Savage Hearts declare War

Evan Walsh’s musical project signs with Irish indie label

Full throttle is probably the best way to describe Savage Hearts’ forthcoming single Gang War. It’s a head-on collision of distortion pedals and no quarter given drumming. Stirring in the background, the infectious keyboards etches out the melody helped with the occasional burst of howling harmonica. A combustible mix of ideas and energy Gang War is The Savage Hearts’ class statement of intent.

It’s written by Evan and his pal Ste Kelly of the band The Raglans who some may recall from playing the Cafe Sessions in the old Chapter 1.

“He lives in Spain but we just started sending each other ideas over and back, and one of those ideas was Gang War - it’s my music, his lyrics and maybe both of us collaborating on the melody side of it - it was great. A couple of songs came out of that collaboration that will be heard in the ensuing months as the Savage Hearts thing rumbles on.”

Ste may have penned the Gang War lyrics, but whether it’s intentional or not the line ‘Roll the stone and follow where it goes/ the path you’re on will always be your own’ speaks of Evan’s new project which has just passed another landmark having signed with Irish label Blowtorch Records.

Eager to sustain the momentum the Hearts plan to release a series of singles over the coming months with the help of Galway company.

He thinks Blowtorch are a good fit for the Hearts.

“Without being pretentious about it, the project is not mainstream - it’s more in the garage rock, punky, underground vein. It’s a place we saw ourselves sitting very comfortably.”

Obviously Evan earned his musical wings with The Strypes, and he’s eager to take the learnings from that.

“With The Strypes, the actual being in the band was brilliant craic, and that was great. The thing I personally wouldn’t want to repeat was the major label side of it - the bureaucracy of it and the internal office politics aspect of it, that always had me driven up the walls a wee bit.”

Evan recalls their major label had a “shopping list of requirements” and the band had to try to “argue and beat it down to as small an amount of compromises as possible”. However that experience also prompted one of the Strypes’ best songs - ‘What a Shame’ which they memorably performed on the David Letterman Show - a blistering performance of an insanely tight band at their height. The lyrics weren’t exactly cryptic in their critique of their record company.

‘After they put it to paper they took him to tea/ and told him just a couple of changes that they wanted to see...

‘Oh what a shame/ that they won’t ever let you be.’

“There were attempts to compromise our direction, our look, our vibe. We always fought against that, and we came out of it pretty well in the end - we always said ourselves that there was never a period when we were ever being disingenuous in what we were doing, but there was always that resistance there.”

In contrast Evan feels “much more at home” in the indie world “because you do have an entirely free hand.”

Of Richard Burke, the main driving force behind Blowtorch Records, Evan notes he comes without a ‘shopping list’: “He sees what he likes, and he wants that.”

Having penned the songs with Ste and also some with Stef Murphy of another Cafe Session outfit - The Mighty Stef - it took a while for Evan to settle on the band to help realise the heavy sound he wanted to pursue.

Step one however was to move out from behind the drums and wield the Hearts’ bass guitar. He somewhat surprisingly describes himself as a reluctant drummer with The Strypes having wished he and Pete O’Hanlon had traded instruments. Making up for it now Evan as bandleader - “in the tradition of Duke Ellington” - recruited Emil Kapusta of the wonderful Dirty Marmalade to take on drum duties.

“He’s splitting his time between Dirty Marmalade and Savage Hearts which is great because there’s a real scene happening, a real collective of people helping on other people’s projects which is great,” Evan enthuses. Another Cavan head, Terry Brady plays harmonica, keyboards and provides vocals too - “Terry is a seriously talented musician”.

The frontman and lead guitarist is Kells native Darragh Muldoon. “He’s the new boy - I only met Darragh when I was putting the band together - but he’s an absolutely brilliant guitarist, he’s got a great blues feel and garage rock sensibility and a great voice as well.

“And we also might have a mysterious sax man joining us as well. A potential fifth member might be making himself known.”

While this Savage Hearts incarnation announced themselves playing support to The Boomtown Rats last summer, Evan is looking forward to unveiling Gang War the other new tracks with a proper launch event. It will take place on March 9 at a “magical mystery venue” somewhere in Cavan - details to be released closer to the time. While they are working on the album in the background, Evan eyes up an exciting year ahead.

“Get the single out, get the ball rolling and get a year gigging going.”

They’re on the right path, their own path.

You can pre-order Gang War by Savage Hearts as a 7" vinyl record from www.blowtorchrecords.com