*Gearoid Devanny. Photograph: Ruth Griffin
ALL-IRELAND fever has gripped Co Clare with an East Clare musician coming out of retirement to pen a ballad in honour of the warriors in saffron and blue.
Feakle native Gearóid Devanny has taken inspiration from Mundy’s ‘July’ with his new tune ‘Clare for Liam’ which was released on Tuesday in advance of Sunday’s All-Ireland final.
Among the lyrics are ‘King Lohan takes up his stance, he tells Ian Galvin it’s time to dance, Tony Kelly ships into top gear, SODs and Rodgers will send us on beer and ‘The county’s gone berserk and there’s no sign of Kinnerk’ plus ‘Eibhear bombs it down the line, Duggan wins it every time, McCarhy’s frees will ease our fears and Ryan Taylor is back he’s got some set of gears’.
There has been great pride for Devo at getting to include the names of his fellow parishioners Eibhear Quilligan and Adam Hogan in song. “It is super to get to include the lads in the lyrics, they’ve given us so much over the year, I wasn’t going to write anything until there wasn’t too much hype about it and I said I better do something.
“It is important to name as many as players and if I’m honest I was disappointed I couldn’t name everybody, maybe if we get the win I might get a chance to add another verse or two and name everybody. The set-up in Clare is pretty good at the moment and things are going in the right direction”.
Indeed it was the All-Ireland final that brought Gearóid out of musical retirement. “COVID finished my illustrious career in music,” he quipped. “I got a fit one night, nobody had any song done for the final so I said I’d give it a spin and an hour or two later I had a chorus”.
When asked if it has reignited his passion for music, he said, “it has and it hasn’t, this is exactly what I wanted, I don’t think I’ll go back to the slog of gigging three nights a week but I may be available for special occasions and appearances”.
Of his music career, he recalled, “I played a good bit over the years, I started wth Sean Tobin, he is not with us anymore, I started with him in 1995 on New Year’s Eve, I’ve been in and out of different things and was in different bands. I did the wedding circuit, people say to me around here that I’ve married half of East Clare but I never did the music full-time”.
Within “the guts of two hours” he had the whole song finished, “over the next day I tweaked one or two lines because I wasn’t happy with them”. Among those to assist with getting the song out were Matt Purcell who allowed his recording studio to be used, Máirtín Torpey who did the music and mixing and Eoin Leonard for providing the drum beat.
Working as an accounts relationship manager with Finsa, Devanny is also the Director of Rugby with Scariff RFC. Living in Tuamgraney, “they are nearly claiming me” and affiliated with the Bodyke club he admitted, “my first love is hurling”.
Others songs released include ‘Come on the Banner’ by Ennis’ Damien Gormley and ‘Back the Banner’ by Lochlann O’Malley from Kilnaboy.
