By Benji Chapman, Music Editor
Damien Tuit isn’t one to waste time. Describing the creation of The Murder Capital’s new record, Blindness, the group’s guitarist digs straight into the immediacy of its creation without a moment for pause after we make our introductions. ‘We really wanted to go with our instincts’, he opens earnestly from behind the blank reflection of my laptop screen.
Tuit’s face is hidden, but the tone of his voice tells me all I need to know about his thoughts right now. Only two weeks after the record’s release and lying in wait for an impending world tour, the band is taking a brief break from what’s usually a breakneck writing process that was the norm for them up to this point.
'We didn't want to add too many bells or whistles’, comments Tuit when summarising the new record. He outlines the distinctiveness of its creation that boldly began during a two-week writing stint straight after the tour for their sophomore hit Gigi’s Recovery, despite mounting concerns of burnout at the time.
Escaping the claustrophobia of Gigi’s writing process that began in lockdown, the chart-topping Blindness is a prismatic glimpse into the explosive output of the band’s ability to belt out hits since then. Even in the artwork’s primal depiction of slurred and jagged pastel scrawls, it’s oozing with an almost sinister fervour that seems to coalesce around the angel-like figure at its centre.
Perhaps it’s in the long wake of their second album - which took the band to the top-spot of Ireland’s album charts - that inspired them to be more immediate this time around. Tuit explains harmoniously that, on their new record, they ‘really wanted just to capture what had culminated in the twelve months since we released Gigi's Recovery.’
Following an album tour that ran parallel to the consecutive and ‘amazing’ victory of Fontaines D.C. at the BRIT Awards for International Group of the Year in March 2025, Tuit gives further nod to the present feeling of excitement for Ireland during what he calls ‘a moment in general for Irish music.’
But, crucially, this isn’t an inherently new happening nor one that should be susceptible to pigeonholing. In this respect, Tuit makes clear that Irish music has been worthy of celebration for a long time, commenting, 'When I see these things [...] I don’t really get "this is a big moment for post-punk or anything" out of it.’
Emphasising the fact that, in reality, popular success and artistic triumphs for the nation are no new phenomenon, Hiut says that 'There's eyes on Ireland at the moment but there always was a great standard of music in Ireland. Music is kind of in our DNA’.
Without question, while bands like U2 and The Cranberries have historically put the country on the map for their role in Ireland’s musical past, it’s equally one far more ancient and rich with a folk music history in a fearlessly unique style. This gets an added emphasis when Hiut and I divulge a shared fondness for Dublin’s noise-rock monoliths Gilla Band.
'What's great about Gilla Band is that they're a big inspiration for me personally, in terms of just sounding so unique, sounding like something I hadn't heard yet.’ Between pauses, I hear Tuit reproach our discussion on Irish music with a greater enthusiasm, while he tells me how the band were a major influence for The Murder Capital and associated acts like Fontaines D.C.
‘I think what they bring - the four lads in that band - is that is the music they'll be making together in that kind of way; it's unapologetically them, it's their authenticity that makes people take notice.'
With the ardour and likeness of a starstruck superfan, he reiterates by saying, ‘they inspired a lot of bands like ourselves and definitely Fontaines. They sounded like something we all hadn't heard yet, it was done in a way that you couldn't look away. You had to look.’
As any member of Gilla Band’s many mosh pits will attest, it’s difficult to tear your eyes away from what Tuit aptly describes as the onstage ‘sonic backflips’ during their epiphanic live shows. I kick the conversation up a notch when I recall a particularly bruise-laden trip to Trinity Centre in my first year, where I first saw the band. I left in total awe.
What followed was a deep dive into a catalogue of contemporary Irish music. Many gigs, bruises, and relistens to False Lankum later, I feel far more qualified to engage in conversation with a musician who so evidently embodies and channels the spirit of Ireland’s expansive musical history in a revitalised manner.
With charm, Tuit details that his love for music runs deeper than just that of Ireland. He excitedly states, ‘I'm kind of getting into the habit of just waking up and starting to play music.' I’m then thrown for a curveball when Hiut tells me he’s also been frequenting a lot of music from Detroit too.
Recently, the likes of James Stinson and J Dilla have been in heavy circulation, but he adds that this has been taking place alongside a relistening of the famous Elephant 6 collective that graced 4 Chan dwellers with landmark records such as In the Aeroplane Over the Sea.
While I’m cautious to press Tiut too hard on what he’s listening to, we reach agreement on another shared favourite with Dilla. 'J Dilla is the best. When you do a deep dive on Dilla you discover so much. He really was king’, he says, in reference to Joe Talbot’s shouthout to the producer on The Jimmy Fallon Show.
‘Joe's been really nice to us’, says Tiut fondly of the IDLES frontman and fellow Dilla disciple. ‘Bristol, just in general, has acts that we're really inspired by’ recalls Tuit. ‘Every time we go to Bristol you get people that want music in their town. There's a kind of a very easy-going nature to it that I really like.’
With a shout-out to local legend Big Jeff, he says, 'He [Jeff] shares something with everyone, and we're big fans of him' when Tuit details a time that the beloved gig-goer and Bristolian superstar sketched the band at their last gig in the city from a spot at the front of the crowd.
When I tentatively ask Tiut what we can expect from the band when they come here next in April, there are dry chuckles and mentions of a mosh pit ‘if we can make it happen’ as he lauds the city’s musical affinity.
'We're all writing music at the moment and keeping ourselves busy’, says Tuit. ‘We're heading off to Tokyo on Monday week and then to New Zealand and Australia, getting ourselves warmed up before our UK shows.'
As we say our goodbyes, I pledge to uphold hopes of a mosh pit when the band come to play SWX on the 26th of April. Gig-goers of Bristol: do him a solid and make you bring your A-game. It’s the least they deserve.
Featured Image: James WallaceWhat do you think of the band's new record?
