The new Celtic renaissance

Its indie acts were once ignored. But songs about the Troubles, poverty and oppression are now going global- and changing how Ireland sees itself

- Anna Cafolla

On a hot Saturday afternoon at Glastonbury, the Dublin garage punk quartet Sprints whip up a mosh pit with their charged tune Descartes, Irish tricolour flags bobbing above them. At Japan’s Fuji rock festival, new songs from Galway indie act New-Dad enrapture the crowd. Travy, a Nigerian-born and Tallaght-raised rapper, crafts a mixtape inflected with his Dublin lilt, the followup to the first Irish rap album to top the Irish charts. Efé transcends Dublin bedroom pop to get signed by US label Fader, and on Later ... With Jools Holland, George Houston performs the haunting Lilith - a tribute to political protest singers everywhere - in a distinctive Donegal accent. From Melbourne to Mexico City, concertgoers scream to that opening loop on strings of Fontaines DC’s Starburster, and CMAT’s viral “woke macarena” dance to her hit single Take a Sexy Picture of Me plays out in festival pits and on Tik-Tok. You might have heard about Kneecap, too. Ireland has always had a fair few punks, ravers and big indie acts, be it the Cranberries, Ash or Bicep, but it’s never had an alternative music scene quite as robust or diverse as today’s: Lankum, Gilla Band, Pillow Queens and Chalk are some of the other acclaimed names, alongside a thriving underground rap scene. It’s now so successful that it is redefining what “Irish music” is, as doors open to musicians once left out of the country’s cultural conversation.