Life is funny sometimes. When I was planning the sessions at Kilkenny Roots, I reached out and asked if Joshua Burnside would be able to make his way south from Belfast. He wasn’t. But on my way home I noticed he had a show in Utrecht coming up later that same spring. So, the morning after his show, Burnside, guitarist Dan Byrne-Mccullough & cellist Zara Byrne-Mccullough joined me in a wharf cellar at the Oudegracht, which is the studio and home of local artist Kees Wennekendonk, and recorded a session. All three songs we filmed are online now. Watch them play Ghost Of The Bloomfield Road, Moon High (featuring Laura Quirke of Lemoncello), and a mesmerizing cover of Vampire Weekend’s Step.
Anything but traditional
Burnside’s approach to folk music is anything but traditional. He deconstructs it, and incorporates lo-fi, sound collage, tape loops and unusual instrumentation. His latest record Teeth of Time addresses contemporary fatherhood, among other matters. As Burnside stated, this feels like his most hopeful family of songs to date. Teeth of Time was written against the background of becoming a dad. But alongside all that joy, came anxiety about the future. He wrote the songs between Belfast and Comber, Donegal and Paris, and recorded in his unsound-proof makeshift studio in Belfast city centre. So the sounds of the city, his home and family life, are all key parts and drivers of these tracks.
On tour in the States
Burnside is about to embark on a tour in the United States. Find all dates here.