Multi-platinum-selling Irish band The Coronas are preparing to bring their fifth album, TRUST THE WIRE, to North America this fall with a September 1 album release supported by a November tour. The previously-announced tour now begins a day earlier--on November 4 at Toronto's Drake Hotel-after the first announced show there sold out in a few days. Now both Toronto shows are sold out. The new album, which follows four double-platinum albums in Ireland, is the band's first release on their own label imprint called So Far So Good Records, distributed in the U.S. and Canada through ADA Distribution. It debuted at #1 on the Irish music chart its first week of release in June, overtaking Ed Sheeran to become The Coronas' first-ever #1 album.
The American tour in November is only one part of a massive touring schedule that included a July 1 sold out show at the Royal Hospital Kilmainham in Dublin--capacity 15,000--where The Coronas played their largest headline show to date. They will round out their Irish show schedule with SRO appearances at the Galway International Arts Festival on July 29 and the Indiependence Festival in Cork on August 5 before heading off to play in Europe and the UK. The American dates will be followed by shows in Australia before the end of the year.
TRUST THE WIRE, replete with the band's trademark soaring vocals, driving guitar rhythms and pointed, yet sometimes poignant lyrics finds the Coronas' four band members exploring age-old relatable themes of disappointment and disillusionment, sometimes at the hands of interpersonal relationships and sometimes via the fickle business they've chosen for a career. In its review of the new album, The Sunday Times in Ireland wrote that "they've brought their towering tunes into the present and staked their claim to be a cleverer Coldplay." Ireland's Hot Press summed it up with: "another highly impressive effort."
The songs on TRUST THE WIRE were written while the members all shared a house in Dingle on the Atlantic coast of Ireland during the summer of 2016. The place and its breathtaking isolation lent itself to the creation of introspective songs for which all four members share credit. From there, they moved on to London and Eastcote Studios in Notting Hill to record with Elliot James (Kaiser Chiefs, Two Door Cinema Club) who also produced their previous release, THE LONG WAY.
The Coronas have 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. Their return to the independent route for TRUST THE WIRE— with their own label--is perhaps best illuminated in the album's first single release, "We Couldn't Fake It," which recounts the band's realization that they need to do things their own way. The album's second single, "Real Feel," is a rousing anthem that lends itself to audience participation. A third single will be coming soon.
Videos for the first two singles from TRUST THE WIRE have already been made, directed by John Broe. The video for "We Couldn't Fake It" has Danny confined to a bathtub fully clothed while the elaborate production for "Real Feel" was actually shot in one take. They can be viewed here:
We Couldn't Fake It: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ycTl3vVTtzE
Real Feel: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=n9JqtIiKsMA
The Coronas' Danny O'Reilly and Graham Knox have known each other practically since their birth just two weeks apart. Their parents were friends, and essentially the pair grew up together. They met Conor Egan at Terenure College secondary school in Dublin where, in 2001, they formed a band called Kiros with O'Reilly on vocals and guitar, Knox on bass and Egan on drums plus another friend. Kiros morphed into The Coronas, the name taken from the Smith-Corona typewriter in Cameron Crowe's classic film about the music business, Almost Famous. The lineup was finalized in 2006 with the addition of Dave McPhillips, a friend they met during a summer in Vancouver, on lead guitar. They also enlisted classmate Jim Lawless as their manager, a position he continues to hold today.
The Coronas' album debut HEROES AND GHOSTS was released in 2007, fueled by the game-changing single “San Diego Song” that set Irish radio ablaze. Then came sold-out shows throughout Ireland and support slots with Paul McCartney, The Script, Justin Timberlake, Pink and others.
In Ireland, their music is instantly recognizable, sparking audience singalongs no matter what size venue they are playing. They started out playing student clubs, and with the U.S. tour booked for November in support of TRUST THE WIRE, hopes are running high that their music will find yet another home.
