For The Coronas, arguably Ireland’s hardest working band, the road has been home since they first arrived on the music scene more than 10 years ago. During the last two years, they’ve toured North America three times and visited the UK, Australia and Europe in addition to playing all over their homeland in support of their most recent album Trust the Wire and last summer’s EP release, Reprise. Bringing their music to new audiences in far-off places now serves as inspiration for the development of what will ultimately become the band’s sixth album, planned for an early 2020 release.
To begin the recording process, The Coronas came to Los Angeles to work with producer Rob Kirwan, who is riding the crest of the worldwide success of his most recent producing project, Hozier’s Wasteland Baby! The Coronas and Kirwan recorded four of the new songs, and the first one, “Find the Water,” will be released on Friday, May 24. The single will be available via digital outlets worldwide through the band’s SoFarSoGood Records imprint distributed by Blix Street Records.
You can stream it here:
https://soundcloud.com/thecoronas/sets/find-the-water/s-HemK5
“Seeing our following grow outside of Ireland has definitely left us with a new-found enthusiasm for what we can achieve in this band,” explains Coronas frontman Danny O’Reilly, “I think we all felt that when we sat down to write the new material. Personally, I’ve never been as excited about our new music as am about the batch of songs we already have for the next album. Of the four songs we recorded with Rob in LA, ‘Find the Water’ felt like the right jumping off point for what the album is going to be.
“Musically, it’s unlike anything we’ve done before – melodically, the vocal delivery. Even the arrangement is unusual for us, yet it was one of those songs where we were all on the same page right from the start, and it came together very quickly, which is always a good sign.”
The theme of “Find the Water” is self-improvement, and for O’Reilly that covers both personal and on the band’s journey. “It’s a kind of reminder to myself,” he says, “to appreciate what I’ve got and to convince myself that I can write a decent song or be a good friend or be a better person or whatever it may be.” There will be a music video available shortly.
In between the recording of the album, the road will continue to beckon as The Coronas already have a slate of summer shows on their schedule. While the last two summers have seen them play two of their biggest shows ever in Dublin—last July at the 3Arena and the previous year at the Kilmainham Gaol—as well as other high profile Irish festivals, this year they will be bringing their own Long Way Home Festival, to some six different cities in Ireland. The concept is to bring with them a lineup of their favourite established and up and coming Irish acts in addition to performing their own set. Shows at the Docklands in Limerick on June 2 and the Big Top in Galway on July 28 have already been announced with the others to be added shortly.
Additionally, The Coronas are set for summer festivals in Europe and Ireland. After making their debut appearance at the eclectic Lollapalooza Festival in Chicago’s Grant Park last summer, the band will this year play Lollapalooza in Berlin on September 8.
The Coronas--Danny O'Reilly (vocals, guitar), Graham Knox (bass), Conor Egan (drums) and Dave McPhillips (guitar)—have five critically-acclaimed albums to their credit—four of them double platinum in Ireland and one on its way there—have spent a decade touring all over the world. The TRUST THE WIRE album debuted at #1 on the Irish music chart in its first week of release in 2017, becoming the band's first album to reach the top spot. In addition to TRUST THE WIRE, The Coronas previously released four studio albums: HEROES OR GHOSTS (2007), TONY WAS AN EX-CON (2009), CLOSER TO YOU (2011) and THE LONG WAY (2014), the first three via the independent Irish label 3ú Records and the fourth one on Island Records. Returning to the independent route, they released TRUST THE WIRE on their own label imprint. They plan to roll out more singles in the coming months leading up to the release of the new album.
Summer 2019 shows are as follows. More will be announced shortly:
June 2 The Docklands, Limerick, Ireland (Long Way Home Festival)
June 15 Fete De La Musique Festival, Luxembourg
June 22 Irish Independent Park, Cork, Ireland
July 14 Citadel Festival, Gunnersbury Park, London
July 20 Splendour, Nottingham
July 28 Big Top, Galway (Long Way Home Festival)
August 23 Custom House Square, Belfast, Northern Ireland
September 8 Lollapalooza Festival, Berlin
