- Music
- 16 Aug 19
The Irish rock band were beloved on the home front and played some ferocious live shows over the years, but in a message to their fans they detailed some of the hidden struggles which come with being in a band.
Otherkin shared a message on their Twitter earlier today detailing their break-up and the reasons behind it.
Their message reads: "After seven amazing years together we've decided to call it a day, This band is a huge part of our lives and while breaking up is not an easy thing to do, it's what feels right for us. We understand this may come as a shock to a lot of you and as such, we feel we owe you an explanation. The truth is that there's no single thing that we could pin it on. The unfortunate reality is that life in a band these days is one of extreme highs and extreme lows; there's the elation after an amazing gig to the pressure of mounting bills, the pride of releasing music that you've laboured over for months to the deflation of struggling ticket sales. It's all there and a band needs a lot of fuel in its tank to get through it. Some bands have more fuel than others and unfortunately, the day arrived where our fuel ran out."
It continued: "We have so many people to thank for the amazing ride we have been on! To our family, girlfriends, friends and loved ones; your bottomless well of love and encouragement sustained us through the good times and the bad and for all that, we are eternally grateful. To our incredible record label Rubyworks who have done so much for us, we can't thank you enough for the unconditional support and guidance you sent our way and it was truly an honour to work side by side for the last few years. Thank you also to our sound engineer and tour manager to the stars, Eamonn Conway, who was the fifth member of the band; you were there for, and sometimes the instigator of, all the chaos and madness and somehow managed to keep everything on the rails. Thanks goes out to everyone behind the scenes; to our booker Alex, our lawyer Willie, our PR Sabrina and our radio plugger Rob. There are many more and you have our thanks. To our managers Niall Muckian and Brian Bradley. Niall for believing in us and taking a risk you have our undying gratitude. Brian, you were the first person to take a punt on us and have done more for the band than possibly anyone else. We'll always remember (and live by) your sage advice to 'keep kicking against the pricks'. Thank you.'"
Otherkin were consistently praised throughout the years for their incendiary live shows and had a dedicated fanbase. It was perhaps from this reputation that they ended up on the support bill for Guns'N'Roses at Slane Castle back in 2017.
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Their debut album, Otherkin OK, was a work of unbridled, no nonsense rock - some of the finest that Ireland had seen in a long time. It debuted at No. 2 on the Irish Charts back in OCtober 2017, showing that the band had a wide reach throughout the country. Several years later, it rightly received a nomination for Choice Prize album of the year.
We wish all the members of the band a bright future - God knows they have the talent for it.