John Francis Flynn announces new album and shares new single ‘Mole In The Ground’

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In 2021, John Francis Flynn released his debut album, I Would Not Live Always – which, in his Folk Radio review, David Weir called “one of the most deeply affecting folk debuts of recent years.” The same year, he was nominated in four categories of the RTE Folk Awards and walked away with Best Folk Singer and Best Emerging Artist. His label, Rough Trade imprint River Lea, once described Flynn’s music as personifying ‘the boundless approach to traditional music the label was set up to champion”. As you can read below, Flynn and his music have come to represent this and much more – a powerful re-imagining of traditional Irish music.

Today, John Francis Flynn shares his new single and video ‘Mole In The Ground‘, alongside news of his new album Look Over The Wall, See The Sky, which will be released via River Lea Recordings on November 10^th 2023, and new Ireland and UK tour dates for 2023 and January 2024 (dates below).

His first single from the album is ‘Mole In The Ground‘, a cover of an American anti-establishment folk song recorded by Bascom Lamar Lunsford in 1928. The song is featured in Harry Smith’s legendary Anthology of American Folk Music, and in that song, there is a line about the railroad man and how “… they’ll kill you when he can, And drink up your blood like wine.” The city property developers are like a modern-day equivalent of the railroad man, gentrification vultures, something John Francis Flynn has witnessed in Dublin, a city with a huge housing shortage crisis which worsened following the 2008 economic crash…the provisioning of care just seemed to go out the window. With the highest rents in Europe and a shortage of affordable housing stock, I’ve read how many millennials now have to consider emigrating for a better future. On the back of this, you have those seeking to maximise profits – property owners and investment funds, so you can understand the anger and resentment many must feel.

This doesn’t just affect housing – Flynn has been a strong activist and social campaigner and was also among those who rapidly rallied the support of the public to oppose the redevelopment of The Cobblestone Pub, a vital cornerstone of the Dublin folk music scene, into a hotel.

On ‘Mole In The Ground‘, John evokes the rebellious energy he felt in his home of Dublin when it was being “torn to shreds by property developers and vulture funds.” John explains, “I was drawn to this song for its almost hallucinatory, anti-authoritarian spirit at a time when Dublin was being torn to shreds by property developers and vulture funds. Nothing much has changed there, if I’m honest, but there’s always hope when people are willing to fight for their communities. I wanted to get to grips with the rebellious energy I felt in the city through the jagged arrangement and to highlight the visceral language used in the song by speaking the lyrics as opposed to singing them.”

When it comes to being a musician, Flynn’s music is steeped in activist spirit, as the accompanying press notes to this album reveal.

Often, to imagine Ireland is to fantasise about rolling hills, giants, saints and snakes. As John Francis Flynn says, it involves “a fair bit of paddywhackery and I hate paddywhackery.” The psyche-celtic album artwork for John’s second album, Look Over The Wall, See The Sky, hints at this too: a crystal goblet of luminous green Crème de Menthe resting upon a mossy ledge, perfectly encapsulating this imagined idea of Ireland in a way that is both funny and poignant. But, if you have to imagine Ireland in the first place, then you’re probably not too familiar with its reality: the towering glass giants of Google and Facebook, the unaffordable luxury hotels lining the Liffey amidst a homelessness epidemic and the highest rents in Europe.  

Listening to Look Over The Wall, See The Sky is described as witnessing history through a modern lens in a trance-like state. 

On his last record, I Would Not Live Always, John was much more conscious of bringing acoustic instruments and weird synthesised sounds together as a concept. But now, with his unique musical language fully formed, “I feel freer within that language to experiment and take it further without it being too conscious or premeditated”. 

Look Over The Wall, See The Sky is an album concerned with imagination, not only with what John calls “an imagined Ireland,” but also the re-imagining of traditional Irish music and the hopeful fantasy of an Ireland that could exist ‘over the wall’: powerful, hopeful and free.

Album Tracklisting:

1. The Zoological Gardens
2. Mole In The Ground
3. Willie Crotty
4. Kitty
5. The Seasons
6. Within A Mile Of Dublin
7. The Lag Song
8. Dirty Old Town

Pre-Order Look Over The Wall, See The Sky: https://johnfrancisflynn.ffm.to/lotwsts

Forthcoming Tour Dates

tickets on sale Friday, Sept 15^th

 Fri, Dec 1^st – Set Theatre, Kilkenny

Sat, Dec 2^nd – Vicar St, Dublin

Fri, Dec 8^th – Roisin Dubh, Galway

Sat, Dec 9^th – St Luke’s, Cork

Sun, Dec 10^th – De Barras, Clonakilty

Thurs, Dec 14^th – Dolan’s Warehouse, Limerick

Fri, Jan 12^th – Out To Lunch Festival, Ulster Sports Club, Belfast

Fri, Jan 19^th – Brudenell, Leeds

Sat, Jan 20^th – Celtic Connections, Drygate, Glasgow

Sun, Jan 21^st – The Caves, Edinburgh

Tues, Jan 23^rd – The Exchange, North Shields

Wed, Jan 24^th – YES. Manchester

Thurs, Jan 25^th – Hare and Hounds, Birmingham

Fri, Jan 26^th – Clwb Ifor Bach, Cardiff

Sat, Jan 27^th – The Exchange, Bristol

Tues, Jan 30^th – Concorde 2, Brighton

Wed, Jan 31^st – The Dome, London

Thu, Feb 22^nd – Theatre Royal, Waterford

John Francis Flynn: The Folk Radio Interview