Episode 1 I Lár an Aonaigh

APPLAUSE

Oh, well...!

Oh, yeah -

"Pulpit of Dean Swift." Yeah.

"Here lies the body of Jonathan Swift,

"Doctor of Divinity and Dean of this cathedral,

"where savage indignation can no longer lacerate his heart.

"Go, traveller, and imitate, if you can,

"this dedicated and earnest champion of liberty."

Here we are.

-Oh, wow.

-Here - here is Gulliver.

"The emperor lays on a table three fine silken threads

"of six inches long.

"One is blue, the other red, and the third green."

Now, Gregory, you read, "One is red, one is blue and one is green,"

but that's not what's in the printed text.

Indeed. In the printed text, it says,

"One is purple, the other yellow, and the third white."

So, what was the issue?

Well, the issue is that blue is the colour of the Order of the Garter,

the primary order of chivalry.

Red is the colour of the Order of the Bath, the second,

and green the colour of the Order of the Thistle.

Swift is getting at the system of political favours.

-Oh, sort of buying honours.

-Exactly!

-Ah!

-Exactly.

The publisher could see whom Swift was getting at,

and the trouble, therefore, he might be in once this got out.

So, he toned it down.

Why, what were the consequences for the publishing?

-Imprisonment.

-Right.

The printer felt Swift's satire was getting far too close to the bone.

"Vision is the art of seeing what is invisible to others."

-Lovely to have you here.

-Thank you.

Happy birthday. Two years old.

Yes! Two years old, as a band. It's insane.

-It's insane how much success you've had, too.

-Yeah, it is.

Everything's happened very quickly, it kind of hasn't stopped for us,

-so, we're just taking it in our stride.

-Well, it's no wonder,

because the songs are so anthemic.

They really have struck a chord with the Irish listeners,

with radio listeners in particular. Ryan, you're the main songwriter.

When you go about writing a song, do you think about, you know,

-striking that anthemic chord?

-Yeah, I do.

I always say, like, when I'm writing a song,

if I can't imagine a room full of people singing it back to me,

then I just kind of abandon it a bit,

because that's the kind of music we want to produce,

is big, anthemic, uplifting music,

cos we thought there was a gap there,

because a lot of music was kind of dreary and downtrodden,

we wanted to bring out some uplifting music,

-so, yeah, I definitely think about it.

-And inject some fun.

-Yeah.

Also, social media has been a big, big thing with you,

and getting you to this point,

-so, tell me, would you be the ultimate social media band?

-Um...

I don't know, really.

Like, we're very into social media, of course,

and we take it very seriously, what we do on social media,

and we're still in charge of our own social media,

so, everything we post comes directly from us,

and we try and post every day.

Like, people used to call us a social media band at the start,

but we never saw ourselves like that, I don't think.

-No.

-It's developed.

There is lots of social media bands who are just social media bands,

or singers, or whatever, but they can't translate that

to then going and playing gigs and stuff,

but straight away we had just a mad fan base

that just wanted to see us playing straight away.

Well, that's it - the connection is there with the fans, for sure.

Look at the gigs - you've sold out the Academy,

the string of gigs at the Olympia, now the SSE Arena, the 3Arena.

How are you dealing with the success and the fame?

We try not to think about it too much.

You have to let it over your head a little bit,

or else - you don't want to get complacent, or anything like that,

but, you know, we're so thankful and appreciative

of absolutely everything that's happened to us so far,

and we'll never forget that it's the fans

and the people that support our music that -

-they're the reason that we're here, like.

-And last word to Jimmy.

Yeah... I agree with everything he says, usually!

-And that is the key to your success!

-Yeah, definitely, it is!

It's everybody that listens to our music,

like, everything goes over our heads,

we're still very grounded,

and we just want - at the end of the day,

we just want people to enjoy the music

-as much as we enjoy producing it.

-Well, we are enjoying it.

For a small league and a minority sport, we've been very lucky,

and we've won a lot of international competitions.

2001 was the first international competition,

and our men's team took part in it, and we actually won that.

The following year,

it was the first version of the AFL International Cup.

We went in there as huge underdogs, as a new team,

and we won that against the odds.

Ireland have actually won it twice.

We're hoping to win number three this time round.

Our ladies' team has been hugely successful, as well.

They've won, like, six in a row, European Championships.

They won the first ladies' AFL International Cup in 2011,

got to the final in '14, and they're hoping to win this year.

The biggest challenges would be competing with other sports.

It would be, still, very much a minority sport here in Ireland.

We might have to stagger our playing season,

so that it doesn't compete directly with GAA.

Our other challenges, of course, then, would be financial.

The League and the organisation

doesn't receive any external government funding

at all at the moment,

so, all this success - and despite all this success -

we continue to have to self-fundraise for every tournament.

Hopefully, we can come back with two World Cups,

which would be phenomenal,

and continue our success at that level.

Going forward, we'd love, even at a small level,

just to grow the sport, get a few more clubs established.

We might get to a stage

where we'd have a full-time development officer here in Ireland

to promote and grow the sport.

CHEERING AND APPLAUSE

# There's a thousand things

# I've wanted to say

# But I've never been brave

# No, I've never been brave

# And you deserve

# The whole world

# An island to yourself

# You're an island in yourself

# And I think it's time

# That I tell you

# How I feel

# This is how I feel

# And I get lost

# When I'm with you

# And you'll hear me say

# Never change, baby

# Stay the same lady

# That I've known for so long

# Never change

# There's a hundred places

# I've wanted to see

# Would you see them with me?

# Would you see them with me?

# And I don't care

# Where we go

# Cos you are home

# You are my home

# And we can stay

# In cheap hotels

# Let's just pay to entertain ourselves

# And I get lost

# When I'm with you

# And you'll hear me say

# Never change, baby

# Stay the same lady

# That I've known for so long

# And I'm your man, hear me

# Scream your name daily

# Who I've known for so long

# Never change

# And I will take you with me

# Everywhere I go

# Pack your bags, we're leaving, baby

# I want you to know

# That loving you is easy

# I thought I'd tell you so

# And I want you to know

# Never change, baby

# Stay the same lady

# That I've known for so long

# Never change, baby

# Stay the same lady

# That I've known for so long

# And I'm your man, hear me

# Scream your name daily

# Who I've known for so long

# Oh, oh

# Never change

# Ooh, ooh. #

APPLAUSE

APPLAUSE