Interview with The Academic

Interview with The Academic

The Academic are definitely up there with some of the most promising Irish acts of 2016 in my opinion. With an incredibly loyal fanbase, unique sound and great attitude, I would certainly consider myself a fan.

The lads are playing a headline gig in Vicar Street, Dublin this coming Friday night (March 11th), which I will be popping along to, so if you're around the area, this is one not to be missed!

I caught up with some of the guys during the week to talk about that gig, support from their hometown of Mullingar and, well, all things Academic-ish.

"We all met in school! Matthew and Stephen are brothers so they've always been playing music together. We were heavily influenced by guitar bands growing up. We loved The Strokes, U2 and The Killers. It's always tough starting a band. In our case, we just gigged around so much that eventually word started to spread. It all happened quite organically." 


I'm always interested when I interview acts who have worked tirelessly to reach their desired success as to what they recall as being the major turning point in their career. The guys however believe that their rise was a gradual one but getting airplay in Ireland and the UK was a huge plus.

"It’s hard to say if there was a specific turning point. What a lot of people don’t know is that we had been out on the road, playing a lot of shows and building up a fanbase around the country and crowds were getting bigger at very show. It definitely helped when radio here in Ireland and the UK started playing our debut single 'Different', there was definitely more awareness around the band."

And that awareness has undoubtedly grown and grown over the last 12 months in particular and the lads admit that the whole experience has been quite humbling.

"It's been an amazing year! We have been humbled by the amount of support we have got. When we started out in a shed when we were teenagers we always dreamed of having our music on the radio, playing to audiences that knew our songs, getting to meet some of our heroes along the way… Looking back over the last year we have achieved a little bit of that. The support from our fans has been incredible, old and new." 

The Academic have a strong connection with the town of Mullingar in County Westmeath, a town that has a reputation for producing musical talent with names such as Niall Horan, Bressie and Joe Dolan all hailing from the midlands and the band say that the support from there in particular, has been incredible!

"We're very grateful for all the support we get in Mullingar. It's where everything started for us, all our first gigs were pub gigs all over Mullingar. There is a real sense of community there, it’s a small town, tight knit and the people there have been brilliant. We are very proud of our Westmeath roots!"

 As I mentioned in my intro, the guys have a hugely anticipated gig coming up in the iconic Vicar Street venue in Dublin next Friday and it is one that they are understandably very excited for!

"We're so excited! It wasn’t long ago, maybe a year, that we opened for Delorentos in Vicar street. It was probably the biggest stage we had played on to that point and now to be headlining our own show there is so surreal. I’m sure on the night there will be a nervous energy before the show but once we get out there we will do what we always do…turn it up loud and play like we always do!"

Although the guys have had a notable amount of success recently, I firmly believe that this gig will propel them forward even more because they are an extremely talented bunch and they even feel themselves that they have so much more to give!

"We want to play to as many people as possible! We will be out across Ireland, the UK and Europe a lot this summer so we are really looking forward to that. I’m sure there will be some new music in the not too distant future!!!"

You can check out The Academic's debut single 'Different' right here! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nu8M3Cw6fuU 

EOIN!