MacD on Music: Nightswimming

Music history is filled with artists who, for whatever reason, took significant breaks in their career. Miles Davis took a five year break from 1975-80, coming back in 1981 with ‘The Man With The Horn’. Kate Bush waited twelve years between ‘The Red Shoes’ and ‘Ariel’. Even Derry’s own Grim17 had a five year gap before re-emerging in 2020.

This week, I’m talking to Good Swim, aka Dave McConnell, who is coming back to music after a twelve year break with his new album ‘The Mountains Sure Don’t Give A Damn About The Sea’. The album “is an uncensored snapshot of perseverance and courage, tackling anger, frustration, confusion, acceptance and healing after an unprecedented health journey”.

We started our chat with a bit of his own history: “I played in bands years ago, and had a solo project. I stopped music about twelve years ago after sort of falling out of love with it. I didn’t really enjoy playing live, so I stopped completely. I came back to music last year. I had a batch of songs and felt it was now or never, in terms of making a record. I’ve always loved singing and playing guitar. It’s always been a constant thing for me, but I had quite a big break.”

I asked if he noticed much change in the music scene since his break: “It’s completely different. I think Spotify was a thing at the time, but I remember going to gigs and EP launches and people would be selling CDs and that’s completely gone. How you distribute music and how you promote yourself is completely different. It’s also never been easier to make music. There’s so much available now. You can learn to do anything on YouTube if you really want to. There’s so many great tools now to make music. The barrier has definitely dropped.”

Next, we spoke about ‘The Mountains Sure Don’t Give A Damn About The Sea’: “I guess it’s my way of coping with a major life event that happened five or six years ago now. It seems like it’s turned, although not on purpose, into a study on grief. The default for songwriters is to write a love song, right? I think what I’ve done is write songs that are an examination of different kinds of hate. The title is a bit word-y, but the reason is that it’s a metaphor for this impending doom that has kind of been caused by something that’s happened to me from a health point of view. I guess in that metaphor I’m the mountain. You can pretend that everything’s fine and you’re okay, but you’re up against the sea, which is just relentless. It’s going to come for you, wave after wave. There’s a lot of themes on the album of just coping with grief and things like that.”

“I never really stopped liking or writing songs. It’s always been a passion for me. I think I would have had the deepest regret if I hadn’t been able to put an album together at some point in my life. It’s a bucket list kind of thing. I’m really proud of it. Creating anything in this world is so difficult. You look at that bridge over there, that building over there, that’s somebody’s passion project. Making an album is no different. It’s an act of sheer will and nobody is going to do it for you. I’m glad it exists. It’s sort of against all odds, to be honest, because it was hard and it took a lot longer than it might have if my situation with my health had been different.”

And that’s it from Good Swim. His album ‘ The Mountains Sure Don’t Give A Damn About The Sea’ is out now on all good streaming platforms.

Now, onto other business. First up, CIRCA will be playing their debut headline gig this Friday (6th November) in Bennigan’s with support from ANAMCHARA and Ellie Brétéché. Doors are 7.30 and tickets are £5 on the door or £6 on Skiddle.

Next, we have Seán Feeny, who’ll be making his Nerve Centre debut this Saturday (7th November) playing support for The Riptide Movement (along with Lavengro). This will be his first time performing tracks from his debut album ‘Galactic Tides’ and he’ll be accompanied by Ruairí Friel on guitar and backing vocals. Doors for this one are 7pm and tickets are £25 plus booking fee on Eventbrite.

Also, there’s new music from Touzai, with their single ‘Peach’ (out now). The track is the penultimate single from their upcoming EP and features a darker, synthetic sound compared to previous releases. It’s out now on all good streaming services.

Lastly, slightly further afield, Sister Ghost will be on tour in Japan from next Tuesday, playing Moonstep in Nakano on the 10th, Ruby Room in Shibuja on the 12th and the Too Hot To Be Cool Festival on the 14th. I have no idea how to get tickets for these gigs so anyone reading this in Japan (or travelling just to go to them) will just have to figure it out for themselves.

Finally, time for the socials. Sister Ghost can be found on Instagram @sisterghostofficial, Touzai @touzaiband, Seán Feeny @seanfeenymusic_, CIRCA @circa_ and Good Swim @youragoodswim.