Chasing Abbey: On making hits, signing with major labels, and upending stereotypes

“At the start of it all, the radio stations were in disbelief about where we were from,” reflects Jonathan “Bee” Byrne of Tullamore hip hop crew Chasing Abbey. “No one could believe we were from Ireland, let alone Tullamore. But I think that’s a bad thing, because this type of music should, and is, coming out of Ireland. People shouldn’t be surprised about that anymore.”

Midway through Hot Press’ interview with Byrne, the Chasing Abbey groove technician is passionately sounding off about why Irish hip-hop and dance should be gaining international attention. He’s rhyming off a list of names – Jafaris, Hare Squead, Soule – who he believes have upended the stereotypes of Irish music. He’s pointing out – quite modestly it should be said – that the success of Chasing Abbey’s debut single ‘That Good Thing’ (No. 1 on iTunes on the day of its release) shows how eclectic Irish audiences’ tastes have become.

But while they're now a band boasting cutting edge production techniques, Chasing Abbey actually started out as a trad act.

“We were all playing trad music around Offaly,” says Jonathan. “It’s a very close community there, so we all got to know each other from that. Then at the start of 2016, we got together again and realised we were all playing trad and folk music, but it wasn’t what we were listening to when we went home. We listened to rap and dance and all that craic. So we said that for the next year, we’d lock ourselves up in this shed/studio we have in Tullamore, and work towards doing music that we all wanted to listen to.”

While Jonathan stresses that the lads all have a solid friendship which goes beyond the music, he also notes that finding a sound that worked for them didn’t come about all at once.

“It was toughfor a while,” he admits. “We were putting up tracks before we’d conceived the ‘Chasing Abbey’ thing and they weren’t going well. We were really hitting rock bottom. And this was all while our parents were getting frustrated every time we said, ‘We’re just going into the shed here to do some work.’ They were like, ‘Ah here, come on lads.’ A lot of people doubted us, ’cos we said we were gonna do this instead of college, but there was a lot of people out there who supported us while we were trying to find our direction. Then around Christmas 2016, things started to change.”

There was undoubtedly a sense of vindication whenever the Chasing Abbey project morphed into the incredibly successful outfit it is today. On top of scorching the festival circuit this summer, the band’s big break came when they signed with major dance label 3 Beat Records in September. “After the success of ‘That Good Thing’, we did a few showcases and had the ear of a few labels out there,” Jonathan explains. “But we really felt at home with 3 Beat. They really got us, they took the time to listen and liked our body of work, not just this song or that song. They’ve also done so much for us since we signed, so we’re over the moon to be working with them.”

2017 might have been a huge twelve months for the midlands trio, but with three singles ready to be fired off in the next few months – and the mouth-watering prospect of a debut album on the cards before the end of the year – 2018 is set to be even bigger…

Chasing Abbey’s latest single ‘Talk To Me’ is out now.