The Devlinsrecently released their fifth album,All The Days,via Blue Elan, which stemmed from a coming together of LA-based Colin Devlin and UK and Ireland-based Peter Devlin, Guy Rickarby, and Mark Murphy in Dublin to record together. They had previously toured together pre-pandemic, with a goal to create some new music, and throughout the subsequent years, Colin continued building up a cache of songs to bring to Producer and longtime friend Rob Kirwan (Hozier, PJ Harvey, Depeche Mode) and the rest of the band.
The songs on the album are reflective and personal, looking at the life experiences and perspective of the band over time, and they also needed the personal quality of the band getting together to record much of the album live in the studio. The energy behind the songs has something of that core concentration drawn from their in-person interaction, while vocals and other instrumental parts were built around that core. Songs like “All The Days” and “Behind the Sun” hint at a light that transcends the clouds of the unsettled modern world while tracks like “Holding On” and “Ruins” confront the repercussions of the past. I spoke with Colin Devlin about the use of perspective and the contemplative atmosphere that makes All The Days feel approachable.
Listening to this album, I feel like I can tell that it encapsulates a number of years of life experiences. It has that level of observation to it.
I agree. You can tell that sometimes, with a good book. I’d written a lot of songs and I was working with Rob Kirwan, an old friend of ours. Rob and I were actually at school together, and he’s done so many amazing records, like with P.J. Harvey and U2. We went through the songs with him, as well, to whittle them down. I wanted to arrive with songs fully formed, with their structure and lyrical content fully finished. I’ve Produced quite a lot of records here in LA with different people, and I like to do it very live. Kirk Pasich, the boss of Blue Elan, and I started Producing records together. We get on great, so we kind of like to go in and get really good friends or session players and do things quite quickly. I think the more that you do that, the more confident you become that when you do that, something special happens.
I think I wanted to take that approach into our own record. I talked with my brother Peter and the guys and said, “Let’s just make it in Dublin and make it the way that we want to make it, as much as we can live.” Even though I recorded some of what’s on the record in my studio here, and we built around that for a few songs, the other half is live and in the room. Vocalists were usually added afterward.
The reason I wanted to do it in Dublin is I didn’t want to do too much sending stuff back and forth. If you’re a band, being in a room together is what makes it special. We were right in the center of Dublin, and it was very concentrated with a week here and a week a couple of weeks later. Something similar comes across in the record, I think. It feels like we’re a band, and we’re playing. I don’t think we could have made it better than it is, and that’s how we feel about it. That alone is a success.
That’s a really satisfying feeling that you took it as far as it needed to go.
Yes, and we’ve been together such a long time that it’s kind of an emotional thing. There’s so much tied up in us playing together. Rob is also great at cracking the whip and is a great decision-maker. I think, aesthetically, we’re coming from the same musical tastes.
Had you worked with him before?
Just on a couple of tracks here and there, not a full-on musical relationships. I’d sent him some of the demos that I did here in LA, and he said he’d love to do it. He’s also a great engineer, and I think that gives it a cohesive feel throughout.
I do think the whole album has a similar mood, and it’s a reflective space with a meditative feeling that runs throughout it. I find that tone and consistency interesting. It is interesting that you’re a Producer, as well. Do you have to take that hat off to allow someone else to Produce?
When you make that decision, you have to let them run with it as much as you can if you trust them. But also Rob and I work really well together, because he trusts what I do. I did all the vocals, for instance, here, and I’d send them to him. I’m so used to doing that. But I didn’t want us to Produce it ourselves because if you get the right person, they will bring something special to it. Rob brought so much to it and helped bring it to another level.
It would be a lot to carry to be the songwriter, and working with the band, and also have to be the Producer. It’s also that they bear some of the mental burden and provide an outside view.
I totally agree with you. It wouldn’t have sounded the same without Rob. It’s also having someone who you respect, musically, in the room, another intellectual point of view looking from the outside in at what you’re doing. It can be very helpful. Rob also drinks Guiness, so it made going to the pub after the recording session very easy. We could just order five pints of Guiness!
That’s of utmost importance in a crowded bar, an easy, fast order.
That was the thing that really sealed the decision to have Rob!
What had Peter, Guy, and Mark heard of the songs before you got together to do the live recordings? That’s a short period to have to get it down in the studio.
They had heard all the demos and all of them were pretty much fully-formed. We’ve been in short situations before, and if the song isn’t finished yet, or ready yet, you’re going to run into that problem very quickly. I wanted to avoid that and make sure that I felt the songs were as good as I could make them in terms of structure and lyrics, but then everyone added to the songs to make them more special. I kind of laid out a blueprint and said, “We can do anything within this structure.” Things also change in the studio when you realize that something is not working. You can do that within a structure that’s good. A good song can be played on the piano, guitar, or kazoo. That’s what I was aiming for, and then the guys brought their own sensibilities and talents to it to make it even better than what I’d initially put down.
The song “All The Days” was partly what I’d recorded here, then building on top of that. “Holding On” was basically built on top of what I’d recorded here, the same with “Ruins.” But all the other tracks were basically, “Here’s the song, let’s go in and record it.”
I would describe these as fairly complex songs, with plenty of layers. The atmosphere is created very carefully. Hearing that it was recorded live does not mean that this has a rough texture. The energy, I think, is live, but the texture is very refined.
Exactly. There’s something that happens when four people play together in a room that’s very special, when it works. I feel like we wanted that element of toughness, that feel of playing, as the basis. Most of the keyboards were done after the initial recording because it’s easy to build on top of that. Most of the keyboard and piano lines are almost like guitar lines, which is great when we’re playing live, translated into guitar. Rob adds beautiful washes and atmospheres of guitars on top of the rawness of it. Guy is a great live drummer, who comes from a Jazz, Charlie Watts-kind of background. He’s got that groove. Everything flows very well live.
A lot of these songs allow room for instrumental sections, particularly in the intro, and that kind of expansiveness must allow for that addition you’re talking about.
There was no thought about length in terms of making singles. We chose “All The Days” as a single because we thought it was just really uplifting and had a great vibe to it. It’s been incredibly well received, which is great, and we played it at some shows over the summer. The guys are coming out for a gig at The Whiskey, a 10th anniversary of the Blue Elan show, and we have a gig in Dublin on October 24th, which will be a lot of fun. I’m really looking forward to that. It’s the first time I’ve really looked back at our earlier songs from a fan point of view, since we haven’t played them in a while. I could never really see that before, so it’s been interesting.
I’m not surprised that people are responding to “All The Days.” This imagery and idea of an “angel of mercy” is something that I think a lot of people can relate to across belief systems in the context of seeing all that’s going on in the world. It made me think of the fact that all people feel overwhelmed and are reaching for help from somewhere.
Yes, and there’s the idea of “Angel of Mercy, where are you now? Come down from the heavens, you’re losing the crowd.” It’s humorous but also very poignant. With all good songs, they start with how you feel, and I think if you touch on something, you know that other people are going to feel that, too. A song like that is uplifting because I needed it to be uplifting for myself at the time I wrote it. You can feel that in the track. With the song, “Slipping Through Your Hands” that has a vibe there at the beginning that I just wanted to run.
That lays the emotional groundwork, for sure.
Then it comes in with the lyrics. It leaves it open, am I talking to myself, am I talking to my younger self? As a songwriter, you often don’t really know, and I think that’s okay. I think that’s a good thing.
With that song, it’s enlightening to think about it as talking to oneself at a younger age. Because when we’re younger, we do think that we can be in control of everything, and write our own story. We do later criticize our past selves, but this song is more confrontational.
Right, it’s not patting my younger self on the back. It’s quite harsh! I don’t know if it’s specifically me. It has an uplifting chorus, but the lyrics are not very uplifting.
The atmosphere creates a space for this confrontation.
Yes, exactly. The song “The Meadow” is very contemplative also, to get back to your point, and a dark beauty to it.
Something of the same upbeat atmosphere that we find in “All The Days” comes up in “Behind The Sun.” Not every song has to have that, but it’s nice. It’s not forced into all the songs, which I appreciate. As it happens, “Behind The Sun” has that, showing the horizon in the distance.
That really is one of those songs that’s about trying desperately to keep in touch with that innocence, and that positivity, and that joy of life. Knowing that you can find that, if you know where to look, in your daily life. It’s also about memories, like when I mention “Good Vibrations in my head.” Good Vibrations was actually not the Beach Boys song, but the shop in Belfast where the Punks bought their records. I remember going there as a child with my older brothers. It was hardcore Punk!
The lyrics also mention “No Romance and Punk’s not dead.” No Romance was the shop in Dublin where they sold all the Punk clothes. [Laughs] It’s just a meditation, thinking about those things. That’s an example. I also mention Simple Minds records that I loved at that time. Whether people pick up on that or not, it’s just my train of thought, my stream of consciousness. It’s about that time, and that excitement. It’s hard, when you get older, and things change, to try to still be in touch with that joy and excitement in life.
That’s an example of how an encounter with your past self can be positive, like a breakthrough.
That’s it, yes! I hope that comes across. That’s a great one that we’re looking forward to playing live, as well.
