Catching up with DJ Shampain, Galway’s Renaissance man
By Dylan Hudson
It would probably be easier to ask Cóilí Collins, stage name DJ Shampain, about what he isn’t doing at the moment.
The Inverin man could well claim to be one of the busiest men in Galway, with the last couple of weeks being particularly noteworthy.
The dance music DJ, Freak Magazine co-creating, TG4 show presenting, ‘Ceol For Catherine’ performing, Stephen Walsh testimonial brace scoring, hair cutting guru, sat down across from me after he attended to his last customer of the day.
“Hey man, how’s it going, what do you want to talk about?”
His new EP, Millennium Madness, seemed like a great place to start, with the DJ appearing to be relieved that I was not interested in talking about his whole career backstory – I am a busy man too after all.
It’s his first full length project, taking just about 12 months to put together the EP that captures the sounds and atmosphere of Galway City (with the help of many collaborators, most notably Julie Dawson of Newdad fame).
“The music actually only took around 3 months [to put together], I wish I had properly kept track of it, but I didn’t.”
“It began as something to do at the start of the year,” he continued “I wasn’t too busy with gigs at the time, so I was just working and going to the studio afterwards, forcing myself to try and make stuff.
“There was never a real plan to make a track project, I just kept making tracks and seeing how they fit together.”
By June, the barber released the EP Catching Up with Myself.
“I put that first EP out in June, which was made in April. It helped in solidifying the whole thing really,
“I wanted it to be a random collection of tracks with Millenium Madness being the more cohesive, polished, listen the whole way through.
“So overall I’d say three months for the music, but twelve for the message and collaborations to fall into place.”
The idea behind using the sounds of the city to create the experience featured in Millenium Madness came to the Galwegian at a moment of boredom rather than as a result of a long dreamt-of ambition.
I had admittedly expected a more complicated answer about how the capturing of sounds around the city took place than I received:
“I just used my phone.”
“I was bored, in my studio, which was in the Claddagh (the artist now creates music at home), and got stuck on a track, so I cycled up to Claddagh Basin and just recorded the water for ages.
“With a lot of tracks I’ve made, there’s elements to them that could just be [for example] an owl which then becomes part of the percussion.
“In this EP I wanted to actually use the field recordings as they are and so when you listen to it, it sounds a field recording and not this weird percussion.
“Since I’ve been a teenager, I’m walking around Galway, listening to music all the time. I kind of wanted it to sound, that if you were in Rome and listen to it, that it sounds you are listening to music in the different seasons in Galway.
“I think it gives more life to it, all these tracks are made with machines [usually], and this just gives them life, to me anyways, I guess it’s how I hear electronic music or even just convey it.”
Fans of the Spider-Man: Miles Morales PlayStation title, will liken this creation, as I did, to a series of side missions in the game which sees you collecting sound samples from around the city to create a track.
“That’s exactly it, yeah” the music producer agreed, despite having never played the game. “I need to play that actually, but that’s it.”
Catherine Connolly, Stephen Walsh, and side quests
Just like in video games, Cóilí’s life is full of “side quests,” something he unsuccessfully claimed he would be finished with pursuing last year.
“I remember I said on my Instagram at the end of last year that I would do no side quests this year, and this has been the year of my most side quests, definitely the most valuable side ones too.”
Notable among these journeys was performing at the “Ceol for Catherine” event, late in now-Irish president Catherine Connolly’s voting appeal run.
“It was amazing really, a really cool experience.
“Dance music is supposed to be independent, and it’s supposed to be freeing. It comes from transgender and gay, bisexual, underground, black culture in America,
“To honour that sort of thing by being a part of a night for a president who definitely respects all those things, it’s really cool, especially when you consider the names that was there as well.”
Despite being as he claimed, “disillusioned” by party politics, the dance music artist relates strongly to Connolly’s running as an independent candidate, being an independent artist himself.
“I am a fully independent artist, run an independent business too. I wish I wasn’t so much so sometimes and I’m sure people that work with me wish the same.
“A lot of the really big Irish artists are independent, but they have label backing and management and stuff like that, which is really cool and fair play to them.
“For me party politics over the years, not that it’s a waste of time but I have become very disillusioned towards it, so to asked to be involved and to have someone who was fully independent be the president and be from Galway is quite cool.
“Oh, and I almost forgot to mention that she’s serious at football too,” he added with a grin.
The sport is another passion for the Galway Dance Music DJ, a die-hard Galway United supporter, who has been attending games in Terryland since the age of 9.
His month was made even more surreal when asked to play in club legend, and record appearance holder Stephen Walsh’s testimonial just a couple of weeks ago, in which, he is by no means shy to mention, he scored a brace.
“To play for Catherine Connolly and in Stephen Walsh’s testimonial in the same month, that was crazy,
“It was insane; to be honest I’ve always wanted to be professional footballer, then I wanted to be a journalist, then I ended up being a DJ, then I ended up being barber and then back to being DJ.
“I was watching the Spurs vs Arsenal game yesterday, Eberchi Eze (who managed a hat-trick against his rivals) was doing his post-match interview saying “I always dreamed about this,”
“I was sitting with my housemate saying, I actually know how he feels, I lived my dreams two weeks ago”, he jokingly added, “so that was cool.”
Thursday’s Airneánach Festival
The musician will be performing at this Thursday’s Airneánach festival, the pilot year of the event, which will take place at St. Nicholas Church, where he will be performing under experimental alias “Cathedral.”
“Because it’s so close to my EP coming out, I wanted to do it under a different alias … not that that means there’s no pressure, but there’s no release tied to it or it being recorded.”
“I’ve played a heap of shows as a DJ and specifically a dance music DJ. I’ve gone way above and beyond what a dance music DJ should typically do.
“So, I think everybody knows I’m kind of capable of doing that, I guess. And then I wanted to do this alias now, this is what it’s going to go under and then the dance and electronic stuff is going to stay as Shampain.
“I want to produce a lot of music. I feel already kind of am and it’s kind of a blurred line already, but with this if you’re going to a Cathedral show just have no expectations, it’s going to be what I decide on the night.
The disc jockey made sure to praise Galway City Council’s night-time economy advisor, Kate Howard, in the organisation of the event.
“She’s really sound, really clued in and actually, came to me asking if we could do an event in here [in Poblacht] but it fell through fire safety stuff.
“The whole thing is basically just about you know using spaces that are available for different things and so.
“I am excited to just, go, it’s going to be an extremely cool venue and it’s going to be a really particular atmosphere on the night.”
The same 24 hours (apparently)
If that all wasn’t enough for Cóilí, the artist is currently in the process of shooting the second series of his TG4 tv show Éire Eile, and has a potential Irish and UK tour in the works.
One would have to ask the question; does he share the same 24 hours in a day as everybody else?
“I might have the same 24 hours, but I think I am really lucky to have the friends that I have, because they work around my crap, and they make everything possible.
“I have the business here with Evan, [Poblacht], and with Ryan, Shadi, Aika, you couldn’t ask for better people to work around.
“The same goes for my music, my agents, Juilet and Gabby are so easy to work with, I have so much help from my friends with pictures and all the artists I collaborated with, and of course my girlfriend Bethany, who puts up with a lot.
“Sometimes you have to kind of convince yourself of the craziness in order to get stuff done.”
