CIARAN MCMEEKEN: From Sportsman To Musician
An interview by Lauren Sanderson.
Auckland based singer-songwriter Ciaran McMeeken released his self-titled debut album this month. To celebrate the anticipated release the acoustic singer has been travelling the country. First stop: his hometown of Dunedin, then Queenstown and Wellington. Before he ends his tour at Auckland’s Tuning Fork on Thursday I grabbed five-minutes with the musical genius to discuss his career so far.
Where does your love of music come from?
I remember getting into music when I was twelve when I first heard Nirvana. My appreciation for music stems from there and at the same time I was playing drums in a rock band, so I was listening to old classic rock bands like The Who, Led Zeppelin and ACDC.
What was the name of your rock band?
We had many. The original name was Homemade Jam, which then got shortened into homemade and then it changed into Strange Dayz.
Have you always been into music?
Not really to be honest, growing up I was heavily into sports like cricket and rugby. Even when I was playing music it was only a thing that I enjoyed doing on the side, it was never a focus for me. My focus was always on sport up until the last five years.
So, how did it all begin for you?
About four year ago I moved over to Australia from New Zealand when I was about 19 and that’s when I left the life I had behind. I went travelling and I brought my guitar with me and started dabbling in song writing. I ended up coming back to New Zealand because I felt lost. When I got home I had a rock bottom moment and I remember my mum calling me up on a couple of things and that’s when I knew I had to commit myself to music. I felt as if it was my calling but I was so scared of doing it. I had a fear of performing live, which stopped me from committing to music, so I confronted it by going to open mic nights and writing songs in my parent’s spare room. It was a really challenging time but eventually I got through the other end and it was all worth it.
You released your debut album this month, how does it feel?
It feels slightly strange, especially after this conversation because we’ve touched on were I’ve been and where I’ve come from. It’s surreal, I remember years ago I was like how the heck do people write albums. I could barely write one song never mind twelve. At the time, it seemed like an impossible task but the last two years has been full on song writing. I wrote in collaboration with some other song writers nearly 50 songs for this album, which got refined down to 17 and then the final 12.
How do you come to that decision? It must be hard choosing just 12 songs out of a possible 50…
It’s an art form in itself actually putting an album together. The 17 were relatively easy to pick but choosing the final 12 out of the 17 was the hardest. That’s when you really have to question who you are as an artist and how you want your music to come across because there were songs on there that would take the album in a whole different direction. It was a big decision and certainly not one that I made by myself. I had a bit of help from my producer Greg Haver.
You mentioned it took you two years to put this album together. A lot can change during that time. Do you find that anything has changed for you?
I would say my taste in music hasn’t changed dramatically. An interesting thing happens when you release your music because you literally do release it from your being and it’s no longer yours, it’s the peoples. I find I can’t listen to music that I have released in the past, it’s like an old jacket that doesn’t do it for you anymore. I think it’s important to make the most of the time that you have when the music is just yours.
How do you go from working on a farm to producing your own music and creating an album? Does it feel surreal?
Recording is such a joy building something from the ground up. For me a lot of my songs are written with the acoustic guitar so to now play with a band is pretty special. The energy involved in creating this album is un real, many amazing people working together to help put it together. It’s a big journey from the conception of a song to the recording of it as the song takes on many shapes and forms. It’s cool to listen to it now and see what it’s become.
For your track That Feeling, you worked alongside Ellie Gouding, One Direction and Miley Cyrus is that true?
Yes in a way, the lady who I wrote that song with has done a lot of writing with those artists. I only had 20 minutes with her and it was meant to be a one on one mentoring session, were I talk about my career and get advice, but I was like if I only have 20 minutes with the world’s greatest song writer then I’m going to write a song. The seed of that song was born in that 20 minute session and I ended up taking it home and really crafted the lyrics. I then brought the song to my band and we ended up playing it together and it really came to life.
Do you have a favourite track on the album?
Definitely. The last song on the album is called Spanish Steps and it’s a special song to me now but it wasn’t when I first wrote it. I wrote it with a guy called Sam Taylor in Sheffield in the UK but it wasn’t until I got back to New Zealand and my producer and I went through all of the songs and he said we have to record Spanish Steps. He loved the song so much because it brought back memories from his childhood and triggered nostalgic emotions in him. It’s now actually the most important song on the album because it captures the essence of me as a song-writer. It’s crazy to think we weren’t even going to record it and now it’s the backbone of the album.
Who’s on your Spotify playlist at the moment?
I’m actually listening to some CD’s at the moment. I was using Spotify until about six weeks ago when my car got crashed into and written off. I had a stereo in there that I could link my iPod to but my new car has a CD player in it so I’m using that. I had a Thomas Oliver CD in my desk and its unbelievable, such a wonderful album. Thomas was influenced by Ben Harper back in the day and I was also heavily influenced by him, so I went and bought some of his CD’s. I’ve gone back to some early acoustic routes and I’m really enjoying it.
If you could duet with anybody, who would it be?
The person who is naturally coming to my mind is Bob Marley. I would have loved to have been there in that era with him, it would have been pretty special.
Well there is still hope as he has a few sons…
He does! I think he has ten sons, I could reach out to one of them and hopefully one would say yes.
Any advice for budding artists?
The music industry is an untrainable beast and it’s pretty daunting. My advice would be to take a leap and commit and think about it long term. We are lucky in New Zealand to have New Zealand on air which sets up a structure for young musicians to follow. The funding is great and helpful but for me the most important thing about the new tracks scheme is it gave me a structure and all my thoughts about not being good enough went away. You’ve got to be grounded and willing to do the hard work. I got some great advice from a farmer once and he simply said just get on with it and that’s exactly what I would say now.
Ciaran McMeeken will be performing the final show of his album release tour this Thursday the 10th August at Auckland’s Tuning Fork. There are still tickets available from Ticketmaster, but get in quick as there are very limited spaces left!
