MacD on Music: If The Marra Never Comes

Doing this column, I’ve gotten the chance to talk to a lot of acts that are sure to be big players in the future of music, both in Derry and further afield.

This week, I’m talking to a band who’s got a greater claim to this than most: The Marra.

The Marra have just released their first single, ‘That’s Just The Way’, and launched it in Bennigan’s this past Friday.

Before it’s release, I met up with guitarist Shane McGowan (not that one) to talk about how the band came together and what their plans are for the future, both the marra and beyond.

The Marra are a five piece, made up of Shane (guitar), Ryan Ward (vocals), Conall McCool (lead guitar), Cale O’Donnell (bass) and Brian McCloskey (drums).

Speaking of their origins, Shane tells me: “Me and Ryan started the band. I was going to give him a song of mine to record, because I don’t like being a solo artist, so he suggested we start a band, and I couldn’t say no. Then there was a six month period where we were just writing songs and making demos and after a while we said ‘we need to get more people in’, so he started playing the songs live, because he does covers around the town, and that’s when Conall came up to him and asked ‘Is that an original song?’ and I said ‘aye’.

"He said ‘I want to be in your band’, so we didn’t ask Conall, he just demanded he was in. With Brian, I saw a video of him four years ago playing drums, and just kept it in my head, just in case I was going to start a band sometime. I just messaged him, and that was him in. Cale was the last addition. Somehow Conall met him, and that’s the five of us. We’ve been a five piece for maybe six months, and we’ve played three gigs” (or possibly four).

I asked Shane about the recording of the single, and he told me: “We tried to record a different single about two months ago, and it didn’t exactly work out. It was our first time in the studio, and we were sort of getting our bearings, and then, when we went to record ‘That’s Just The Way’, which was written about a week before we went in, we were going to record something else, but thought ‘this would be a better single’, so we literally all learnt it in the practice room the day before

"After we recorded it, I saw an interview with Gordon Raphael [producer for the Strokes] on YouTube, and thought he’d be perfect to mix the song, so I sent him an Instagram DM, and was basically ‘You’re my idol and why I got into making music, so could I send you a song’. He said ‘send away’ so I sent it to him and he said he would mix it.

"That was a bit mad for us. That’s probably the best thing about the song, that he had a part in it.”

Speaking about the future, Shane told me: “We recorded another song last week called ‘Losing My Mind’.

"That one used to be a folk song, and now it’s probably a punk song. Before we went into the studio, just for an experiment, we said ‘let’s just play this as fast as we can play it’, you know like, just before you can’t play any faster, because it has to explain the song title, so it should feel like it’s going to fall off the tracks any time.

"That’ll hopefully be the second single. I don’t know what the plans are after that, just keep writing. We’ve got a lot of demos, maybe twenty songs. It’s just trying to work out which ones are best to record. One of the first songs we ever made is seven minutes long and we’ve never played it live because we’re saving it for our debut album. It’s our closing song. I think the goal this year is to release an EP maybe.

"It’s too expensive these days to record an album. Release an EP, do more gigs and just keep growing as a band and write better songs. The last thing you could do is rest on your laurels.”

Now, onto other business. This Saturday (1st April) sees Ethan Hollan playing the Nerve Centre to promote his new single, ‘Forest’, which is released this Friday. I’ll be talking to Ethan about that in the coming weeks. Also with a new song out are Switch, who’s single ‘Hear Me Call’ is available now.

I’m going to be talking to them next week. Both Ethan and Switch can be found on Instagram @ethan_hollan and @band.switch, respectively.

In other news, Touts have recently been featured on the Independent’s ‘Music Box’ program, a program that has helped launch the careers of, among others, Bastille, Lewis Capaldi and Jamie Cullum. Also coming up on it tomorrow (28th March) is Nell Mescal (sister of Paul). These performances can be found at www.independent.co.uk/tv/music-box 

The Marra can be found @themarra_band. Their single, ‘That’s Just The Way’ is out now.