Interview with Cork based five-piece metallers God Alone

It’s always exciting to hear of a new act making waves in Ireland, regardless of genre. Younger bands in the heavier genres are one in a million in recent years, with more bands tending to generate towards radio friendly alternative rock and indie genres. In comes God Alone, a self proclaimed post-metal five piece from Cork. Their most senior members are currently sitting their Leaving Cert mocks, while the rest of the band are in fifth and transition year respectively - all with aspirations of studying music after graduation.

The band formed in October 2016, when members Jake O’Driscoll, Jack O’Hanlon, Cian Mullane, Sean Thompson and Dylan Kelly were aged 15-16 years old. Inspired by fellow Corkonians ‘Altar of Plagues’ and Canadian experimental group ‘Godspeed You! Black Emperor’, God Alone bring a free flowing energy to their music, each song a crescendo of progressive styling dipped in Black Metal. God Alone insist that their influences are wide and varied and that their new material is influenced by a wider array of genres, as well as their native Cork City.

“We also take great influence from our area, most of the band lives in the north side of Cork City which can be considered an underprivileged area and we're very influenced by our surroundings, neighbors and culture. We're just ordinary young fellas from Cork making tunes that we love and surprisingly people seem to like it.”

The band write their music in an improvisational format, letting the songs evolve naturally through lengthy jam sessions. This in turn gives their music a unique improvised feel which can take different forms live, 'depending on emotional intensity'. They recorded their first EP Invitim in GroundFloor Studios in Cork City with Ronan McCann - also known as the electronic act Carried By Waves. God Alone stated that Ronan feels like a 6th member of the band and has been a big supporter since the beginning.

Bringing last year to a promising close for the band, they landed a support act for Irish doom metal veterans Soothsayer in Cork’s Fred Zeppelins. A gig like this was very much a desired aspiration for the lads, and they were thrilled to be billed with Soothsayer - a band they credited as one of God Alone’s influences.

“It was an honour to play with such sound lads and amazing musicians. We were also delighted to be asked in the first place and that they even knew who we were!”

Currently the lads are mid-way through recording their first full length album with Ronan McCann in Cork and are planning for a late 2018 release. As for now the band have to balance their studio sessions with school studies - put down their guitars and pick up the books.