In a gaelaxy far, far away

The sound of Hyper[Borea] can most aptly be described, if at all, as an ethereal odyssey into a world of electronic ambience and Celtic mysticism. A tad eccentric, maybe, but the two distinct and seemingly irreconcilable styles flow together in Hyper[Borea]’s own Gaelic galaxy far far away. The group’s fusion of pulsating drum ‘n’ bass beats with traditional Irish harmonies makes their new album, Gaelactica, a supremely diverse musical venture.

For the past 10 years, the Irish group have been churning out their innovative brand of Celtic-techno with a flare for the eclectic. But what’s the true sound of this unique musical hybrid?

“Well that’s the problem with Hyper[Borea],” says group mastermind David Bickley from his home in West Cork. “It’s very difficult to label. The label I’ve put on it is Gaelic music from the far future. I kind of realised at some point that, hang on a minute, the reason that this isn’t mainstream and the reason the market isn’t there, is because it hasn’t happened yet. This is actually kind of way in the future. It might be actually hundreds of years ahead of its time.”

The group’s newest offering is a mesmerizing mix of pulses, thumps, whizzes, bangs and diddley-aye fiddles. Dubliner Una O’Boyle provides gorgeous vocals with an adept Irish tongue, overlapping the progressive Celtic grooves and making for a sound that oozes originality. Most listeners will acknowledge the sound’s creative authenticity, whilst others will be left wondering if the blend is legitimate.

“It’s slowly trickling through,” says Bickley. “Live, I mean, it’s totally different live because it really is quite intense and I don’t think people quite expect that. They’re up and dancing but then they’re ‘hang on a minute this isn’t the four on the floor, what BPM is this?’ They’re actually like, ‘this is just high energy, good time fuckin’ music full of balls and energy.”

Either way, the music will almost certainly find a niche in the vast and ever-expanding universe of electronic music, a genre which seems to spawn new categories and subcategories every time a DJ plays with a new beat combination.

In that case, the sound would be a kind of “psychedelic-punk-ancient-tribal-ruckus,” laughs Bickley. “With Hyper[Borea] it’s very difficult to pigeonhole because world music aficionados would say ‘hey, this is a bit too dancy for our tastes. Dance people would say ‘this isn’t dancy enough for our tastes.’ It’s funny, everybody wants to pigeonhole stuff but when we play live, and people come see or people listen to us, they love it. That’s a real problem in music today. What section of the music store are we going to put this in? We don’t have a slot to put this in so we can’t sell it. That’s a load of bollocks, it has to be listened to. People have to be able to buy all kinds of music. It doesn’t have to fit into certain genres.”

And what of the Hyper[Borea] effect?

“It’s pure atmosphere,” he says. “I like music to actually do something to somebody. I know that all music does, it all triggers stuff up in our emotions, y’know. But I like music that actually, I suppose, changes the way you think, changes your brainwaves. It actually puts you in a different state. A lot of music is kind of about that, a lot of music talks about that within itself and a lot of music is kind of on the periphery of that. But not a lot of music actually does it.”