Click here for more tunes from Goldmund at betarecords.com/goldmund.byrne
Differentstyles for different moods... please rate the songs so I can focus onmore of what you'd like to hear- left to my own devices I'd skip betweengenres every day as I have done on these four tracks! You'll find some of the nice things people have said about the music they've heard here down the left side of this page. If you send a nice comment but would prefer not to be quoted, please let me know and I will of course respect your request :)
I've had a lot of requests and encouragement from old friends to put in abit more of my background & history up here- my musical family, my work on 103FM, busking in Ireland, working for Fiction Records and recording in New York, nearly getting signed by an industry legend, gigging in Germany, working with bands and such like. I've been asked to tell thesestories so often that I'm going to finally put some of them down in writingsomewhere.. here. People have shown an interest, so here we go, as much as I can bring myself to type today!Maybe getting some of the basics up here will save me some typing andretelling in the future. I'll start with the family, and then move on tothe abbreviated life story I often end up doing at parties :)
Goldmund & Family
Goldmund Byrne is a proud member of an awesome family ofmusicians, artists and performers, (we hope to link to all of them hereeventually!) including Day One , Marxman , Offside, The Emmet Spiceland and Brian Byrne :
The family line-up goes a-little-somethin' like this:
Goldmund's paternal grandfather Tommy Byrne, was a three timesFeis Ceoil winner in the thirties, and later sang with Val Doonican and the Four Ramblers.
Goldmund's maternal grandfather Owen Monaghan was a passionate drummer from childhood.
Goldmund's father Michael Byrne and uncle Brian Byrnetopped the Irish charts in the sixties with Donal Lunny in the EmmetSpiceland (sometimes called ireland's first boy band!) famouslyknocking Bob Dylan off the topspot with the Number One MaryFrom Dungloe, the success of which prompted the creation of the Mary from DungloeInternational Festival . The Emmet Spiceland, formed from theembers of The Spicelanders and The Emmet Folk were atthe root of much of what came later in irish music, with strong ties toPaul Brady, Christy Moore, Shay Healy, BrianBolger, Leo O'Kelly, Mick Maloney and PhilCoulter and even a then young Davy Spillane andClannad. Much of their work has been lost in prehistory now, buttalk to people in the know of a certain age and they always go back tothe Spiceland-- before Moving Hearts, Planxty,Horslips the lot.
Bob Geldof once told Goldmund"They did Irish music, but in a different way and they dressed like mods!They were like The Beatles, man!"
Well, actually he said"They were like the f**kin' beatles, man!" - but then, we'd expectno less of Sir Bob ;)
Goldmund's uncle,Brian Byrne went on to great success in the WestEnd with major roles in productions like Jesus Christ Superstar,Hair and The Rocky Horror Show among others.
Brianmarried Chitty Chitty Bang Bang film dancer Mavis Ascot,who later went on to choreograph the original Riverdance withMichael Flatley and Jean Butler.
Goldmund's Aunts, Moira Byrne, Louise Byrne, AnneByrne and Paula Byrne did huge amounts of touring, tv andrecording in the seventies, with their band 'Jeep'. There wasn't aTV or variety show they didn't cover, from 321 to Victoria Wood & JulieWalters, Cannon and Ball, Tommy Cooper, Russ Abbot, variety performances,the lot. Their harmonies were fantastic, and you haven't heard beautifultill you've seen them singing The Chatanooga Choo Choo in The AndrewsSisters style American airforce gear (There's a great old video of themsinging it whilst riding into Richard Stilgo's tv show studio in anactual US Army Jeep...).
More recently the girls provided backingvocals for a remix of Mungo Jerry's classic "In theSummertime"
Anne's daughter Tulisa, Goldmund's cousin, recently won "Best UK Newcomer" at the MOBO awards with her band NDubz .
Erik Feely , another of Goldmund's uncles, has become a very wellregarded artist of growing renown, painting and exhibiting to some trulymarvellous reviews of his art
Goldmund's brothers haven't been lazy either:
Brother Hollis Byrne, vocalist for Top of the Pops guestperformers Marxman . rode high in the early nineties charts with"All About Eve" and a single with Sinead O'Connor. Signed to GilesPeterson's 'Talkin Loud' label, Hollis later performed to great criticalacclaim with the edgier, less commercial but more authentic and superb'Offside'.
Phelim Byrne's awesome quirky tripped out beats with 'DayOne' signed to Massive Attack with their Melankoliclabel in Bristol and spent a lot of time on MTV and soundtrack work like'Cruel Intentions' with Sarah Michelle Gellar. 'DayOne' were produced by Mario C (Mario Caldato) of TheBeastie Boys and the band are currenty promoting a new record inJapan.
Oisin Byrne MC's with Roni Size & Reprazent
and Jack Byrne is busy putting out dance records inDublin
Sister Niamh Byrne was asked to perform at the Ashton Courtfestival in Bristol with her girl band, with a track recorded and producedby Goldmund.
Goldmund's Personal Bio:
I've lived either immersed in, or on the fringes of , the music industry for most of my life, but usually on the businessend. I guess I was playing it safe, and maybe being a little afraid, buttrying to be sensible and knowing that if the time ever came that I feltready, at least I'd already know my way around. I've always gigged andplayed music wherever I've gone, but purely for the love. Until recently,I've never really tried to get anything released commercially, but asyou'll see when you read on, it's nearly happened by accident a few timesanyway!
Born in London... Was making tunes with the bleeps on my 8 bits before I could get hold ofa traditional instrument...
Moved on to double tape deck overdubbing with walkman headphones as apickup and a very suspicious looking guitar shaped keyboard! Spent most of my teenage years in Ireland . Sister Fionnuala Feelyheld the mic to the guitar while I recorded what I could manage on thetape deck in Brittas Bay!
At sixteen or so, I walked into the offices of our regional radiostation, East Coast 103FM, in my school uniform on my lunch hour andhanded the manager a tape of me trying to be a DJ. He must have beenshort staffed or stunned by my amusing resolve because he asked me tostart that Friday night. I turned up expecting an evening of training,carefully watching what he did so I could learn how it all worked, andspend years answering the phone.
Nope.
He gave me a tenminute rundown of the controls and said
"Right, I'm off, I'll comeback for you at 4am" and starts heading for the door.
I'mincredulous. "Aren't you going to stay with me and make sure I do itok?"
"Nope- you want to learn to drive, go into the citycentre!"
And that was it. He was off with a cheery: "Good luck- Iforgot to get you a key cut so if there's a fire, put a chair through theglass doors and run like f**k".
Blimey. Ok, here I am running my own radio show. Ho hum. Oops, scratcheda record. oops, played dead air instead of the news!
It gets easier. One day, I ask "have you got the new single by {so and so}?"(can't remember who now!), and the manager says "no, I haven't been downto the record shop yet this week"
I say "What? We buy our records?"
He looks at me like I'm stupid and says ""Well where else would we getthem?"
I said "Well, I don't know, I'd have thought the record companies wouldhave sent them to us for free in exchange for us playing and promotingthem, surely it's free advertising?"
"Naah, don't be silly, not us, we're not that big"
But actually, as far as I could see, we were. We had been a smallpirate radio station called Viking, but a couple of years back, the Irishgovernment had handed out 17 official licenses to the best of them. Ifigured that being one of 17 stations in twice as many counties wasn'tbad at all, and we covered Wicklow and a good portion of SouthDublin.
So I said "Well, have you tried? Asking the record companies?"
"No! Don't be silly!!" Laughter.
"Well, do you mind if I do?"
More laughter. "No! go ahead! Be my guest!
There's plenty more laughter throughout the day, about the schoolboy withthe goofy idea. I'm laughing too, but I'm determined to try anyway, so Istart making some calls.
A couple of weeks later, the records and promotional products start tocome in. Yahay! I'm rolling! Stuff for on air giveaways. Invites toparties and slots to interview bands. Backstage passes. I get more andmore involved, till I'm backstage at every gig in Dublin. Everyone knowsme. I put people in touch with eachother, everything's great. I play allthe up and coming Irish bands just like John Peel in the UK and get areputation for being helpful.
In a small town, however, jealousy and resentment are never long in poking up their heads,and I ended up out on my bum. I was drowning my sorrow's with fellow DJMr Fantastic (Now known as Mr Spring on RTE's2FM) who, notably, had been producing some records for Zig &Zag at the time, and he was sage. "Graveyard shift radio, man. Whof**kin' needs it? You can do much better than that. get out there and doit!". I'll always remember that kindness. So off I went, to the new worldof contacts I'd made in Dublin.After finishing school in Wicklow, and in between various winter jobs intelevision (RTE), radio, record label (Liffey Beat, Peer), promotion(Rape Crisis Centre Benefit Concerts) and press jobs, I used the summersto busk around the country with my accoustic guitar, sofa surfing,sticking out my thumb and seeing where I ended up. Popular busking hauntswere Grafton Street in Dublin, Shop Street in Galway, Derry, Belfast (care of Tiberius' Minnows) andMaynooth.
It was a great time to be a busker- everyone knewand helped eachother out. Other buskers in the communtiy at thetime included Glen Hansard of The Commitments and TheFrames, Mundy, Paddy Casey, The Big Geraniums,Cion O' Callaghan, Colin Scallon and Simon Taylor(now known as Disgo Du), many of whom went on to great recorddeals and success. You can find many of them here on myspacetoday!
Moved to New York, took an A&R job with the now legendaryFiction Records/ Songs, home to The Cure and, among others,Neneh Cherry and the Stereo MCs. I gigged away my sparetime at venues like Sin-/Sin-e and Anti-Folk haven "TheFort" in Sidewalk in the company of the likes of JeffBuckley, Lisa Loeb, Paula Cole, Spacehog,Lach and Major Matt Mason.
My shows were attended by folk as diverse as Molly Ringwald,ayoung Liv Tyler and, most proudly, writing legends TimothyRose (The original version of Jimi Hendrix' "Hey Joe") and ChipTaylor.
When I first met Chip, quite by chance in the worldmusic section of Tower Records on Broadway, he mentioned having beeninvolved in the music business once upon a time as a songwriter. Now, when you work in the music business, youhear this phrase a lot , and usuallyit means that they once played a song in a pub when they werer hammeredat college. So, being the nice, polite guy I am, I humoured him and said,"Oh really? That's great... Anything I might have heard of..?" To which he replied, "...well,yeah, maybe... Have you heard of a song called 'Wild Thing'"?. Ifelt a bit stupid then.
Turns out he'd written the classic "Angelof My Morning" too. I do this kind of thing a lot- read on... Fairplay tothe guy though, he came to see me play anyway, and I couldn't have beenmore thrilled!
A friend of mine, Poppy, from Maynooth, near Dublin, was in New Yorkworking as a model and staying with Denny (a friend of her family's) in aspectacular high rise apartment with the classic glamorous Manhattenbalcony etc. I'd met Denny a couple of times round there and he seemedlike a nice old chap but he pretty much left us to ourselves. One nightthey threw a party there and I showed up with my guitar and ended upbanging out some tunes with. of all things, some guy on awashboard... drinking stupid amounts of whisky and generally doingwhat I do, which is having a good time, really, really well. What can Isay, I'm a professional. I left no tune, drink or foxy young vixenunturned.
Anyway. I play this great session, drink too much. Howmuch? Well- after two showers the next morning , my taxi driver - who I was urging to get me to an urgent meeting as fast as he could fordouble the dollars - asked me (through the bullet proof glass if youwouldn't mind) if the meeting was important and had I had a couple ofshots of whisky to steady my nerves! Now that's some shamelesssaturation. I'm not proud.
Anyhooo.. A couple of weeks later I'mround at Poppy's with their neighbour Andrew and I'm thinking, f**k, Denny's got a lot of CDs. Theonly person I knew with that many CDs was me, and that was because Iworked in the music biz and got them all for free by swapping cataloguewith all the other labels. And then I notice a little blue card, which Irecognise as a Polygram Music/ Records visitors badge. I know it, cosI've got a bunch of them at home myself at the time. So the wheels slowly turn and I ask Andrew :
"Does Denny have something to do with the musicbusiness?"
Andrew: "Oh yeah! He's, like, some big deal guy at Island Records.Actually, f*ck, yeah , I forgot to tell you this, he's been going round everyoneasking who this great kid Goldmund playing guitar at his party was, sayshe wants to talk to you about your music!"
Me: "You f**ing twat, thanks for letting me know!"
Andrew: "Uh, yeah, sorry man. You should give him a call" Me: "NoSh*t!"
So weeks and weeks go by. I keep thinking, I should call that Denny guy.I look him up. Turns out he's Denny Cordell, Head ofInternational A&R for Island Records. For those of you thatdon't know, A&R are the guys that find the new bands and sign them, offeryou the big contracts and the dancing girls etc. He signed TheCranberries. He signed my friends from Dublin, The Frames. Heproduced and, it seems, more or less discovered Tom Petty. The listgoes on- look him up, check your album covers, he's probably all overthem.
So anyway, more weeks go by. I'm still thinking, I really shouldcall Denny. I'm busy. I think, I'll drop into his office next time I'm atIsland down on Lafayette Street. You see, I'm in the musicbusiness, working as an A&R guy myself, and I'm always thinking, "isn'tit a bit lame being an A&R guy and trying to push your own stuff on yourcolleagues and industry friends?" So none of them really know much aboutthe music I do, it's a hobby. Things like this hold me backunnecessarily, and I manage to not call for probably three months, but Iknow I'll bump into him again at some point, and I can introduce thetopic again then... all cool like, none of this begging puppy on thephone business... there'll be plenty of time. So I get on with things,ready to take that story up again later.
In the meantime, I'm walking down Broadway one day when I bump into oldfriend from the Irish music scene John Connor, of The GoldenHorde.
Me: "What's up John?"
John: "oh, I''m out shopping for some clothes, want to help meout?"
Me: "Sure, no problem, I've got nothing much on for a while, what sort ofthing are you looking for?"
John:"Oh, um, something black I suppose"
I'm thinking, no surprise there, all he ever wears is black, he's in aband from Dublin. So we wander around a couple of vintage places lookingfor bits and, searching for inspiration, I ask if there's a particularoccasion he's trying to dress for.
"Oh, um, yeah, uh, a funeral actually."
me: "Oh, sh*t, man. Sorry man". Foot in mouth again. "God, um, er,anyone, er, close? Sorry..."
John: "Um, eyah, well, uh, sort of, did you know Denny Cordell?"
me: "erm.. yeah... I did. Sh*t, yeah. Oh gutted man, sorry"
Gutted. On soooo many levels. Oh well. Rest in Peace, Denny and cheersfor the encouragement! Hopefully we've made a few people smiletoday!
I start thinking about going back to London for a while, to check out themusic business there, and finish up at Fiction. I was meant to head backabout then, but some stuff came up and I ended up hanging out an extra few weeks, doing some projects for various other labels.
What came up? Well, I think I'd been playing in Sin- /sin-e, orAn Seo next door in Manhatten's Lower East Side when a guy calledDave asked me if I'd like to record something. We were all a bit worsefor wear and I didn't take it too seriously. I was imagining a littlefour track cassete recorder up in his studio apartment somewhere in theBronx kind of thing. So, like I do, I leave it for a few weeks, thenrealise I've got a few new songs I'd love to try out on a tape, so why,not- I dig out Dave's number and make the call. He gives me the addressand I'm relieved it's actually in Manhatten, not miles away and asks meto come down at eleven in the morning on whatever day it was we agreed.I'm thinking, who the f**k feels like singing at 11 O' clock in themorning (unless they're still going from the night before) but figure, ohwell, beggars can't be choosers and make the date.
So, on the day, I rush over in a sweat, late as usual, wondering whetherI should have brought my own mic or borrowed a better guitar. My voice ishoarse and I'm mildly hungover from being plied with booze by a bandeager to make contacts in the industry the night before. I find theaddress, in SoHo, and I'm thinking, "this is all a bit nice. .. maybe he still lives with his mum and dad. Dave's folks must be loaded..."The place is full of art gallerys and stuff. You've seen them in the movies, you know the sort. Whenever there's a fancy New York gallery, it's around this area.So where's the door... oh right here it is... I realise I didn't ask whatbuzzer it was and think shit, I'll have to find a payphone and call. But,hey, while I'm here, I'll just check the labels on the door, maybethere's one called Dave's house. Hey... stop laughing, you never know.I'm hungover, don't want to walk to a phone and have always been luckywith stuff like that. So I wander over to the numbered door, and thereare in fact very few buzzers, and there's one marked "Green StreetStudios". And a plaque. So I'm chuckling now, thinking, "this Dave's agreat one, bigging himself up with the plaque and everything. hehe. Ormaybe that's not it, and it's one of the other bells..? No, f**k it,let's try this one first. So I give it a ring.
me:"uh, hello..?"
Lady's voice on intercom: "yep- Green Street Studios"
me: "Um.. oh... right, um, er... is Dave in?" ("Is Dave in?" What am I,six? "Can Dave come out to pway pweeeease?")
Lady's voice: "Uh, yeah, sure, is he expecting you?"
me: "Uh, yeah.. Goldmund Byrne..?" I say it like a question,because I'mnot too sure now. There's a Dave in there alright, but is it theright Dave (I used to worry alot, can you tell?)
Voice: "Yeah great, he's waiting for you, come on in!"
*door buzzes*
I go in. The door opens more or less straight onto stairs and the journeydown them is punctuated with disc after gold and platinum disc. SonicYouth. Salt-n-Pepa. Others I was too stunned too absorb. Sh*t, maybe Ishouldn't have had that 14th drink last night.
So I go down stairs, Dave's there sober now, and really warm andwelcoming. I feel really bad for thinking he was a student with a tapedeck and turning up hung over. They put me in Studio A with my ownengineer and tell me I've got all day. Transvision Vamp's WendyJames is mastering her new album next door in Studio B. I chat toher, clueless, and nearly die laughing at myself when I suddenly realisethat I'm sat with my old classmate David Carthy's favourite obsessionfrom teenagedom. His wall was covered in pictures of her, he wanted to gofind her in London (can you imagine? "Herrooo, Wendy! I weally wuvyoooooooou!!")
It's all just too funny for me, the day just keepsgetting more surreal. Wendy plays me her new album. She comes in andchecks out what I've been recording and tells me I've got a lovely voice.We arrange to meet up at a gig we're all going to later- Pulp and Blur (Iforget who was supporting who).
What a nice lady. I loved her tunes as a teen but hadn't fancied her likemost of my mates did, but I&..39;ve got to say, stood there in person (andbefore I even realised it was her), she really was one of the loveliest peopleI'd ever seen or met, with the most gorgeous and incredibly colouredeyes. I saw her weeks later on my way out of Sony and she stopped herentourage to chat and say hi and offer to send a finished copy of thealbum to Green Street for me.
Anyway, on with Green Street. I record some acoustic sessions. I get amega band together to record everything. Haggis, ex bass playerwith The Cult on bass. Johnny Cragg, drummer for Spacehogand ex of The Hollowmen on drums. Joe McGinty of ThePsychedelic Furs says he'll play keyboards. Erin from the studio isgoing to do backing vocals. It's all looking great, everything'shappening. By accident maybe... but that's how I like it! But then destinydecides to take me another way. My other half at the time got a call fromher relatives in Texas, saying that her Grandma's alzheimers was taking aturn for the worse, and if she wanted to be sure to see her again, weshould come down before heading back to the UK. So we agreed to spend sixmonths down south and then go straight to London from there.
So... next stop Dallas, Texas, with nothing much to do except gettoo hot and bring myself up to date with sequencing and computers inmusic...
London calling once more for a while doing label work again andmaking some hip hop for a change in the tunes.
Next- Germany for a while, gigging all the Irish and American pubsI could find, and running Jam Sessions with lines around the blockat The Fat Lady Sings in Erlangen near Nurnberg with somefantastic musicians like Dave Jackson.
Back to the UK in 98 where I started teching up studios for oldfriends like James Atkin of the notorious EMF, did sometours. Went back to dayjob-land for a while after this, working for a fewmajor corporates before starting my own consultancy. Now making music inbetween bouts of other work.
Have recently rebuilt the studio and been relearning how everythingworks- all the software has changed beyond recognition, it's likestarting again! All the while banging out recordings as and when I havethe time... These songs are generally written and recorded on the fly-the aim is to get them in good enough shape to sell them on for others toperform! All support and encouragement welcomed, you lovely, lovelypeople!
Rating will help me pick songs and styles to focus on- I love making somany different types of music and have nowhere near recorded anythinglike my best yet!
Thanks for caring -
Goldie! :)
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