Beggers’ Banquet

The Plea’s debut album, Dreamers Stadium, strikes a balance between the fresh and the faintly familiar. The band, headed by Donegal brothers Denny and Dermot Doherty, evoke comparisons with classic rock giants like U2 and The Verve, while maintaining a unique, stadium swagger.

“It all started out really small and got really big: the band went from acoustic to massive, eclectic type tunes,” says Dermot, The Plea’s guitarist. “We wrote the album in under three weeks. It’s the most we’ve ever written in that short a time frame. We demoed over 20 songs and then gradually whittled them down to the ones that sat best together.”
Dermot’s brother Denny sings and plays guitar and piano with Paul Toland on bass and Gerry Strawbridge on drums. Though they all hail from the small town of Ballyliffen, the brothers found their footing in America. Dermot and Denny moved to Boston, working on building sites by day, playing the city’s pub circuit at night. After an agent saw them perform and approached them about doing a few more gigs, the pair moved to Minnesota, where they recorded in a big budget studio for an album that never saw the light of day.
“We’d done some demos and were all ready to release the record. I’m glad we didn’t. The songs we recorded for the next album are a lot better,” Dermot avers.
The brothers are grateful for their time spent in Boston, because it was where they learned to expand their horizons musically. “When it comes to writing your own stuff, it’s always better to get away from your hometown,” Dermot explains. “You get different reactions.”
Back in Ballyliffen, the pair teamed up with Toland and Strawbridge, and began to get the word out about The Plea. Eventually, founders of legendary Belgian dance label R&S Records, eager to expand into the rock scene, took notice.
“They said they’d start building a rock label around our band, which makes it feel like we’re part of the label coming into its own,” said Dermot.
Best of all, The Plea were alotted the chance to record their energetic, anthemic folk rock with studio legend Chris Potter.
“I’ve never seen someone spend so much time in the studio, and with no big ego. He’s worked with loads of people. You’d think he’d be sitting there telling stories about The Rolling Stones and Paul McCartney. It wasn’t like that at all. He was great to work with.”
Because of Potter’s prior connections with U2 and The Verve, Dreamers Stadium often draws comparisons to the big-name bands.
“It’s great. It’s amazing,” says Dermot at the mention of U2’s name. “They always have something on their albums that turns your idea of them on its head. If we can do that over the course of our career, I’ll be thrilled. It’s certainly the level we aspire to.”
When it comes to the Coldplay associations, however, he’s not so pleased.
“I don’t like that, not at all,” he laughs. “Anything with a big chorus in it is going to get compared to Coldplay!”
Not that he’s complaining. The Plea found themselves on a near-meteoric rise to fame after they were invited to play the second stage at Oxygen.
“We’d come from local gigs, and then we were asked to play Oxegen. We asked ourselves, ‘Why?’ It was one of the few times we could play most of the album’s songs.”
With their richly-textured soundscapes, big melodies, and catchy, guitar-driven rock, The Plea may just live up to the title of their debut album and grow into Ireland’s next big thing.

Dreamers Stadium is out now. The Plea play the Westport Festival June 24.