Tom Dunne: Kneecap and other brats... my music awards of the year revealed
Pictured are Kneecap (left) and Charli XCX (right).
You may not like the following, but in years to come historians will say: “That was 2024; the year in music.” Bits of it were visible from space, other bits just seismically detectable. It was garish and OTT, but some people made absolute fortunes.
Taylor Swift’s Eras Tour. It grossed over $2 billion in ticket sales, twice the previous record for a live tour. 149 dates, 21 countries. Shows in Seattle and Edinburgh tripped earthquake warning systems.
Taylor herself spent 484 hours on stage, 24 of them singing just one actual song, the 10-minute version of ‘All Too Well’. The dress she wore in LA took 2,100 hours to complete, more time than all of my ancestors spent dressing themselves.
Nothing here was small, but no TVs were thrown from hotel bedrooms.
In April, when Charlie booked her autumn arena tour, the general feeling was that she was being wildly ambitious. For all the kudos heaped on her over the years, she wasn’t exactly giving Taylor pause for thought commercially.
Then Brat arrived. Vogue ran articles called ‘How to Have a Brat Summer’, it was used in the US presidential election, had untold memes and nine Grammy nominations. Collin’s dictionary named brat as the Word of the Year, redefining it as a “confident, independent and hedonistic attitude”. Way to go that girl.
It’s our generation’s JFK event, our “where were you when you heard the news?” moment. I’m still not over it. It was such a joy to crank our Acquiesce and Rock ‘N’ Roll Star to celebrate, less so to later find yourself googling ‘Dynamic Pricing.” But still, when they take the stage next year, the small ransom you shelved out, the holiday you cancelled, the kitchen extension you put on hold, the child you took out of school, will all make sudden, blinding sense.
Why they chose this time, the anniversary, this year, of the debut album and next year, when the articulated trucks hit the road, of Morning Glory, the really big one, is of course a mystery, but let’s hope they make a few bob out of it.
I’d be quite optimistic about that. When the tour was pegged at 19 dates analysts had estimated the boys would pocket £400 million. But it’s at 41 dates now, so by that metric they should see about £1 billion. Rumours of a 50% take on all food and drink sales are unconfirmed. Hotel TVs are getting nervous already.
And no, it wasn’t for making one of the films of the year, or one of the albums of the year, or for the seven wins at the British Independent Film Awards (BIFA) or for having Noel Gallagher and Paul Weller queue and ask for photographs with them at their recent London shows. No, it wasn’t for any of that.
It was for doing in a matter of months what over 100 years of Irish self-government has patently failed to do. It was for making, almost overnight, the Irish language cool! It is now, north of the border at least, the coolest thing on the planet.
Right now, the cúpla focail, outguns any bit of body art, tattoo, piercing, naming of a cool band that no one else has heard or obscure dietary choice in declaring you as one hard assed, individualistic, non-conforming chara of the highest order. Cád is Gaeilge ar brat?
Ten years after the success of ‘Take Me to Church’, ten years after his very first release put him in the position of needing to learn “everything about everything, at once”, Hozier released the Unheard EP, featuring ‘Too Sweet’, to keep his album on the radar over the summer festival period.
The rest as they say, is history. Hozier is back, number one on Billboard, with a career-defining moment of sweet, sweet validation.
It’s a success that speaks volumes about the nature of the current pop world. Brat, Too Sweet, Chappell Roan, et al, are all testament to how, when the algorithm gets your number, so too does mankind, with breathtaking speed, and in breathtaking numbers.
Who knows what 2025 will bring. All we can do is pray, that next year, dear lord, the algorithm might sniff one of us.
