Two Brothers Jamie Martin and his brother Richie funnel a lifetime of musical experience into their folk duo Cry Monster Cry. By Jonathan Keane They say the bond between siblings is nighon unbreakable, with an emotional and intangible connection that two strangers – or even good friends – who have simply met somewhere along the line could never hope to duplicate. That bond is evident in the ebullient folk rock of Cry Monster Cry, a Dublin-based duo consisting of brothers Jamie and Richie Martin. The siblings’ acoustic sound could only be described as honest. This honesty and, sometimes, solemn grace and charm, is palpable in the songs of their debut EP, The Fallen. Cry Monster Cry’s music is beautifully simple. The brothers, equipped merely with acoustic guitars, may have that ‘stripped down’ sound – a cliché overused when referring to folk music – but it’s still one that’s warm and inviting. Their sound boasts countless alluring melodies, and the effort and care put into each composition is apparent. And yet, despite the fact that the brothers seem musically to be a natural fit, the formative days of Cry Monster Cry were, in some ways, an accident. “We always played music together in the house,” recalls Jamie, speaking down the phone from a windy pier in Howth on a sunny Sunday evening. “We never wrote music or anything. My brother was in a few bands but I’d never been in a band before. When the last [band] broke up, we decided to give it a go, writing songs.” It seemed like a natural confluence of events. Even their parents were musical – particularly their mother, who played violin. “When we were younger, our parents used to play a lot of music for us,” says Jamie. “When we went on trips, we’d 52
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listen to a load of music in the car.” While both are guitarists now, the brothers’ first forays into learning instruments at an early age saw Jamie take on the piano and Richie the violin. It was only in the years to come, as the two became more and more involved with music, that they found their love for guitars. “We grew up listening to everything and playing everything. When we were younger, we always went to gigs. I was sneaking into friends’ gigs when I was 13 and 14. We’d listen to Thin Lizzy and we’d do covers of anything. The music we’re playing at the moment, I suppose, just comes naturally to us.” Jamie notes the folk-driven direction he and his brother have taken musically: “We didn’t set out to be a folk band, we just started writing these songs and that’s what came naturally. It was just a matter of writing songs, it wasn’t too serious.” Perhaps it would be fair to say that Cry Monster Cry has never become too ‘serious’ in the strict meaning of the word but, as the months progressed for the two, it certainly became more deliberate and determined. It was around mid-2010 that the duo, which would later become known as Cry Monster Cry, began to take form. Really coming into themselves in 2011 in terms of writing and recording, the brothers Martin made their presence known with The Fallen EP, recorded with producer Keith Lawless in Studio 2, Malahide. A short and concise effort, the EP, if anything, laid down the duo’s intentions for the future. Plenty of positive press followed, much to their
pleasant surprised. Yet Cry Monster Cry were not content to rest of their earlywon laurels, and the duo has made many changes since, particularly to their live show. “It’s been really interesting because we started the band as just a two-piece,” says Jamie. “When we played gigs before the EP it was just the two guitarists. That was it. It was great but, when we recorded the EP, we did 90 per cent of the instruments ourselves, but obviously we wanted to play them live. We recruited some of our friends who are fantastic musicians”. This saw Cry Monster Cry expand to a five-piece with bass and drums, added to the fold for the full live-band experience, and Studio 2’s