They see to your bins and light your streets . . . but that's not all county councils do. Did you know they might also give you a few bob to get your album off the ground? JIM CARROLLfinds out how
YOU’RE in a band. You’ve spent a couple of months playing shows in front of your mates, rehearsing in that dump of a shed down the road and writing songs. The time has come to try to record those nuggets and, naturally, you need a bit of cash to do this. So who do you call?
Many acts around Ireland are tapping an unlikely source for these funds – their local council. One case in point is Katie Kim, whose acclaimed debut album Twelvecarries a credit on the back sleeve thanking Waterford City Council for funding.
"Conor Nolan works with the council and he is the reason Twelvewas possible," Katie Sullivan, the band's frontwoman, explains. "He gave me all the information I needed to get grants to put the album out. There aren't many people who work with town councils like him."
Nolan is the Waterford City Council arts officer and he has pointed hundreds of Waterford bands in the right direction since he took up the job nine years ago.
“Back in 2000, we had a programme going with Waterford Music Network called Teenage Kicks,” he says. “After a while, we realised that we had a load of requests from really young bands, bands who would be 14 or 15 years of age, so we did a process with the IRMA Trust the following summer where we ended up doing 51 recording sessions.
“On the back of that, we bought some gear, appointed Lorne Carson as Ireland’s first engineer in residence and he started working with those young bands and recording them. The bands, who were the 14-year-old and 15-year-olds then, are now acts like O Emperor, acts who are the top of their particular league. It’s great to see how they’ve developed.”
He admits that it took time to persuade the council to fund these schemes.
“For too long in many council minds, music – and specifically pop music – wasn’t seen as an art form. But they’re coming around to it, especially when they have social inclusion programmes on the go.
“Now, when councillors have people getting onto them looking for rehearsal or recording spaces for their children’s band, they’re able to point to these programmes that the council are doing. More and more councils are doing it around the country too, which is great.”
Up the road in Wexford, Adebisi Shank are an act who have also enjoyed the benefits of local government funding. Band member Mick Roe explains that he found out about the bursary scheme operated by Wexford County Council’s arts office by accident.
“My dad told me about it originally because I was totally unaware that the council had funds or financial help for musicians. I think the main problem for bands like us is that lack of awareness. Once you fill in the forms and send them away, it’s grand, but you need to know that those grants are there in the first place.”
The band received €5,000, which "pretty much" covered the costs of recording their album, This Is The Album of A Band Called Adebisi Shank, in Baltimore with Aloha guitarist TJ Lipple.
“The council didn’t look for anything in return bar a mention on the sleeve to say they had supported the work, which was absolutely fine with us,” says Roe. “If I got €5,000 from a record label, you’d be contractually bound to do all sort of mad stuff.”
John Haggis runs the Granny It’s OK label in Waterford and has seen how council funding has helped many young bands in the city. He sees such assistance as hugely important – and not just in financial terms.
“Over the last few years, you’ve seen a community of young bands like that coming together down here,” Haggis says. “It starts with Teenage Kicks for the kids down in Garter Lane, goes up to Conor as the arts officer and goes up to the studios. Everyone seems to rally around when people need a bit of advice. At a time, over the last 10 years, when Ireland has been losing a sense of community, the music industry has been gaining that with the help of council involvements like this.”
But Haggis says bands need to be realistic when approaching the council for financial help. “A lot of bands would send in proposals looking for the best amps, drum-kits and studios and they’re only up for a grant for €1,000,” he says.
“It shows you that they haven’t sat down and considered it seriously. It takes a band maybe a year or two to figure things out, get grounded, work out how to deal with people like the council, work out what’s best for them and grow as musicians.”
Adebisi Shank’s Mick Roe believes bands should not rule themselves out of funding because they think the council wouldn’t be interested in the kind of music they’re making. “A lot of my friends in bands have not applied for grants because they don’t think the council will support bands like them and that they’re looking for more pop acts. From my experience, I see them supporting some fairly unique artists like ourselves.
“If you look at some of the proposals sent in, and I don’t want to sound mean here, they’re just not as impressive as some of the stuff indie bands around Ireland have done.”
The man with access to the cash notes an increase in bands approaching him for funding. “We have three different grant processes for arts funding at the council and we’re hugely over-subscribed,” says Conor Nolan. “We’d usually get 48 or so applications between all three programmes; this year, we’ve got nearly 90. The economic climate does effect these things.
“But we do want to fund as many bands as possible who are doing original material right across the musical spectrum. I want to talk to those bands who have the cop-on to go out there and do something right and see how we can help. We want to make them realise that it’s a slog, but the harder you work, the more chance you might get something out of it.”
