Groove Tube with Cian O’Connell

Last February, Galway guitarist Charlie McCarthy was announced as the new bass player for Gurriers – a five-piece fast become leaders in an already thriving Irish punk scene despite playing their first gig just three years ago. And since then 2024 has been busy. Gurriers’ debut album, Come and See, arrived in September, preceding an extensive European tour and, last month, a surprise performance on Later with Jools Holland.

Attention around the band has aways stemmed from their live show – a searing blend of noise-rock, post-punk and shoegaze – which they take to Galway’s Róisín Dubh for their penultimate tour date next Thursday, November 28.

It is a homecoming for Spiddal native McCarthy, though he has long been a fixture on the Dublin music scene.

Often working as a session musician with the likes of Efé and SexyTadhg, the experience of having a real stake in a band as they fly through a landmark year has taught him a lot about the industry.

“When a band starts to operate overseas, it becomes a bigger operation,” McCarthy says.

“There’s more moving parts, more people. I’ve always been in that in a session capacity, where that’s the prerogative of the artist working with their own management and their own organisation.

“This is the first time I’ve been in that world of it too. That end of things is also my concern. I think I’ve learned more about how the business of music works this year than any other year.”

When he made the decision to join Gurriers, it coincided with the end of McCarthy’s time as a core member of experimental punk outfit Nerves – a band that began working together over five years ago and released their debut EP, Glórach, in March.

“Being in a band is like being in a relationship with multiple people I think,” McCarthy says.

“The whole time I was chatting to the lads in Gurriers about joining the band, I felt like I was cheating on Adam [Nealon] and Kyle [Thornton]. It was terrible.

Pictured: Galway gig…Gurriers, with Charlie McCarthy (second from right). Photo: Loélia