Eurosonic was a really great experience. 13 Songs isn’t out in Europe yet. It just came out in the UK last week so, for me, this was really about getting some initial exposure in the European market.
I haven’t played much outside of Ireland – at least not my own solo stuff. I played some gigs in London last October, and I also played a small little gig in the Bitter End in New York in 2005, more for the sake of having had the experience of playing a New York venue.
I’d had a very crazy week leading up to Holland. I shot a video in London with Maria Mochnacz – who directs all of PJ Harvey’s videos – and I also had a photo-shoot for a magazine cover over there. So I was a little bit exhausted by the time I got to Groningen.
Luckily, I went over the night before. A good idea! We played on the Thursday night. The venue was beautiful – it was upstairs in the Grand Theatre, which is on the main square. I was very lucky to be there. Ian Wilson from 2FM really went out of his way to find the right venue for what I do. He booked me for this, and I’m really grateful to him for asking me – especially given that I’m not in the mainstream. I felt very... privileged.
It was a small venue – it only held about 150. A lot of people couldn’t get in, actually. There were big queues outside the door. There was one Italian promoter who couldn’t get in and he had to contact my agent the next day.
The only problem was that the Dutch radio engineers kind of messed-up on the mix so I had to cut the set that went out live on Dan Hegarty’s 2FM show.
I had to cut five songs out of it. I dunno, I think they were just really tired because they’d so many gigs on. Anyway, something didn’t work.
Actually, it was a bit embarrassing because I kept saying ‘Europe’ while I was onstage. I felt we were going to play a gig in Europe, even though Ireland is obviously in Europe.
I got picked up on it, too. Two different people – one Dutch, one German – came up to me after the gig and asked, “Why did you say this was your first time performing in Europe?” They were kind of giving out to me! I told them, “Next time I’ll remember to say mainland Europe, but thanks for pointing it out.” Ha, ha!
Overall, the whole thing is really professionally run and quite cool and calm and collected. Everybody’s an adult, if you know what I mean. It was still quite grungey, though.
Not so much trendy music industry types; more rough and ready promoters from different countries. There was no air of pretension – at all.
It’s funny – it’s like a musical trade fair with all these gigs happening and people milling around. But it was absolutely worthwhile. Both at the show and after the show I realised just how worthwhile, in fact.
I also stayed on for an extra night and that turned out to be a very good idea. A lot of people came up to me when I was out at other shows.
There were just loads of people. Lots of them seemed very loyal to Eurosonic – you know, they’ve been coming there religiously for the last few years. And these are journalists, promoters and radio people – Dutch, Italian, German, French. So even though 13 Songs isn’t out there yet, it was a great way to generate interest.
Will I go back again next year? Actually, I don’t think you can. I don’t think you do it twice. People generally go to Eurosonic to launch themselves. And hopefully I’ve done that.”