Who We Were (The Suffering Gaels : A History)

"Still in Therapy!"Check back later. 
28 March, 2002
Suffering Gaels pay the piper....off
reprinted with permission from The Gilmore News

15 August, 2007
Local has-been jumps sinking ship shocker !!!

12 August, 2007
Conor Byrne Exit interview leak !

A controversial document leaked to The Gilmore News. www.myspace.com/thegilmorenews

13 August, 2007
Irish Emigrant session migrates.......

Seattle's longest running Irish session disappears after eight years.

23 August, 2007
NW Irish Music Community Reeling from Loss: "Ta, Finn!"
Beloved Finn McGinty takes off for "greener" pastures. We wish him every success in all his endeavors. Click on this link to read information on Finn.

31 December, 1969
Archival materials
What was going on before The Suffering Gaels. (We were suffering back then too, just under different names.)

Suffering Gaels pay the piper....off

March 28, 2002

In a desperate bid to revitalise their floundering career The Suffering Gaels today unveiled new line-up changes. Spokesperson and image consultant for the aging folk group, Aisling Ireland, explained the thinking behind the move. "When I came on board the first thing I noticed was the attention that people gave to the piper in the band. At their performances the only question people have is about the pipes..all they want to know is what the hell is that yoke your man with the beard is playing. This gave me an idea and over several tense meetings I got them to re-arrange themselves. It was difficult to do but they soon saw the benefits in changing. I mean, it's just Irish music and no-one has any great interest in it. It's not like people have conventions for this stuff " the blonde bombshell laughed.
" At first, they fought the idea but when I explained how easy it was to play the thing they came around. With three pipers in the band, of course we needed a musical instrument to fill out the sound and Tom elected to switch to the fiddle. Well he will when he finds out about it on his return from Japan. I think he'll enjoy stepping out of the limelight as front man for the band...let's face it, he's been carrying the load for a long time and it's time the other three shared the burden.
The band is delighted with the change. Legendary ex-fiddler Dale Russ said" It's such a simple idea really I don't know why I didn't think of it before. The fiddle is such a hard instrument to play and the pipes are so easy. They don't have any strings you see, so no problem with tuning and messy rosin. I won't have to work as hard and people will ask me all the questions.
Conor Byrne was equally as excited. " For me it's perfect" said the white-haired entrepeneaur " Sure and didn't I learn to play them when I was two and a half. Now I'll be able to relax on stage and not have to worry about the technology of the fiddle. I'll be able to concentrate on my singing and then I'll be the first piper to be able to sing and play at the same time"
On hearing of the change Mac Ginty's first question was"Play the pipes? What are they?" After the band assured him that he wouldn't actually have to play them but just move his fingers and elbows at the same time he went along. "Sure that's just like playing the guitar"
Disgruntled former employees of the band, Tomas Mulgradient and Peedo Giollamhuire, said last night.........continued on Page 3. 


 

Local has-been jumps sinking ship shocker !!!

August 15, 2007
 

Celebrity News .

Local has-been jumps sinking ship.
Biff McGurgle, local icon, "entertainer" and rat impersonator caused a furore when he announced his intentions to "jump ship" in the middle of a long tour aboard the luxury cruise ship,the USS Amerikay. McGurgle complained, via his lawyer Wilheim Von Gallaway, that the ship was sinking and that he intended to use his skill as a rat impersonator to " get the hell off the ship before the women and children made things difficult."
Mc Gurgle is not the first "entertainer" to take the easy way out. Over the years such "entertainment" luminaries such as
Mel "Black Sheep" White, Martin "The Organ" Parkinson, Eugene "Stompman" Dillon, Aidan Brennan-on-the-Moor ,and Conor Byrnepub all jumped ship and swam to "safety" over the years. No-one has heard of any of them since and it is feared, or hoped by some, that they all failed to " make it" and are adrift aimlessly on the sea of life, far away from the warmth and safety of the mother of all cruise ships.
A myth has grown around these ship-jumpers.....local folkmusic afficionados have it that they are all well and live on a mythical green island somewhere over the horizon. An island where the road will always rise to meet you and the wind will always be at your back.
This myth has been well and truly busted by the Dept. of Outlandish Security . Spokesman Gordon"Buzz" Burridge said that
"People need to be more careful with what they not only say...but with what they think as well. It's not the first time that a miniscule part of the population invent a faraway land that's somehow better than the mothership. Why there's even a tiny number of insignificant migrants who believe there is a land "downunder" where beer flows and men chunder...they even have animals that bounce for Gawd's sake" If such a green island exists then it means your on your face on the road, and you have a draft on your back..not a good scenario mite"
Rumours have surfaced about The Gilmore New's attempts to re-locate to an undisclosed location. These rumours are, as yet, unprovable and are scurrilous in the extreme. Some one has made allegations and the sooner the alligators are apprehended , the better.

 

Conor Byrne Exit interview leak !

August 12, 2007

The Gilmore News has come into possession of a leaked memo.. purporting to be the minutes of Conor Byrne's exit interview upon leaving the The Suffering Gaels. Those old fogie- folkies among you might remember them as a little-known and not much liked musical group with vaudevillian tendencies who played in some of the lower class dives in this town back in what we thought were the good old days ....now with the benefit of hindsight how wrong we were. Byrne was never seen again but then again nobody really went looking for him. Foul play was suspected at the time, but since that term was also applied to their "musical"stylings the disappearance of Conor Bynre has gone un-investigated.

An internal band memo from the Suffering Gaels exit interview with Conor Byrne, tells the whole sordid story. A jack-booted Human Resources Director for The Gaels refused to comment on the memo saying only that "….any member of the band's entourage caught leaking or even taking a leak would be severely punished" The Gael's HR division is famous for it's closed door meetings and devious underhand methods. In the cutthroat world of Irish traditional music they set the bar for low and dastardly behavior. Invited musical guests had to sign wavers stating that they wouldn't play better than the band.
HR:
So, Conor, is it okay if I call you that.
CB:
Whatever Dude.
HR:
We'd love to know your feelings as you leave this great organization to which we owe allegiance.
CB:
They're a bunch of wankers.
HR.
Sorry Conor but that is language inappropriate for an exit interview. We only want to hear the nice things you have to say about the band so we can leak it to the Gilmore News. Any negative stuff will be heard behind closed doors..... which will also mute the sounds you will make during your exit beating.
CB
Right so. They're not a bunch of wankers…they're a bunch of feckin' wankers who I pulled outta the gutter and through sheer grit and determination I honed into the …"
………….…tape muffled here as exit beating starts earlier than scheduled.

There you have it....a young musician cut down in his prime and The Gilmore News vows to search out injustice like this....especially if it has a good photo and a catchy headline....and will continue to .....contd. Pge 103

 

Irish Emigrant session migrates.......

August 13, 2007

Shock ! Horror ! Musicians out of work....and that never happens.

After being in place for over a million years, The Irish Emigrant Session has been cancelled. As per usual for bar owners closing down sessions, the new owners waited until the end of the last session to inform people that it was in fact the " last "session". Not for them the common courtesy of saying that the next session would be the last session, thereby allowing the session host, Leo Mc Namara,.. a chance to organize a huge blow-out session to celebrate the eight years he spent hosting it.
Luminaries such as Frankie Gavin, Martin Hayes, Kevin Burke, Danu, Dale Russ,Tom Creegan, Conor Byrne (for fecks sake), Dave Cory, Sara Cory, Damian Werner, Barry Foy, Suzanne Taylor, Hanz Araki, , the New York Phucking Philharmonic all have sat in on this long-running musical gathering.
The denizens of the bar, all twenty-two year old girls and their devilishly-handsome
boyfriends were shocked at the announcement.
Kimberly, a girl with devilishly handsome breasts said "Like Omigawd !...I can't believe it's over....It's like the end of The Gilmore Girls.....or the last episode of Lost " Her devilishly-handsome boyfriend said "like Dude.... it isn't right...I mean , Y'know, like....what are going to do for Irish music now.....it's not like you can buy it on iTunes..."

For the last couple of years Leo was accompanied by guitarist , Biff Mc Gurgle.
Mc Gurgle was devastated and refused to be interviewed for this piece, until we offered him some money and then he wouldn't shut up...
"What am I supposed to do now" he whimpered" I came to this great country to better myself...I traveled by coffin ship and had to eat my shoes to survive and now this.....what are my kids going to do ?...Okay I don't have any kids...but what if I had...No-one cares about my imaginary kids......it's like...Omigawd I'm so not LOL "
McNamara and McGurgle hope to keep their duo together by reworking their old vaudeville routines and were last seen heading for the Catskills.

Leo can be found every Sunday banging out the tunes at Paddy Coyne's

from 6 - 9 PM.


NW Irish Music Community Reeling from Loss: "Ta, Finn!"

August 23, 2007

Finn is a native of Coole, County Westmeath in Ireland's midlands. He first played American country music before moving on to rock and roll. It wasn't until the mid-eighties, while living in Japan, that he began to play traditional Irish music. Finn moved to Seattle in 1989, where he met the rest of the Gaels, now Crumac and joined the group as their singer and guitar player extraordinaire. His diverse musical background and inventive energy lends a highly distinctive quality to the music of Crumac.

Finn is also in demand as as a Voice Over artist and actor. His first film, Lost on the B-Side is nearing release. Lots of information on the film at http://www.lostonthebside.com/

He performed in Samuel Beckett's "Rough for Theatre 1" in Tokyo in 2006. http://metropolis.co.jp/tokyo/658/stage.asp

He has produced several decidedly not Irish albums with Kirk Marvin http://home.comcast.net/~kirkm05/

Samples of that music can be found in the Kirk Marvin Folder at http://tinyurl.com/lmf5y

 

Archival materials

December 31, 1969

Under development