Reaction to CMAT hit is a warning to Fianna Fáil as they consider presidential candidate
CMAT's 'Euro-Country' gives a thoughtful reflection of the Irish identity post-crash from the point of view of someone who came of age during the era of bank bailouts and austerity. Picture: Youtube/CMAT
"All the big boys, all the Berties/All the envelopes, yeah, they hurt me/I was 12 when the das started killing themselves all around me (All around me)/And it was normal, building houses/That stay empty even now, yeah!"
If you've spent any time on social media or are even vaguely aware of the cultural zeitgeist, those words were read in the voice of Ciara Mary Alice Thompson, aka CMAT, the pop-country singer from Dunboyne, Co Meath, who has owned this summer.
From her becoming the "woke Macarena" and inspiring thousands of TikTok dance imitators, to a breakout set at Glastonbury, to headlining last weekend's All Together Now festival, it is CMAT's moment.
In her latest release, , CMAT gives a thoughtful reflection of the Irish identity post-crash from the point of view of someone who came of age during the era of bank bailouts and austerity.
While the scars of the time run deep in Irish social and political life, it is interesting to hear the perspective of someone who was a child in those years, as much of the memory of it is done through the lens of older millennials, whose perspectives were more related to a lack of jobs and rampant emigration and, as CMAT points out, suicide.
Deaths by suicide in Ireland peaked in 2012 during the recession, with the National Suicide Research Foundation finding that there were 476 more male suicides in the years 2008 to 2012 than had there not been a recession.
But aside from being the catchiest bridge of an Irish song in a long time, the virality of the song across social media and its pointed use of former Taoiseach Bertie Ahern as a totem for the entire collapse opens a conversation about the post-2008 Irish economic downturn to a new generation of voters.
While it may feel as though it was just yesterday, many voted in last year's general election who wouldn't have been in school yet when the decision was made to bail out Irish banks.
The consequences of the economic collapse and austerity budgets of the early 2010s may still be felt, but it would be understandable if the generation who grew up in the recovery years and subsequent revolving existential crises did not understand its context or nuances.
Indeed, speaking on stage in Waterford at the weekend, CMAT herself is quoted as saying she doesn't know all of the politics, but she knows the impacts.
"Nobody I grew up with basically lives here anymore; everyone has had to emigrate.
“Nobody can afford to live here; everybody is leaving home. And everyone who is left behind is left with less and less public services, healthcare, and security in everything that you need to live a life not in danger.
“I believe this is directly the fault of the Irish government that we had 20-25 years ago."
The comments came in the same weekend that the subject of that bridge, Mr Ahern, was named as the most preferred of a slew of potential Fianna Fáil presidential candidates.
It is unlikely that any would-be candidate or the Fianna Fáil party at large will be making decisions based on one song, no matter how catchy, but the prevalence of the sentiment online should sound a warning for some in Fianna Fáil.
If their candidate for the Áras is closely associated with the financial crash, they will have to relitigate their party's role in it.
Having successfully navigated its electoral shellacking in 2011 to return to power just nine years later and being the largest party in the country by the 15-year mark of the troika bailout, it is something many in the party would be loathe to do, especially not with such a good soundtrack.
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