The Deadlians: “You want to write songs about everything that's going on in the world, but you want to write in a way that's giving people confidence to change it”

Talking to The Deadlians, you get, more than anything else, a strong sense of camaraderie. On the phone, they talk over each other, laughing with one another throughout the conversation, greeting each other warmly as they come in. And that spirit of camaraderie extends not only to the band members themselves but also to their fans, and the other bands they’ve come up with.

The trad rock band, founded in 2017, are a part of Irelands’s growing independent scene, which has, in recent years, produced artists like Lankum and Jinx Lennon. And, as in most music scenes, there tends to be a lot of interconnection and shared admiration: when asked to name some trad artists they’re excited about, the band quickly rattle off a list of artists like Jimmy Clarke, Méabh Mulligan, and Ivy Hughes-Dennis.

“It’s grand,” says frontman Sean Fitzgerald. “We all talk. People do encourage each other quite a bit.”

“Sean lives with Daragh,” one of his bandmates points out, referring to Lankum’s Daragh Lynch. “It’s like The Monkees, you know? They all live together. It’s all in the trad band.”

“It’s like the Powerpuff Girls,” Sean laughs.

Since the band was founded, they have developed a devoted fanbase, including among other trad bands in Dublin (Lankum, for instance, were inspired to feature the song ‘Newcastle’ on their album after hearing the song played live by The Deadlians), through their immersive, energetic live performances, in which they play a wide range of songs. In that time, however, while the band have released a number of projects to Bandcamp, they have only released two albums to major streaming services (including their most recent, Rid The Land Of Greedy Toads).

“There's millions of songs that aren't on the album,” says the band. “Most of the time, we just sort of come up with them on the spot, and a lot more comes out than we keep - the ones we keep are ones that are a combination of all our tastes, I suppose. Ones that make us laugh.”

In writing their songs, the band work collaboratively, and tend to pull from very wide range of influences.

“Some of the songs, see, they're from themes,” says Sean. “So, for instance, we did an album based on the zodiac signs - me and Luke [the band’s keyboardist], trying to come up with songs to do with the elements of the zodiac.”

“‘Cheeky Monkey’ was a zodiac song,” he says, referring to a song from Rid The Land Of Greedy Toads. “It was the Libra. [On the album], we were covering ourselves.”

“‘Beep Beep Teddy’ - that's not on the album, that's a song we do live - but that was to do with Valentine's Day,” Sean continues. “‘Prince Fingallian’, I based it on an old poem. That's where the title comes from: ‘rid the land of greedy toads’. And it's the story of these two Bonnie and Clyde kind of characters, Prince Fingallian and Dydy. They're taking on the world and they're fucked. You know what I mean? It just talks about how great they are and that they're gonna rid the land of greedy toads.

“‘Jaws’, I think we came up with that on the spot, and it was about basking sharks and marine life attacking the rich and attacking, like, fiber optic cabling and stuff.

“They all come from different places.”

The Deadlians. Photo Credit Ishmael Claxton

A lot of the band’s work, like the song referenced above, can sometimes take on a topical bent: the cover of Rid The Land Of Greedy Toads, for example, features a group of toads in top hats and monocles carrying eviction notices fleeing before a group people in masks holding musical instruments. Do the group see themselves as political?

“No, would be the smart answer,” they reply, tongue-in-cheek. “Everything's political, though. Politics affects everything, and everything affects politics. But no, is the smart answer.”

“Let me try and answer that question properly,” Sean continues, more candidly. “You want to write songs about everything that's going on in the world. But you want to write in a way that's giving people confidence to change it but also not, like, finger wagging. You know what I mean?

“People aren't gonna listen to music if it's just, over and over, ‘Donald Trump is a big fat prick!’ Like, who wants to listen to that shit?”

In their songs, the band tend to be more artful with their critiques.

“‘À La Mode’ is all about revolution, clearly,” Sean says, speaking of another song from Rid The Land Of Greedy Toads. “‘We have of been in Ireland where we had seen such sport/The raising of the parliament had quite pulled down the court’. So there's a very direct statement about how the parliament and the court are the same thing - like a royal court. The parliament has become not of the people but just a court for the rich. You see? We're gonna create another king, and we're gonna create another system of government. And as soon as it proves wrong, we're gonna tear it down again. But that’s not the kind of thing that will telegraph across the media, that everyone will understand.

“If you want to change things, you don't run around saying I’ve got to change everything.”

The band seems not to focus on the media, or fame, or anything like that, but more on their audience, and the people at their shows. Speaking to them, you get a sense that their whole ethos is very “of the people”. Pointing this out to them, they agree.

“I mean, it probably is, because that's all we've been surrounded by,” Sean says. “We never went into the industry, we didn't go into the photographs and interviews, and we've been around forever. So we haven't really been around the industry or whatever. We've just been around the people.”

As a result of that, the band seem to be almost completely in tune with their audience. When asked about their experience touring, the band launch into a place-by-place list of the various locations they’ve performed in across the UK and Ireland. They describe which places are more sleepy, which places are more energetic, which places are more hippie-ish, and so on. Their whole show is designed to prioritize engaging with the audience, and getting the audience to engage back.

“Dancing people come to the front of the stage. If you're gonna move around, come to the front of the stage,” said the band, describing one unwritten rule they hold for their shows to bring the audience in. “Sometimes you come up with songs on the spot with the crowd. That's a sign of a really good show.

“I don't like when bands might as well be just in a fish tank, or a bird of paradise on a TV, you know, just dancing around and there's no interaction with the crowd or whatever. I hate that. I find it really boring. Sometimes I've seen bands and it’s like, you're so good at playing your instrument, but it's so boring because you can't communicate with anyone.”

“That interaction is really important for us.”