Scary Eire
I’ve been on the lookout for this session for a while but watching the fallout from RTE TV’s ‘Ireland’s Rappers‘ was the spur to look again, a comment on the Irish Times ‘On The Record’ blog by Stevie Grainger rang true:
“I’ll never forget the buzz i got listening to the “Truncheon Song” by Scary Eire on the Dave Fanning show in the early 90s”
One more search and there it was. The audio quality is not the best but I think you’ll get the picture. If anyone has the remaining two session tracks or indeed a higher quality version of please get in touch.
Formed in 1990 Scary Eire were a pioneering Irish hip hop outfit featuring Dada Sloosh, DJ Mek, Mr Browne and RiRa. In 2007 they released a compilation ‘The Scary Era’.
More reading: ‘Beats, Bodhráns and Bloody Mayhem – the story of Scary Éire‘ [state.ie]
Truncheon Song (1993)
On March 19th Dan Hegarty played two tracks from the 1993 Fanning session which he said was not easy to track down. Unfortunately I was not prepared so had to listen back to the show on the RTE player and only caught one track. Thankfully Ian Wilson has announced that Dan will rebroadcast the entire session on Easter Monday so tune in or check back here after that date.
Hold Yer Whisht (1993)
February 23, 2012 at 8:56 am
Aas thinking pretty much the same thing. missed the first few minutes of the RTE Irish rap documentary & was wondering if any reference had been made to Scary Eire.
Seen them in the venue opposite the Bad Ass Cafe (just a few doors down from Comet Records) in Temple Bar in the early 90s. Can`t remember the name of the venue.
Has there ever been an item on venues? I used to almost live in the New Inn in Clanbrassil Street run by Smiley Bolger. Into Paradise (personal favourite), Blue Angels, Fatima Mansions, Engine Alley, Slowest Clock, Real Wild West, Wilder, Coletranes (later Revelino), The Garden Hasn`t Changed Much, Swinging Swine, Honeythieves, Power of Dreams, Dixons, Moby Dick, Candystore … the list goes on.
Memory is somewhat fading & maybe not all of them were in the New Inn, but most for certain.
Highlight for me was a secret gig That Petrol Emotion played (prior to Trinity Ball, I think).
February 24, 2012 at 7:04 pm
A few names there that have not yet featured Thomas, I’ll have to get on it!
February 26, 2012 at 11:37 pm
hould your whist and lost for words were the other two tracks as far as I remember. they also did a radio session for Midlands radio three at the time, which was very impressive
March 22, 2012 at 5:52 pm
@Thomas Erbsloh
That venue might have been The Rock Garden, gig was either late ’93 or early 1994 I think. They’d been singed to Island records by then and Adam Clayton was lurkin about. Mr Brown lit a massive spliff the size of a baton during “Yeah”. Was a good night, but not as good as the Barnstormers gigs the year previous imho
March 22, 2012 at 10:25 pm
According to Ian Wilson on twitter Dan Hegarty will be repeating the full Scary Eire session on Easter Monday.
March 24, 2012 at 8:03 am
That venue was the Rock Garden and that night was probably the night they played with Marxman. Their track ‘Lost for words’ may have been on record by then (a sampler 12” on Tommy Boy records). If the Midlands radio three session Shane mentioned is the one known as ‘Zone HQ’ that circulated on cassette in Dublin at the time it is very impressive indeed. It is not only an excellent example of a group introducing themselves but in the conceptual delivery of how they designed it (a live megamix with rap) it is document of hIphop itself at that time.
Ri- Ra opens up with ‘i remember, i remember back in the days when people were amazed by the hip hop craze’. This was a significant reminder that the individual members had a good 10 years in the game by the time record companies featured.
March 24, 2012 at 11:11 pm
Adding ‘Hold Yer Whisht’
April 27, 2012 at 11:42 pm
repeat of the 1993 live radio session on RTE 2FM Dublin