In 2004, Declan O'Rourke released his debut album, Since Kyabram, garnering critical acclaim and announcing the arrival of a major songwriting talent. Two decades on, he's releasing a 20th anniversary edition of Since Kyabram on limited edition vinyl and CD, including never-before-heard bonus material.
Below, Declan explores the legacy of the record that changed his life...
I like that something that once meant something only to me, that was secret to me, and born through me, has slowly transitioned into something I feel less connected to over time, but that has become a part of other people's lives, in a far-reaching way. People I will never know in far-off places. I sometimes get a glimpse, when I hear a story firsthand from someone after a show or the like.
There are the everyday stories of people with loved ones, singing their kids to sleep. Or someone who listened to something on a beach somewhere I'll never see. And I think, wow, I’ll never see it, but my voice sang there. A guy who played cricket for Ireland once told me he’d psyched himself up for World Cup games in South Africa by listening to Marrying The Sea on headphones as he approached the oval each day. These are wonderful gifts, but just glimpses. Perhaps it’s also the thrill of sensing what the iceberg holds if these are only the tip.
Watch: Declan O'Rourke sings Gallileo on The Late Late Show
I said I feel less connected to it over time. My feelings have not diminished for it, or my nostalgia for all that it represents in my own life, the experiences that led to it, or that came from it. It is further away from me, and continually pushed farther away, by time, by other experiences, and by the fog of existence and accumulated memory. I wonder if that’s what a mother sometimes feels like, when her child is growing up, and is drifting away a little further at a time from her sphere of influence. It’s not a sad feeling, but a proud one.
If you believe in something, and give it your everything, it can manifest in ways you will never dream of, and change your life.
I don’t listen back very often. I was reminded recently that for a time, every once in a while, as a ritual, I would go for a drive when I’d finished a new record and listen back to them all, one by one, in the order they had appeared. That was fun if a little indulgent. But there are 7 now, and that’s a long drive. Whenever I do listen back to Kyabram though, I am flooded with memories and the warmest of feelings, not just for having achieved what I envisaged for the songs which I am very proud of, but for the people who shared it with me and gave so much of themselves, for the songs themselves which I still love to sing, and because it taught me that it’s true… if you believe in something, and give it your everything, it can manifest in ways you will never dream of, and change your life. That if you take each piece of a puzzle and work on it carefully, with the philosophy that you only have to get it right once, then you pull them all together, you will be rewarded for your perseverance.
There are no guarantees. But you will give it your all anyway. You may not get it right every time. You may sometimes miss the mark. But trying makes you better. And if you do all of the above, and if you do something because you love it blindly, you will find that however much you grow older or change, no matter how many years have passed, you will have something that you are proud of, that you can open again and dive into at any time, and something you will revel inside as one of the most golden and luckiest treasures you may ever come to know in your life.
Since Kyabram: 20th Anniversary Edition is out now on coloured double vinyl and double CD.
