Microstate
Visit www.MicrostateMusic.com
Put two monkeys in a room with a typewriter and eventually they'll write Macbeth. That's the theory that Microstate blow out of the water, writing hit after hit in what seems like the heartbeat of a hummingbird.
One bleak Donegal morning, Seamus McHugh stared vacantly at an empty can of Red Bull while Mark McClean casually strummed a guitar. 1 hour later, the classic "Body & Mind(Red Bull song)" was born.
There followed a latent period of 5 years while the world readied itself for more musical genius. And by god but didn't that genius arrive in the Porterhouse North one Mater Res-party night in 2006, when the seeds to "Buckets of Craic" were drunken sown on a field of dreams and brilliance.
Fast forward to Tahiti 2007, where stunned crowds gathered to witness the first live performance of the finally completed "Buckets of Craic" song. Imagine their rapturous joy when they realise that another, equally brilliant song - "The Bends" - had also just been penned on their beautiful island. Some say there are likenesses carved from wood in Polynesia today resembling Mark McClean that locals worship as a deity.
An extensive South American tour followed. The now named "Senor Spiffy Pinguino" McHugh/McClean combo meal began work on their first album, a concept piece loosely based on the story of a tragic scuba diving accident. Their diligent perspiration and inspiration often in the face of outright ridicule was rewarded on the salt plains of Bolivia when they celebrated completion of their debut album - "For Tips".
Not ones to rest on glories past, Senor Spiffy Pinguino's creativity continued with unabashed aplomb, penning the anthem "Affable Fucker" during a turbulent time in a flat in Glasnevin. This was followed by a purple patch, one saturday morning in Clontarf, when 3 songs were written in a one hour period. Some say the sky that day turned a darker shade of blue, and the birds themselves hushed in the trees out of respect for the historic occasion.
Rocking the Ballycastle faithful at Healyfest 2008, Senor Spiffy continued to reinvent itself. New equipment, a new outlook and new direction necessitated a new name - and so Microstate was born, during a tour of Europe's smallest nations and principalities.
At Healyfest 2009, crowds braved the wet and cold to listen to the now re-invented McHugh/McClean tour de force. Joined on stage by Mairead on violin, Dermot on drums, and Padraig on Bass, 3 people 'collapsed query cause' as the musical soundwaves hit their cochlea, stimulating previously undiscovered pleasure centres and potentiating a transient seizure.
Where to next for Microstate? A growing facebook fanbase combined with recent shout-outs on 2fm radio have encouraged two introverted fragile souls to quest for more. And so, to the recording studio they went in mid-october, hope in their hearts and music coursing through their veins.
Their numbers swelled by the formal expansion of the band to include the irrespressible Mairead and unstoppable Dermot, Microstate descended upon SALT Recording studios. All four swam through a river of blood, sweat and tears to emerge, cleansed and victorious, clutching the new "Microstate EP" in their collective fist.
By the end of the day recording no fewer than 5 sound engineers had been drafted in sequentially to relieve their collegues who had been reduced to quivering masses of jelly as the tsunami of emotion that is Microstates music threatened the watershed regions of their cerebral circulation.
Despite a considerable garda presence at the lauch of the EP in O'Donoghues Pub, Baggot St, riots erupted as demand outstripped supply for the new EP. It's rumoured that a Mr "Alan Dunne", one of Microstates most dedicated fans, is wanted for questioning with relation to the trampling of 3 elderly genteman unlucky enough to be passing between him and the new EP at it's release. Far from expressing disappointment, Microstate have released a statement applauding this enthusiastic display, and question why more people were not trampled that glorious day.
Where to now for the band critics have hailed as "The new Beatles, if the Beatles had been better"? As the cult following that is the Microstate faithful surges past the 120-mark, live performances and shameless self promotion are demanded by the fans. The shanghai-ing of Ails McCabe to the vacant Microstate managerial post only serves to make eventual world domination by Microstate all the more inevitable.
We urge you to watch this space.