 The Screaming Orphans not only have new material out but they're also touring and in fact they are playing at Leos in Crawley this coming Tuesday night, the 31st. The Screaming Orphans four diverse sisters from Bondore and Joan, Angela, Gronja and Marie Therese and they, well they came from a musical family because their mother Kathleen was a well-known Kelly singer. She played shows not only here in Ireland but also in England and in Germany and then went to the girls, hit their teenage years, they formed their own band, a Celtic pop band and wrote their own material and they've played with the likes of Sinead O'Connor, Peter Gabriel and the Chieftains down through the years. Anyhow I'm delighted that two of the sisters Gronja and Joan are joining me now and streaming as well. Good afternoon ladies. Good afternoon John. How are you doing today? Hello from Bondore. Pardon? Hello from Bondore. Well yeah. Just down the road. Good part of the world. I hope the weather's better there than it is here. Ah, do you know it's wet? Yeah. How are things going? You've new material out and you're touring so you know things must be good with the Screaming Orphans. We do. We just have released a new pop single and it's actually it's coming out November 3rd. So that's why we're doing just a couple of shows up to the release but it's in the past I know for the in May was it or June was it June or whatever? God I forget. We actually released some Irish music. So we have a folk album. Yeah. This is our pop offering. Well folk with a twist. Yeah, folk with a twist. Yeah, you're right. Folk with a twist. It's got a pop, pop leaning as well very much. And that material and those songs and the way the way that they were on the album that that must go down well live. It does. It does. We do a lot of touring in the US and it's very popular. You know I suppose you know it's popular with a lot of people not even people with Irish heritage. I think because we always have the pop element to know some of the songs some of the you know the more traditional songs and the folk songs we actually play in a very traditional way. But the ones that we add a sort of a pop twist to and they they really seem to appeal to people who have especially in the US you know people who may not have you know Irish heritage. So it's great mix. So it pulls the whole crowd in because it's interesting for the people of with you know that know these Irish songs from their parents grandparents to hear a new twist on it. Yeah. So that yeah. But I'd imagine that a lot of people who come to your shows in the States that they would there would be some Irish connection and there might be some familiarity with these songs. Oh there is. There is. And that's why at times we like to do something just a wee bit different with them. So especially for the younger people because I always think it's great to pull in the younger people. But we always feel like we do with the sort of more pop twists because they listen to the song and they say oh that's a great song. I love that song and then they go on to Spotify YouTube or whatever and they start looking it up and they find the old versions of it. And many people have come up to us and said oh because we mentioned a lot of people as well at our shows that would have you know recorded it before us many years. So because it's a learning experience you like to teach people about your culture and your songs. Absolutely. And it's great to bring more people into the fold if you like to forward traditional songs and folk songs and then you know they'll go off wherever Spotify whatever and they'll discover some of the original artists and whatever the entry point it's great. It is. It is. But this latest thing that we have stop stop it's kind of like the other arm of us isn't it Jo? It's kind of more our pop side. You know we always love our pop music as well as our Irish and you know traditional and mixing the two. But so this is our more being it's going to be we're working on a new pop album at the moment as well and we're back producing it with John Reynolds and Janades. Yeah that which has been a very successful collaboration with you and when you were recording the song as well you got you got a great backing vocalist Lucy Jules. We want to steal and bring her on tour with us. Yeah well she sang with um she sang for years with George Michaels. How did you manage to get Lucy on board? Well do you know actually it was um she happened to be in with John in the studio and we had actually sent across um you know a couple of songs like demos to John and he was actually playing it. He was just you know doing a little bit of working on it saying oh maybe you should you know drop this you know just like he sees amazing. So um she happened to come into the studio and she was working with John on some other track because John works with many. This is when he was in London still he actually has moved now to Ireland. He's moved to studio to Ireland which is brilliant but um she happened to be in working on some other music that he was doing and he played it for her and she said oh I love that. She said I know exactly what I would sing. She said if that was like yeah and George saw and she just got up at the mic and sang it and John says do you mind if I tape you? And she says no problem and he said she said she would be delighted to sing on it and she it was so amazing. We couldn't believe it. Yeah well it was your lucky day wasn't it? Lucky day yeah. And you know as you mentioned there you guys do a lot of touring in the States so it takes you away from home quite a bit and you I know you you've done cruises in the past and festivals so you know a wide variety and then when we're in the States there's you know a long time it's like there's long distances involved and as a result you know you don't go over there for a week and come home. No that is the thing it's incredibly um long distances between shows and it's always really funny we come home you know to drive to Dublin is like the road to us because in general we drive we will always drive to a gig that is 12 hours we don't consider that like anything major and when things start to go into like you know we actually we rarely fly to 18 or 19 hour gigs like if we go to Florida we would drive now we drove to Montana once for a gig but we're trying to we're dying to drive to California we actually have a festival scheduled um next year in California and we were we were planning but the problem with it is it cuts off a big not a big but a chunk of our time at home so yeah and we love home like I could never like settle really and you know in America I just I love Ireland it's it's part of you you can really be creative and right here we come home here to recharge and right and just and just spend some quality family time and you know just kind of there's nowhere like home and especially dirty go as long as now we're telling everyone exactly fourth best destination in the entire world we're no longer a secret yeah it's great to go on tour and and connect the people and meet new people and all the rest of it but it's you know it's good to get home as well oh that's great there's nothing like it but America is America is a great place for touring though it's it's um it's very much set up for it you know the roads and you know and the venues Americans love music and the thing about America is if you even stop in some little town or little city there's there's always a great music scene there's a great music venue the people actually they go to even if they've never heard the band they actually you know because they love music it's their night out oh there's somebody on tonight it might be a Tuesday night so they actually go with their friends because they like to discover new music and and luckily there still is uh you know there still is that in America there's there are a lot of people who you know like to discover music still through the old-fashioned way of going to see a band that was touring passing through instead of you know spotifying you know YouTube and all that yeah which is which is fine up to a point but you know it's fine up to a point nothing can hide the just the excitement of just discovering band life it's brilliant yeah and and when you're on these mammoth journeys from place to place who does the driving our other sister Mary Trace Mary Trace is the quiet one if we have to go somewhere in a hurry I do it yes I have got the lead foot I'm just on the GPS I'm the Google Maps and if Angela was driving we would never get there it would take three months because she doesn't want to hit anything yeah she drives so like she terrified it's an animal she's cautious she's cautious she's a careful driver I nearly hit a fly there it's like she is so worried that an animal will come across the road and we're crying in the cargo please Angela so smart Mary Trace is the designated driver she is she is like she's attached because we were playing in a festival outside Kansas City and of course with airlines when was that this is like about it was 2021 it was the end of 2021 they just shut down the airport and they just cancel all flights so it was like and we had to be back in New York and like this was on the Sunday the Monday afternoon we had to be back in New York and they weren't like flying us out until I don't know like right here no don't exaggerate but anyway so we just made a snap decision and we were the one who was lucky people we just got um a minivan we got the last rental car a minivan so we picked it up and we just drove from camp and Mary Trace drove straight she drove for hours she did what she did she did the night but Steve was going through because there's something although I didn't sleep either no I was I was her GPS but you know things like that you know um you know Mary Trace it's great to have her it's just fabulous she just seems to have eyes she can see deer yeah from like three miles away she goes there's deer over there they're a danger at certain times keep her happy don't fall out with Mary Trace then whatever you do no you couldn't fall out with her she's really easy going she's the best in the world and he's managed four sisters and off that touring together and recording together and playing together it can't be easy yeah all the time yeah we're weird no we're not we're not we're not joke no you know the thing is John people always ask that but I've always always said the thing that binds us together apart from like family ties because you know we're used to grew up with each other we've always played music together and first and foremost music is our passion it's our obsession and we've always always always wanted to be in a band and we we we know that we are individually we are not as strong as we are together together we are really strong and we realize that we realize that years and years ago we know that we can't survive without each other we're one of those bands that if something happens to one of us we will we will cease to exist we could never replace each other because there's just something about the four of us playing together and the four of us we don't even have to think we're like we're just tied in and I suppose we've been at it so long we are just aiming as well to break the world record I don't know what it's been but for the longest the longest of female bands yeah four not just four female band but four sisters four sisters for all those years listen I was I was going to play Mary from Dunlop but now you were chatting so much about stop stop I'm gonna feel guilty if I don't play that so play whatever you want whatever you like I'll line up I'll line up stop stop so and this is from your your new album this is an album of pop material but you know important to to remind listeners as well that you did of that that saw that album of the folk songs the traditional songs earlier in the year so people can expect anything done at Leo's anything we like to we'd like to surprise and we don't like to stick to anything we like to watch the crowd I think it's you're being brought up entertaining and that's why you don't stick to one thing because to cut one thing off you know from your in your creative output and just to concentrate one thing is like cutting off part of yourself because we love our Irish music we love tunes we love ballads we love folk songs and we love pop music okay well it's hard to punish on wrong you there's therefore okay well it is it's next Tuesday night 34th down in Leo's in Crawley and the best look with the album and the the money to agronia and Joan from the Screaming Orphans thank you