My Saturday with DJ Emmet Condon: 'You can plan a lot for festivals — then chaos theory comes in to play'

Emmet Condon of Another Love Story festival

6.30

We’re up and about and into the kitchen, breakfast gathered and cartoons on, and I hang on the couch for a little while to start the day off. I grew up in a family business (Marguerite’s Bakery in Newcastle West, Co Limerick), where Saturdays didn’t exist.

So, the Saturday morning thing is such a special treat for me. In the course of how I work, between festivals and gigs and DJing, weekends can be taken up throughout the year at different times. 

So, those Saturday mornings where you get to just hang out and start the day slow, and ease your way in to it, are pretty special.

Saturday mornings, Macca comes on NTS, the online radio station, at 10am. He’s a great DJ; I really love that show.

11:00

We moved, during covid, from Dublin down to South Kerry. We live in slightly glorious isolation, near Caherdaniel, which is fantastic for a range of things, but a tough find for great coffee. 

So, the Aeropress becomes a very important part of life in our house. I have to really limit myself. 

I’m a tea fanatic. I’ll have a few cups of tea throughout the day, with one cup of coffee as my treat at 11am each day.

13:00

We have one little girl, Lauren. She’s just popped over the stage of summer camps this year. We’ve been flat out, jumping from camp to camp to camp.

One of the nice things about living where we live is that in the summertime there’s a band of returning families to some of the little beaches and campsites. 

So, we have a squad of summer pals who make their way down to the beach every day around the same time. 

That’s what we were lucky enough to do as kids, when we were coming down here. 

And to see your own little daughter and her friends start off on that step of those lifelong friendships is a lovely thing.

I surf quite a bit, or at least used to.. I might try and squeeze in a surf or a cycle and take advantage of all that we have at our hands.

15:00

Small events and small festivals, like Love is a Stranger or Another Love Story, are built on a huge amount of hard work and hustle from a small amount of people.

People would be astounded if they understood the amount of hours that went in to [smaller festivals], not to mind the bigger ones that have just happened, like All Together Now. 

It’s phenomenal, the effort that goes in to these things. When you’re starting from scratch, you pour yourself 10,000% in to these things, as we did for many, many, many years.

Over the last couple of years, as we’ve all slowed down slightly and once kids come in to the equation, your time and your priorities do, inevitably, shift. 

Two weeks out, you’re on all the time.., but having done it for 11 years now, you also know that you need to give yourself a bit of time and space to breathe. 

It’s important to spend time with your family when you work in this industry, because you tend to be gone for extended periods. You’re working late hours, you’re coming back pretty drained; happy, but tired.

17:00

You can plan a lot for festivals in advance, until the gate opens, and then chaos theory comes in to play. 

Our hope, and our way of working, has always tried to be that you try to worry or stress about it, or work at it as hard as you possibly can, up to the point of getting to it. 

And then, if you’ve done all that you should do, then the event should run smoothly. The actual event is the tip of the iceberg.

19:00

We may cruise down to one of the local pubs for a pint, either in the Blind Piper or Staigue Fort, which is a real gem in Castlecove, up the road from us. 

If it’s wintertime, it’s Munster match time, so we might squeeze a match in with a beer and make our way home.

21:00

I’d love to say I sit down and open War and Peace, but, like lots of people, you tend to be glued to your phone. 

I don’t watch a lot of TV at all. Claire, my partner, is a pretty voracious reader, so she’s working her way through a book and I’m either trying to force myself to read something, like a Kevin Barry book, or I am inevitably scrolling through bloody Instagram or reading about sports.

I hit the bed, if I’m good, around 11 or 12. Festival days are long and tiring. We tend to be first up and last to bed. 

But they’re also the days of our lives. So you wouldn’t want to take the odd late night too tough in that setting. It’s worth it.

• Emmet Condon is a DJ, music promoter, and one of the organisers of Love is a Stranger and Another Love Story. Love is a Stranger takes place in Ballyvolane House, Co Cork, on August 16-17, Another Love Story takes place in Killyon Manor, Co Meath, on August 23-24.