Danny O'Donoghue talks social media, personal loss, and The Script's new album

In the latest issue of Hot Press, we sat down with Danny O'Donoghue for an extensive, 5-page feature on one of Ireland's biggest bands.

Currently gearing up for the release of Sunsets & Full Moons, the band's long-awaited sixth album, Danny O'Donoghue talked to us about the adverse effects of social media, losing his mother at the start of this year, going"back to basics" with this new album, and how Muay Thai boxing helped him cope with adverse mental health effects.

SOCIAL MEDIA

The album’s first song, ‘Something Unreal’, is a subtle warning about the damage that social media can do. Seeing as The Script first made a name for themselves on the cusp of the social media revolution, is it extraordinary to see how anxiety-inducing it can be?

“Absolutely,” says Danny, shaking his head. “I mean, you would charge The Script as being fairly successful on social media. 700k on Instagram, nearly seven million on Facebook. And even me, I’m still looking at it thinking, ‘How can I make it look better?’ I still get anxiety.

“It feels like the world’s reached fever pitch, in terms of social media. It feels like something bad might happen, to the extent that people feel so undervalued, they’re either going to come off the platform or the platform will have to change their system around likes and how they operate – because it’s so narcissistic. Look, I’m in a band, I’ve an ego, I take pictures and upload them and look at the responses, so who am I to judge? But personally, I made my Instagram private recently. I said, ‘I’m not fucking going there. I don’t want to be famous. I want my music to be famous’.”

A lot of this dawned on the singer following his stint on BBC’s The Voice. He was a judge for the first two seasons.

“Coming off from that, people were saying, ‘You’ve a golden opportunity now! You’re on the BBC. You’re in the limelight, why don’t you stay?’ Well, for one thing, at the time my mother had a brain aneurysm. For another, I needed to go back to fucking basics. I had to ask, ‘Do I want to live a life of being famous for being famous? Or do I want to be remembered for being a great musician?’ My dad was a great musician. And when he died, he was remembered for it. That’s what I want more than anything.”

You can read the full interview in the new issue of Hot Press, which is on sale now. Or you can order it online here: