’ve just heard from fellow Kerry music makers Ten Past Seven? O’Donoghue
laughs: “It’s kind of funny but it is the exact same way that the lads got together – only we added a member from Cork!” Why did the four upstarts decide to go the instrumental route? “We kind of intended on putting in vocals at some stage but none of us ever really sang,” Jamie explains. “And during the course we didn’t really fall in with a singer that we liked or fitted with us.” When it comes to writing tunes, the lads have a steadfast formula. “We jam it out and see where it goes for a while, then let it sink in a bit and if anyone has more ideas after that, we just throw them in.” The Kingdom music scene is a little on the tame side. But O’Donoghue is doing his part to keep the Killarney rock fans looked after. “I organised a live music night in a club once a week last summer but it petered off a lot over winter,” he says.
“Killarney people are generally kind of lazy, even if they really like that kind of music. But I threw a bigger thing in September in the Granary called Electroshoc. There’s an upstairs and a downstairs in the club. We got a few DJs from Electric Underground in Cork, Donal Dineen
headlined and we ran busses from Cork, Limerick and Tralee. I’d love to do that sort of thing semi-regularly.” I have to ask what fellow instrumental groups are doing it for Heliopause at the moment? “We love the Redneck Manifesto and just started listening to And So I Watch You From Afar. We also like Battles from the US.”