Tree Of A Kind

In another time, and with just a little bit more green in the kooky comedy department at RTÉ, the Cluskey brothers would make one hell of a musical sitcom. With The Monkees and The Partridge Family for inspiration, the show would follow Daniel, Shane and Oisin as they adjusted to life in the craggy west of Ireland, having left their childhood home of Japan behind. To cope with the dramatic change in scenery, the trio form an oddball rock band, allowing them to punctuate 22 minutes of hilarious misadventures (fighting over girls, fighting over harmonies, fighting over the last coconut cream etc.) with a spirited rendition of whatever track they’re plugging that week. Glenroe with guitars. They’d make millions.

Even without their own primetime TV series, those Cluskey boys seem to be a everywhere; Oxegen, Electric Picnic, Castlepalooza, Indiependence, Sea Sessions, and that’s before we get to feelgood pop anthem ‘Radio’, which has barely been off same since it was released back in April.
While this is certainly not my first encounter with The Kanyu Tree, I’m still finding it tough to believe that Daniel, Shane and Oisin Cluskey are actually brothers. For one thing, they look nothing alike. Bassist Oisin is lanky and boyish, big brother Daniel is short and dark-haired, while singer Shane’s look is textbook elfin frontman. The cover of their debut album People Street only highlights the anomaly by layering the three contrasting silhouettes on top of each other. To put it simply, they are the least convincing family band since The Ramones.
As I sit down to tea with the suspicious threesome, I can feel my responsibilities shift from conducting a revealing interview to exposing The Kanyu Tree as cold-hearted, fame-hungry frauds. After all, if they’ve lied about having the same parents, they’re probably fibbing about writing their own songs and playing their own instruments. A few cunning questions about the new album will expose these phonies.
So lads, the joyful People Street is chocked full of happy-go-lucky hooks and rousing key changes. Was it as fun to make as it is to listen to?
“Ha!” Oisin exclaims. “Some of the days were like, 18 hours long!”
“But when you’re in the studio, time flies,” Daniel adds. “You’re kind of in a time warp.”
“It’s like…” they begin in tandem, then each insist that the other speak next. “Sorry,” they say together, before immediately bursting into laughter.
Daniel shoots me an apologetic look, “We’re always finishing each other’s sentences.”
On the other side of the table, Shane couldn’t look less amused. He rolls his eyes crossly and sets about papering over Oisin and Daniel’s blunder.
Yup, they’re brothers alright.
Now that I’ve confirmed their true identities without marching them down to the nearest GP for blood tests, I can resume my curious fascination with family bands. How does it work, then, making music with your brothers?
“In one way it’s good because you can be honest.” Shane says. “Obviously, we fight a good bit, but we forget about it two minutes later.”
The Cluskey boys have been playing together since they were yay high; I’m assuming instruments were chosen on a first come, first served basis.
“Kind of,” Daniel laughs. “I started with guitar and Shane was playing piano. Then Oisin wanted to start playing guitar and I was like, ‘No! We need a bass-player!’”
“Then I scrapped the piano for the drums.” Shane adds. “I still play when we’re recording. It’s good playing live, we did it for two years. It’s tiring, but I kind of miss an element of that.”
In recruiting A Tribe Called Quest’s Ali Shaheed Muhammed to produce their debut album, The Kanyu Tree created one of the most unexpected collaborations of the year. Still, something about their funk-tinged soul pop must be appealing to the elite of Stateside hip hop. Earlier this year, they were asked to support De La Soul on an Irish visit.
“It was great,” Oisin beams. “We have a great photo with one of the lads!”
“I gave him the whole, ‘We recorded with Ali Shaheed Muhammad’ spiel.” Shane adds. “That was my line to start the conversation.”
“Yer man didn’t really care, though,” Oisin jests.
Do the boys consider themselves hip hop experts, then?
“Pretty much, yeah…” Oisin begins, before they all erupt into laughter.
“I mean, I think the reason we ended up with Ali is because we have a soulful factor to our songs,” Shane admits.
“We wanted someone who really wanted us,” Daniel says. “We sent it to a couple of people to see who would bite back.”
“But Ali is into all kinds of music.” Oisin raves. “He seems really easily affected by music. And the fact that he was coming from a different background added a bit of an edge to our sound. He was a great presence in the studio, just a really chilled-out guy, made us feel relaxed. There was a week actually where he wasn’t there and we kind of freaked out!”
“When he was gone we realised the importance he had in the studio!” Shane laughs. “You kind of need someone to impress.”
Clearly the lads had no trouble bonding with Muhammed, even if the legendary New Yorker was completely out of his element in rural Britain.
“Straight from Brooklyn to a farm in Birmingham!” Oisin notes. “On one of his first days he saw this giant rabbit and was like, ‘What the fuck is that?’ He got his camera out and said, ‘Look at this!’”
Shane adds, “Tim (Latham, Grammy-winning engineer of Britney Spears and Black Eyed Peas fame) is from New York as well, and over dinner they’d be talking about New York a lot, sharing stories.”
Oisin: “We could only really talk about Salthill.”
Back to the album itself, where did the phrase People Street come from?
“It’s a metaphor,” Shane offers. “‘People Street/I can’t find my feet’. It’s about trying to get to that stage in your life where you know what you’re doing. The album’s pretty melancholic, lyrically.”
Really? With all those great, jangling choruses, it’s hard to tell.
“Well, we wrote the songs when we were trying to make it as a band,” Daniel says, “so it’s all about making a new way for yourself. That theme is definitely running through it.”
As well as giving the band their name (‘kanyu’ means membership in Japanese), the Cluskey brothers’ early years in Asia inspired ‘Mariko’, a kind of twisted ode to technology.
“It’s about how something can become really celebrated and within a few moments, something else is there to take its place.” Shane says. “We wanted to develop a story that explained it, so we came up with this Japanese robot called Mariko. She’s the latest thing in technology but soon, she’ll just be in the way, something better will come along.”
Clearly, this is not something The Kanyu Tree, currently appearing on posters from here to Termonfeckin, need to worry about just yet. 2011 has been incredibly good to them, what’s been the highlight?
Shane is first to answer: “Finishing the album.”
“Really?” Oisin scolds, “is that it? That’s a bit boring.”
“Nah, I just thought it would be a nice way to round up the interview!” he quips, and they all collapse into laughter again.
“It is a great feeling to have it done, though,” Oisin adds, “although, as Shane says, albums are always abandoned, rather than finished.”

People Street is out now on Sony Music Ireland. The Kanyu Tree kick off a 12-date nationwide tour on October 26 in Galway’s Radisson Hotel.