Good Vibrations

Though raised in Limerick, Emmet Scanlan has been at the heart of the Galway music scene since moving to the city eight years ago. Initially, he came to study science at UCG but after four years of hard graft, he ditched his lab coat and took up a position behind the bar at Tig Neactain’s pub in the city centre – a spot renowned for its associations with culture and the arts.

It was over pints that Emmet, who had been writing songs on his acoustic guitar “sporadically” for some years, made the musical connections that would lead to the formation of What The Good Thought – a multi-national collective who’ve been writing, rehearsing, recording and gigging together for four years.
“I suppose if I could describe the sound, I’d say it was rich, because of the cello, classical guitar and percussion,” he reflects. ‘Many interesting, intricate bits and pieces’ is the sound they strive for, he elaborates.
“In the beginning, I got the band together to showcase my songs. But, as it evolved and grew, the various instruments became much more involved in the sound than I’d expected.”
When they were working on the early songs, it was quite “chaotic”, says Emmet. But that was then: “As time’s gone on, we’ve learned how to hold back and play for the song, so it’s really come together. I’m not the type of guy who’s the happy wanderer pottering down the road with his guitar and backpack. I like the idea of a band, and when you get it right, it’s great.”
What The Good Thought – comprising Emmet on vocals and guitar, Scot Nicola Geddes on cello, Italian Alan Preims on percussion, Swede Peter Akerstrom on classical guitar and, most recently, fellow Paddy Cathal Doherty on bass - have been intermittently holed up in the studio for the past 18 months, working on their debut album, Hands. It was mixed in London by Alan Wallis, of The Joshua Tree fame, and is due for release in Spring 2009.
“It was recorded in Galway at a studio called The Forge, which is just over the road from my house,” Emmet explains. “They get all sorts in there and they’re bang in the centre of Galway, the rates are competitive and massive care goes into the recording. We had really good fun there.”
A recent Galway show served as a launch pad for the debut single, ‘Helicopters’/‘Superstore Flowers’ (available for free download, see URLs Aloud), which the band is promoting in earnest.
“I sent the new single to the radio stations, and Galway Bay FM were so quick to come back to me,” Scanlan enthuses. “John Richards, who’s on during the day, has played the song three or four times this past week alone. I was so chuffed and shocked at the amount of DJs who are willing to do an ‘in studio’ and give us some help. I thought it would be a lot more difficult, but we’ve had a lot of support.”
Indeed, the band have a strong fanbase in their now-native Galway, though they’re all too aware of the challenges of accruing such local support.
“Galway is seen as an artistic and happening place, but the downside is that sometimes that can get taken for granted and people get a bit complacent,” the singer observes. “There isn’t a huge pile of venues here, and the town is in a funny place at the moment for live music. Two or three years back, before the Roisin Dubh was done up, it took 180 people at capacity. Now it’s a much bigger venue and there’s still a lot going on so that’s great, but for bands starting out it’s tricky because there aren’t many real ‘listener’ venues, places that people will specifically go to hear music. The Crane Bar is great as a listeners’ venue, it takes about 80 people. But if you want to do something between 80 and 300, that’s where your problems lie. Cuba is a great venue, we launched our single there recently. But it’s a club setting. You need a good crowd to get the vibe. So it’s hard for bands starting out.”
For Emmet Scanlan and What The Good Thought, though, the only way is up. In the past year, they’ve had their material used in a short film, Without Words by Brian Deane, which won an award at the Babelgum Film Festival in Cannes. In addition, they were the only Irish artists to be invited to perform at the 20th Folk Alliance Festival in Memphis, while Emmet graced the stage at New York’s Irving Plaza as support to the Saw Doctors.
“It was brilliant,” he gushes, “but it was just me, so it was a little daunting! But it went down really well.”