Last month, we shared Love Henry, the debut single (watch again below) from the new doom folk band ØXN [pron. ‘oxen’], featuring Radie Peat (Lankum), John’ Spud’ Murphy and Eleanor Myler (Percolator), and Katie Kim. This week, they announced the release of their debut album CYRM [pron. sy-rum] via Claddagh Records on Fri 27th October 2023 (Pre-Order Vinyl/CD).
To celebrate the release, they will play two live dates at The Sugar Club, Dublin, on Tue 31st October and Wed 1st November. Presented by Enthusiastic Eunuch and Foggy Notions, support will be from Iona Zajac (31/10) and Poor Creature (1/11).
The band say of CYRM: “We had rehearsed so intensely for our live stream in the Martello tower that we figured it would be the best thing to book in studio time right away. So, during some phase of the pandemic, we went up to Hellfire Studios and got battered by gales and petted cows while putting down the bones of the album. Some of said gale can be heard on The Feast. The rest of it, mainly vocals, recorded by Katie and Spud back in Guerilla Studios.”
CYRM is a six-track album featuring traditional folk songs and covers. Just over 45 minutes in total length, it features ‘The Feast‘, written by Katie; original arrangements of traditional folk songs: ‘The Trees They Do Grow High‘, ‘Love Henry‘ and ‘Cruel Mother‘; the latter uses parts of an arrangement by Andy Fenstermaker (Andy The Doorbum); and two covers (‘The Wife of Michael Cleary‘ by Maija Sofia and ‘Farmer in the City‘ by Scott Walker).
What began as a side project duo between Radie Peat and Katie Kim in 2018 blossomed into a full-on, multi-textured tapestry with the addition of Myler and Murphy during lockdown. This resulted in one of the streaming highlights of the Covid era – an unforgettable live performance from a Martello tower in Dublin in conjunction with visual artist and Lankum collaborator Vicky Langan.
ØXN take their literal name from the draft animal. Oxen are not a breed of cattle but rather steers – adult, male bovines that have been castrated. Something about the story of the beasts appealed to the band: Castrated, pulling heavy machinery; out to slog, or an interred beast for milking, since about 4000 BC. Sometimes worshipped, sometimes doomed for domestication.
Like Claddagh Records’ founder Garech Browne, with his own rich and storied past, ØXN is a band made up of people whose primary expression comes through music above personality, above aesthetic, above all else. This need to tell stories through evocative sounds that are enough to stop you dead in your tracks is the twine that binds Claddagh Records artists together. So it’s fitting that ØXN lead the charge as the label enters a new era that will see these stories reach farther than ever before, following the signing of a worldwide licensing agreement with Universal Music Ireland in 2020.
CYRM TRACK LIST
1. Cruel Mother
2. The Trees They Do Grow High
3. Love Henry
4. The Feast
5. The Wife of Michael Cleary
6. Farmer in the City
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