Cheer up! That’s the simple message from John Blek, and the title of his brilliant new album coming in September. Leading up to the album, Blek released the songs Country Mile and Easy Now and we just so happened to film those songs in Kilkenny early May during Kilkenny Roots. I’ve been lucky enough to get a vinyl in the post and bought a new record player to listen to it; Cheer Up! is Blek’s most complete work to date, and that is saying a lot. On his second session for The Influences – filmed during Kilkenny Roots, he also delivered a stunning cover of Chris Smither’s Leave The Light On.

This session was the last of twelve sessions we filmed at Kilkenny Roots in May 2024. Three intense days, filled with beautiful music and special exclusive intimate performances by brilliant artists. It was such a pleasure to reunite with John Blek, who filmed a first session for The Influences a year and a half prior at TakeRoot festival in Groningen. His voice and his songwriting has found a place in my heart since that first session – and this session was the perfect way to close these three packed days.

Blek came to this session at the Pembroke Hotel in between his load in and soundcheck at the Set Theatre, where we saw him shake up the building later that evening with a special reunion show of John Blek and The Rats. If you aren’t familiar with the two albums of that outfit, please click here, because they’re calling out your name.

Allowing each song to dictate its own natural path

With no sign of letting up the ever prolific John Blek brings us his ninth studio album. Cheer Up is a reflection on his life; lyrically demonstrating his personal growth while sonically showing his musical evolution.

John Blek says: “This is a very important record to me. It’s the first of mine that is entirely autobiographical from start to finish. Also in the past I have tried to be quite restrained when it came to the production of my songs but this time around I wanted to adopt a more is more approach. Allowing each song to dictate its own natural path and taking it as far as I could with the resources available to me.”

The album features performances from Dutch three piece harmony group Woolf and the Dresden based Broken Strings. It was recorded at Wavefield Recordings, Clonakilty, Co. Cork and was co-produced with Brian Casey. Cheer Up will be released on the 6th of September on John’s own label Bigger River Recording Co. 

“Part of the joy of what I do is getting to meet other artists. I played some shows with Woolf in the Netherlands and we immediately clicked. The first time I heard them sing together I knew I wanted to work with them and to hear their voices add a new depth to my own songs. It was the same with Moritz Brümmer and Filip Sommer (The Broken Strings) who I met on an artist in residence programme in Dresden back in 2022.”

The Influences in Ireland.

In August 2023 and May 2024, The Influences traveled to Kilkenny, Ireland, to film sessions during Kilkenny Arts Festival and Kilkenny Roots Festival. Over the course of three weekends, I filmed 23 sessions, with acts on the festival’s line up, and other Irish musicians that I admire. A lot more will follow in the weeks and months to come. So, please subscribe and keep coming back! Find all Irish sessions here.

Photos

Keep watching

Thank you for watching and enjoying this session. You’ll probably like some other sessions from The Influences’ archive too, like this earlier one with John Blek we filmed at TakeRoot festival.