It’s always a treat to hear that Hot Press has been of help to Irish musicians during their formative times. That was certainly true for Cillian Foster. “The Hot Press Year Book was my bible,” he says, “I’d ring every number in the back trying to get support gigs.”
His initiative drew the attention of a certain local legend. “I got a call when I was in the pub, “Howerya lad, this is Don Baker!” He said, “I’ve got eight gigs coming up, do you want to do them?” I was like, “Fuckin’ right I do!” He got me up and running.
Foster honed his craft at the Zodiac Sessions, the same open-mic night that provided a training ground for Gavin James. The culmination of two years work, his Volume 1 album is full of driving, up-tempo rock and roll, huge radio friendly ballads, and Cillian’s vivid slice-of-life lyrics. “Every one of the songs is based on a true story that either happened to me or to somebody close to me.” The most harrowing story recounted comes on the final track, ‘Wicked Crime’, a direct address to the man who, in an unprovoked attack in 2001, viciously beat and stabbed Foster, leaving him with a punctured lung and lucky to be alive. “I didn’t really overthink it. With that song, that was exactly what I was feeling at the time and it just kind of spilled out.”
Foster’s experience working in a drug rehabilitation centre provided inspiration for another of the album’s most striking tracks, ‘Ballad Of Addiction’. “The songs are still full of hope; you may have an addiction but you can overcome it. In the job I was doing I saw hundreds of people do it.”

HEAR: New single ‘Jazz’ is available for pre-order on October 16, with Cillian Foster’s GDC: Volume 1 following on October 30.

SEE: Cillian on tour with Relish in November.