A huge dose of rock in the tradition!
In seven years of existence, THE CELTIC SOCIAL CLUB has succeeded in imposing a sound, a style and a name on a well established Celtic music scene. With four studio albums and two live albums so far, They have crisscrossed stages, festivals and continents. These seven Franco-Irish troubadours continue to refine their elegant and daring reinterpretation of the traditions of Celtic music, blended with great amounts of rock energy, of pop harmony and folk melody.
The astonishing journey for this band began in July 2014 and was only meant to be a one off event at the Vieilles Charrues festival. The energy, the desire and the freshness, forged a band from an event. This meeting of adventurers, gathered around a name, THE CELTIC SOCIAL CLUB. A band with a cultural mission: to advance traditional music from Celtic cultures (Brittany, Ireland, Scotland, Asturias) by fusing them with rock, pop, folk and groove.
Organized like a guerrilla group , the collective pops up all across Europe, but may surface in Asia, and has been known to materialize in The United States, even showing up in Central Park, NYC. Having toured the world, The Celtic Social Club's sights are set on The United Kingdom, which has a history of musical superiority and a lack of tolerance for French artists. The Pogues and the Clash have often been cited in an attempt to summarise the spirit of energetic and ambitious musical mash-ups. Taking the torch from these pioneers, The Celtic Social Club has gradually forged a new and stable path to original territory.
Their fourth album, DANCING OR DYING? will be released on October 8th 2021. Irish singer, Dan Donnelly will add his voice to his Breton counterparts: Manu Masko, Ronan Le Bars, Goulven Hamel, Pierre Stephan, Mathieu Péqueriau and Richard Puaud. They have levelled up their recording game over the last year and are keen to prove that with the new material, that love they will be a force to be reckoned with.
One-shot and shoot again /// 2014
In July 2014, in front of the 50,000 spectators gathered at The Vieilles Charrues festival, THE CELTIC SOCIAL CLUB gave its first concert. This one-shot imagined and driven by Manu Masko (drums), accompanied by a groovy and promising first album, decides the collective of go-getters to continue the adventure. After a live acoustic album recorded in New York, the support of France Inter Radio and some great European dates, Jean-Pierre Riou (Red Cardell) left the group, replaced by rock guitarist Goulven Hamel, who therefore joined in January 2016, Jimmy O'Neill (vocals, guitar), Ronan Le Bars (uilleann pipe, low whistle), Pierre Stephan (violin) Richard Puaud (bass) and Mathieu Péquériau (harmonica, washboard).
Freedom and world music /// 2018
While continuing its work in France, the group flies away for « world music »festivals in China, Turkey, Algeria, Switzerland… He records his second studio album, A NEW KIND OF FREEDOM, affirming, from the cover, its new status as a « BAND ». The sound has tightened, more electric, more pop, more rock. Faada Freddy is invited for a Christmas single. During this long tour, the band is sometimes joined on stage by Algerian, Chinese and North American musicians, inviting themselves in the musical opening of the great planetary concert of « world music ». After concerts in northern United States, the NKOF TOUR culminates, in September 2016, with an emblematic date in Central Park, for the twenty-fifth anniversary of their sponsors The Vieilles Charrues, in New York City. Europe 1 Radio discovers them on this occasion and will not let go, just like the Rolling Stone Magazine ... Frontman of the group since its creation, the Scottish Jimme O'Neill (The Silencers) is thanked and replaced for a time by Martin Kelly, another singer from Glasgow settled in Berlin.
On the way to Avalon /// 2019
Irish singer and guitarist, Dan Donnelly from Belfast, had settled in New York, then in Stockton on Tees, joined the group in the process of writing their third album, FROM BABYLON TO AVALON. With the addition of this new voice, the band, finally stabilised. The new line up ushered in an era of pop rock sensibility and meticulous songwriting. UK Alt- Rockers The Futureheads joined in the mix with poignant reinterpretation of the classic « Black is The Color ». While the group toured in France, Belgium, Spain and the Czech Republic, the single « Remember Joe Strummer » hit the airwaves of the BBC. Championed by the iconic DJ Janice Long and the Joe Strummer Foundation, THE CELTIC SOCIAL CLUB decided to embrace the United Kingdom, with a few dates in Scotland, the North of England, at the legendary 100 Club in London and the Beautiful Days Festival. The adventure was greeted with a full page spread in Paris Match Magazine. The more than enthusiastic reception led to the UK, special edition release of the album, in September 2019, on the London label Kitchen Disco Records.
DANCING OR DYING ? /// 2021
Stopped in the middle of a French and English tour by the Covid epidemic, THE CELTIC SOCIAL CLUB immediately threw itself into the writing and recording of what will become its fourth album. Combining absence and distance, the seven Franco-Irish have patiently built, through the Channel and from their respective home studios, these twelve titles which are certainly, to this day, the most free, elegant and successful in their discography. With great bursts of rock energy, pop melody and folk magic, DANCING OR DYING? is simply a great record made by a band imposing a sound, a style and a name.
From March 2020, surviving "lockdowns" through the medium of the internet, THE CELTIC SOCIAL CLUB focused on its writing and recording work. Between DAN DONNELLY, the musician from Belfast (Levellers, Wonder Stuff, Watercress…) living in Newcastle, and his comrades stranded in Brittany, a new method of work and production was invented, taking advantage of this suspended time. Between France and England, in an incessant back and forth of files, the album took shape little by little. Always anchored in the tradition of Celtic music and viscerally attached to the quality of his songwriting, Dan took inspiration from The Beatles, heroic rock and new-wave elements. Influences which take new liberties, by daring for example a dialogue between an uilleann pipe and a gospel choir, between a fiddle and a classical trombonne, a washboard and « eighties »keyboards… Shouting proof with the three successive singles released since June 2021: FOR REAL, THE EDGE OF THE WORLD and HOME.
Mixed and mastered by their loyal New York team (Ariel Borujow and Ricardo Gutierez), DANCING OR DYING? further refines a sound and compositions that no longer hide their desire to compete on equal terms with international bands. If the record resonates with perfectly assumed adult rock, THE CELTIC SOCIAL CLUB remains deeply youthful, overflowing with envy, optimism and freshness.
The highlights
