Live report: Keywest serenade Vicar Street

When Keywest released their 2015 album Joyland, as lead singer Andrew 'Kav' Kavanagh recounts, Ed Sheeran was dominating the charts with his second album, x (the name Sheeran receives heavy boos; unsurprising, considering the controversy that's been unfolding on his tour).

Against the odds, the independent band snagged the number 1 spot for two weeks, besting Sheeran.

Fast-forward to the present, and Keywest are planning the release of One More For The Road for September 25, 2026. Then they hear Taylor Swift is releasing The Life of a Showgirl: The Encore the same night.

All of this is to animate the crowd to get Keywest's new album and beat another giant. It's only available in physical formats and isn't on any streaming platforms.

That tells you a lot about what Keywest are about.  They're old school. Throughout their career, the've built a following primarily through street busking. These methods have yielded success: three of their albums have topped Irish charts, they won Best Street Act at the 98FM Best of Dublin Awards two years in a row, and they were named Most Promising Artist at the Hot Press Hottie Awards in 2015.

Their busking experience bleeds into their music too: when busking, a band can see immediately which songs grab people's attention and hold it, and which don't. It's a way of learning learn to strike the balance between what works without sacrificing originality.

'All My Love' is a good first impression of Keywest's more recent material, written by Kavanagh about his wife and young son. The lyrics are joyful and simple, the melody a folk-pop blend.

'All My Mistakes' follows, a fun, upbeat melody contrasting with pessimistic lyrics from that 2015 album. "I knew in the end you would never be mine / But of all my mistakes / You'll be my favourite one." The drums are more audible on this one, an understated rhythm carrying the quick beat toward a cheerful section of 'la-la la-la'.

Kav tells jokes after nearly every song. Leading into 'Dreamstealers', a frustrated track about the thanklessness of hard work, he explains he's been looking at house prices and realised there's only one option: to start an OnlyFans. "You're laughing now", he tells the crowd, "but you haven't seen my feet."

'Parachute' is another affection-filled ballad with bright guitar, plus a tambourine. For this one, Kavanagh and guitarist Andrew Glover split the crowd. Kav leads the women's voices, while the other Andrew, nicknamed 'Glove', instructs the men, before Vicar Street croons in harmony on the word 'parachute'.

Andrew Glover of Keywest. Credit: Malone Graham for Hot Press.

Glover has been Kavanagh's best friend since they were children in Artane. The band is completed by electric guitarist Luke Murphy, who Kavanagh introduces as the "best-dressed member", and drummer Conor Ray.

Murphy is also the most hyperactive member. He often climbs onto the box at the edge of the stage, jumps off, and head-bangs to the instrumental sections. By contrast, Glover stands at his microphone with his feet close together.

'The Little Things' is introduced as the song people get married to. It's a suitably sweet love song; the guitar still sounds folksy, the beat is the right speed for a dance, while the smooth yet genuine lyrics explain its mass appeal.

New single 'Scars' is about how Kav spent lockdown: unemployed and stuck in a one-bedroom flat with a girlfriend he barely knew, who later became his wife.

'Something Beautiful' foreshadows that relationship, written when it was just a hope and she was still with an "uglier fella". It is a more melancholy song, with a slow, bumping beat.

"Then I said, what if Bob Marley wrote this?" In an unexpected turn, the band plays a reprise with the slow, pronounced downbeat of reggae, and some harmonica backing.

A bit earlier, the audience promised not to beg for an encore because "you know that we know that you know that we know that we're coming back onstage because we haven't played our biggest song yet". That biggest song, saved for last, is 'The Things I Wish I'd Done', which is every bit as nostalgic and wise as the title implies.

"Life goes by in the blink of an eye / Then you're older, and it's over ..."

One More For The Road is available for purchase here.