Kingfishr on ‘Killeagh’: "That’s probably why it’s connected with so many people – it’s not over-thought. It’s not trying to be anything"

“Tell me,” I ask Kingfishr, “what’s it like to be on this rocket to the damn moon??”

“Heads are spinning. Heads are spinning,” laughs Fitz.

“I think,” jokes McGoo, “it’s like those two Cork rowers, you just keep the head down and pull like a dog.”

Fitz and McGoo, two thirds of the blessed trinity that is Kingfishr – singer Eddie Keogh completes the triumvirate – are both sound as a pound, good company and come across as a pair of no-nonsense characters who more than know that a pat on the back is only six inches from a kick in the arse. They aren’t the type of dudes who will grandstand so… let me do it for them.

Kingfishr are the rock’n’roll story of 2025.

No question. McGoo tells a tale of New Year’s Eve 2022.

“We were on the NYF Dublin bill before The Blizzards,” he says. “There was a free bar near the 3Arena, where Westlife were doing the countdown. Off our heads, the three of us walked down there and were like, ‘We’re going to play that!’ It was so far away in the distance at the time – and now we’ve two dates there at Christmas.”

There’s no denying it! Thing is, that isn’t even the pinnacle of it. In June 2026, in just one week, they will play headline shows at St Anne’s Park Dublin; two nights at the SSE Arena, Belfast; two nights at Virgin Media Park, Cork; and a show at Malahide Castle, making it three outdoors in the capital city. That listing would be incredible across most bands’ entire careers. Kingfishr are doing it in one week!

Safe to say, Kingfishr are not like most bands.

So I’ll say it again: Kingfishr are definitely the story of 2025. Think of it this way: every now and then, a song drops that tilts the axis of the music industry perceptibly: Grandmaster Flash’s ‘The Message’; Jeff Buckley’s ‘Hallelujah’; New Order’s ‘Blue Monday’’; Phoebe Bridgers’ ‘Motion Sickness’. Now, we can add to that illustrious list Kingfishr’s ‘Killeagh’.

Yes, it is that important. The numbers speak for themselves – streamed 36 million times on Spotify alone, ‘Killeagh’ spent 10 weeks at No. 1 in Ireland. It has been certified a frankly ridiculous 12 times platinum, and (while released in 2024) was the most streamed song in Ireland in 2025.

It goes beyond very large numbers. ‘Killeagh’ is the sound of the villages and towns of Ireland, and the sacred place that GAA clubs hold the length and breadth of the country. It’s a song that nobody could have predicted making the splash it did, not even the totalitarian algorithms. But when you see it happen, you know exactly why.

It captured a massive audience of people who wanted, indeed perhaps needed such a song, with its rousing chorus and stirring lyrics: “All I have to remember, is the pride that I felt / Round the Páirc Uí Chinnéide where the boys never knelt.”

It’s a song that relates the passion played out in matches that define communities on GAA pitches every week: “They’d go raring and tearing and fighting for love / For the land they call Killeagh and the Lord up above.”

For good measure, there’s its epic, Cuchulainn-evoking ending, which goes, “When my time’s at an ending / When my days are no more / Bury me with my Hurley by the river Dissour”.

Aye, that’s the song of 2025 right there.

“I know we’re very lucky,” McGoo reflects. “It’s going really, really well. We’re looking forward to the two 3Arena shows. But after that, we get a minute at Christmas to sit down and actually ponder what the fuck is after happening.”

When I ask them to tell me the origins of ‘Killeagh’, I refer to it as the greatest b-side since ‘Mr. Brightside’ After all, ‘Killeagh’ was originally released as the flip to ‘Bet On Beauty’!

At which they laugh loudly. “I have a friend at home,” Fitzy relates. “who plays music as well, and always wanted a song to sing if Killeagh [then a little-known GAA Club in Cork] ever won something. So, after a few pints, he said to me, ‘You’d hardly write the song’. To which I replied, ‘Absolutely not, no way’.”

Fortunately, said pal was persistent, so Fitz – safe in the knowledge that Killeagh were unlikely to win anything! – promised he’d write it, if they got to a final. Lo and behold, the Killeagh hurlers only went and won the damn thing.

“So, I nabbed the two boys,” Fitz continues. “We sat down, grabbed all the buzzwords about Killeagh, and within 15 to 20 minutes, we threw the quickest thing we could possibly throw together. I said, ‘That’ll do’. We didn’t think anything of it, and that’s probably why it’s connected with so many people. It’s not over-thought – it’s not trying to be anything. It just is what it is: it captures some sort of emotion in itself.”

That it certainly does. Indeed, it’s a track that bypassed the music industry, confounded the all-commanding algorithms, and rocketed off on its own trajectory.

“No, there was no music industry involvement, really at all,” Fitz explains, “We sent it out on WhatsApp, and it started doing the rounds on WhatsApp, and then we put it up on TikTok. It did fine there, but nothing major.”

Later, the band sat down in the studio, did three live takes, chose the first one, had a friend put some cello on it – and hey presto, a smash hit was born!

“It confuses us as much as it confuses anyone else,” Fitz laughs.

A THOUSAND YEARS

‘Killeagh’ began to feature in a series of ‘get ready with me’ TikTok videos, posted primarily by teenage girls. Then hurling season started – and what a season it was for Cork, winning the National League, the Munster Championship and battling all the way to the All-Ireland Final, before Tipperary stopped them. And all that monumental drama was played out to the nationwide soundtrack of... you guessed it...

But, I point out to these genuinely humble men, writing ‘Killeagh’ so instinctively is a testament to their 10,000 prior hours. Both are steeped in the Irish trad scene. Fitz played in Comhaltas sessions since the age of 14, while McGoo relates, “When we were in primary school, a tin whistle was put in our hand. I come from a part of Tipperary where traditional music might be the only kind of music.”

“When I wanted to learn the guitar as a kid, there was no guitar teacher around, so a banjo was got. There’s such talent in this country, and we’re just one small example, who are after getting a shot.”

Interestingly, McGoo’s family farm in Ballina, on the shores of Lough Derg, in County Tipp, is only down the road from the homestead of the late, wonderfully great Shane MacGowan.

“That’s right,” McGoo affirms. “I remember when his mother died, God rest her, it was the biggest funeral I’ve ever seen. Shane  grew up there, over in Puckane, near Ballycommon. The Ballycommon Comhaltas branch is probably the strongest in Tipperary North – there’s something in the water down there.”

“Or the lack thereof,” Fitz marvellously suggests.

McGoo’s family farm in Ballina, is something of Kingfishr Ground Zero, when you consider that much of their debut album, Halcyon, was written there.

“It’s my grandparents’ old, thatched cottage and dairy farm,” McGoo explains, “that my father diligently works away on. And I suppose it’s a bit of fresh air, a bit of peace and quiet. We can make as much noise as we want. Our only neighbours are my parents and a herd of cows.”

“Once we moved in,” Fitz elaborates, “we realised that something was a little different about it. But myself and Eddie didn’t want to be intruding on the farm or McGoo’s parents. At one point, we said to his Mam, ‘I hope we’re not making any problems, and if we are, please just boot us out’.

“She replied, ‘Are you joking me? There’s been music in this house for hundreds of years, and when we were just thinking it looked like there was going to be no music in the house, ye came along.’ And that solidified why that place is so special to us.”

McGoo explains that there’s been some sort of farm there since the year 1100, saying, “That’s almost a thousand years of people sat around the kitchen playing music together. I find that incredibly powerful.”

THE GOOD OLD DAYS

There must be gold in them there walls, because Kingfishr are a hell of a lot more than ‘Killeagh’. Indeed, in 2025, they were third only to Taylor Swift and Zach Bryan as the most streamed artist(s) in Ireland. That is quite extraordinary, especially when you consider the likes of CMAT, Hozier, Dermot Kennedy and Fontaines D.C. are treading the same territory, not to mention  artists like Chappell Roan, Sabrina Carpenter, Drake and more.

Ordinarily, Kingfishr close their set with ‘Eyes Don’t Lie’, which has been streamed on Spotify 26 million times, and ‘Caroline’ – streamed just the 13 million times. So how are these other songs landing?

“We just did two shows in London,” Fitz relates. “You expect at this point that those would be the big ones. But at both those London shows, after we played ‘Diamonds & Roses’, the crowd went off on a cheer that lasted two or three minutes. And that shocked me more than anything, because that had been happening with ‘Killeagh’, but never with anything else.

“And then out of nowhere, it’s been happening with ‘Diamonds & Roses’. I was shook after that both nights. ‘Caroline’ has always been the show-ender for us, just the nature of it. The vocal in the bridge and towards the end of the chorus encourages a group singalong. It’s just euphoric. There’s no other way I’d rather end the set than everyone in the entire room singing the exact same thing over and over again, arm in arm.”

Indeed, a boss video on Kingfishr’s Instagram shows the band playing ‘Diamonds & Roses’ at an after-show party at O Ceallaigh Irish Pub in Groningen. They then decamp outside for a rousing rendition of ‘Killeagh’ – seeing how much the songs mean to the ecstatic crowd is brilliant.

 

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In 2025, Kingfishr played international festivals, a debut sold-out North American tour, and recently completed a sold-out European tour. McGoo explains that their audiences are a mix of the Irish diaspora and locals.

When Kingfishr supported American country star Dylan Gossett, his fans dug them, especially during ‘Shot In The Dark’, which the band always perform out amongst the audience. It’s a special song for the band, written the night that they decided to quit their jobs, commit fully to the music game and let the chips fall where they will.

Fitz takes up the story.

“We had ‘Shot In The Dark’ written,” he says. “We went on a support run with George Ezra, and to do something to engage the crowd, Eddie used to go down into the middle of the pit. We found it worked so well that now, at all our own gigs, we always go down into the middle of the crowd to perform ‘Shot In The Dark’. It breaks the barrier between the audience and us, and makes it so much more of a human moment.”

It’s pretty incredible that the band’s debut album, Halcyon, was only released in August. Writing in these pages, Riccardo Dwyer pretty much nailed it when stating, “This debut signals major intent for a zeitgeist-defining band, rapidly becoming one of Ireland’s biggest.”

Across its 16 tracks (a deluxe version was released in November containing four previously unreleased songs), it certainly does that and doubles as a precious document of the history of the band.

“That record,” Fitz agrees, “would certainly be the story of the first three years of the band, and Halcyon being the good old days. I think it sums up that the past three years have been the best three years of all of our lives and it tells that story quite well for us.”

NOT JUST CRUNCHING NUMBERS

Halcyon – recorded with Dave Anthony Curley at his Dublin-based recording studio, The Clinic – is also a magnificently diverse record, the sound of a red-hot road band, working its material under the glare of the lights and in front of baying audiences.

“We didn’t ever have a period where we locked ourselves behind the closed door,” says McGoo, “and figured out what we wanted to be. As soon as we were signed, we were churned into the machine and it was like, ‘Right, whatever you got, we’re going to put it out, and try to build a bit of momentum’.

“We never really figured it out. So ‘I Cried, I Wept’ and ‘Man On The Moon’ are borderline rock songs, while ‘Shot In The Dark’ and ‘Killeagh’ are as folky as you get. I think that is a beautiful part about the record as well. Because you are getting the true first three years of the band.

“We very much grew up in a public place, so you’re getting that – us figuring out what we want to sound like.”

“The reaction everywhere has been a bit mad,” Fitz says, “I always go back to the first tour we ever did of Ireland. I remember talking to the lads and saying, ‘We’re playing to 400 people at Dolan’s Warehouse!’ Now we’re doing that everywhere, to go to the other side of the world. And that is a nuts feeling. The shows are only getting bigger. But no matter where we go, people are very welcoming and very happy to have us.”

Kingfishr at 3Arena on December 18th, 2025. Copyright Jason Doherty/ hotpress.com

Indeed, later in the week that we speak, Kingfishr have two nights at the TF Royal Castlebar, followed by the no-small-matter of two sold-out 3Arena shows. For good measure, thise shows are followed in 2026 by a sold-out Australia tour, another UK tour, and then that gloriously crazy week in June. Which will be, I suggest, quite the homecoming. But I’m getting way ahead of myself.

“One step at a time now,” McGoo cautions. “Look, it’s a credit to everyone working with us as well. Because management, agents – everyone is so behind us and so motivated. They believe in the music. It’s not just crunching numbers. They can see the vision, and they have the drive to help us achieve those kinds of ticket sales, which is great.

“So, like we always say, we really have the easiest part of this job. We get to go up onstage and take all the credit, but there’s an entire empire behind us.”

Indeed. Kingfishr are the Emperors of Ireland 2025.

• Halcyon is out now. Kingfishr play St Anne's Park, Dublin (June 5); SSE Arena, Belfast (June 8 & 9); Musgrave Park, Cork (June 11 & 12); and Malahide Castle, Dublin (June 13).