You’ll have to draw your own conclusions here!
The artwork of Soda Blonde’s sophomore album Dream Big is subtly subversive. In the foreground, a befurred woman looks away disinterestedly from a man, perhaps a potential suitor or a lover past his use by date. Upstage, two couples appear to be partying hard, ill-intent etched on their faces. Through an open door, a girl floats above a bed recalling a scene from The Exorcist. If the music therein is not quite as disturbing as the tableaux suggest then it does help shift perceptions beyond the notion that Soda Blonde are just another Irish rock band. There is a profundity inherent and a sense they make music and present themselves to the world now on their own terms.
‘The process was different. I got sick of drawing a conclusion in each song to what I was trying to say,’ singer and primary lyricist Faye O’Rourke says. ‘Through Covid I was… f***ing fed up of myself, of coming in saying, “Here’s all my feelings.” Adam [O’Regan, guitarist] wrote lyrics for the song Bad Machine for example. It was a much more immersive experience.’
I’ve been interviewing Faye O’Rourke since her days co-fronting Little Green Cars, the band that died so that Soda Blonde could rise. For 11 years the four members that now make up Soda Blonde toiled with Little Green Cars’ other singer, Stevie Appleby. Now, as Dream Big shows, the members of Soda Blonde are positioned to overtake their previous vehicle but it is a process: The Exorcist image, a non-too subtle nod to that.
‘A lot of the songs for the first album were written when we were actually with Little Green Cars,’ Faye says. ‘This is the first out-on-its-own-two-feet Soda Blonde album. The best thing now is that we are a proper band and we are f ***ing amazing.’
Initially, the band tried to be their own managers, booking agent, chief cooks and bottle washers but have allowed others in to share the load. But Faye says she is disillusioned by the music industry and sings of her findings on the impressive counterpunching Midnight Show.
‘To be a musician is almost a form of prostitution, doing all the things we are told we are required to do now,’ she says. ‘All the social media stuff; I’ve always felt a bit of anarchy towards that kind of thing. I don’t want to fall out of love with music because I have to do all this other shit. I like to think that people are fans of Soda Blonde purely due to the calibre of our music.
‘We don’t give them a gimmick or another angle or give much of ourselves away.’
She has however always been frank in conversation and says people can ascertain her opinions on life in her songs. The song WWDWD (When We Die We Die) she explains, reflects her spiritual beliefs such as they are and on the passing of her grandmother. ‘I haven’t actually worked out what I believe in. I’m inherently, deeply flawed,’ she says with a laugh. ‘But I think that when we’re done we’re done. My grandmother passed away in February. I don’t think you could have had a closer grandmother grand daughter relationship than ours. I was with her for the five days and nights during her palliative care. I was accepting, it didn’t freak me out but you realise the brutality of death as things just shut down.’
She confesses she is not very good at writing positively but is trying to become ‘more of a glass half full person’. Her marriage to actor and musician Fionn Foley earlier this year has helped in that regard.
‘It definitely suits us both but marriage was not something that I felt I needed to tick off my list,’ she says. ‘It was just a commitment that we were both excited to make; He’s a very good match for me.’
Faye is working on more material for Soda Blonde and a solo project is in the offing. ‘I’m making a record with an Indian ragga pianist,’ she reveals. ‘The guys are really supportive… we have such a strong sense now what we want to achieve with Soda Blonde.’
The industry has been warned. Dream Big is out now. For live dates, visit sodablonde.com