DC Dolls have taken the Dublin music scene by storm over the past two years, expanding their fan base across Ireland and playing over 20 gigs nationwide. They are a five-piece female rock group. Their members include Vi (lead vocals), Abi (lead guitar), Kate (rhythm guitar), Susan (bass guitar), and Tracy (drums).
The group has most notably performed at Electric Picnic 2023 and Based Festival 2024. Abi says that her favourite thing about these experiences and being part of a band is becoming a part of the community. “ I’ve made friends for life now, and it’s awesome,” Abi notes. “Everyone’s so nice, everyone’s so supportive, and then obviously, like, the band is my family. I love that I have the excuse to see them every week as well,” she added.
When it comes to their experiences as students, two out of the five band members are sitting their Leaving Certificate this year, with two others working through college and one working full-time. Abi explains how “It’s very difficult to – surprise – to get five people in the same place at the same time. But we have always been kind of circling back to consistency, and we’ve always been consistent that Sunday is band practice days.” She says how “gigs will come up that we kind of can’t refuse”, but at the end of the day, “the band is our number one priority”. There is a clear dedication to their art in the way she talked about the band, prioritising it over everything else.
On top of being a mix of students, Abi also explains that they have faced extra difficulty as an all-female band. “We’ve been told things like, we’re two ethically diverse.” She further highlighted that “It’s definitely a thing I find personally that we’re just looked at, like we’re not as serious as some other bands. Like, we do try not to take ourselves super seriously, but there is a point where we do want to be taken seriously.” She goes on to say how “There are also advantages with it because we got to play a lot of gigs for women’s aid.” She says that the female musicians in Ireland “feel like it’s like one big community.”
Another predominantly female-fronted band based in Dublin is Selenite. In an interview with lead singer, Sara, she noted how the name comes from “a rock. It’s like an angelic force to do with the moon”, which is definitely reminiscent of how the band plays. They consist of Sara (lead singer), Niamh (guitar), Millie (guitar), Cassie (bass guitar), and Josh (drums). Their music blends shoegaze, dreampop, and rock, creating a unique, extravagant sound for all their performances.
Their band is predominantly composed of students. Sara explains, “It’s difficult because we’re all on completely different schedules. Some of us are working, we’re all in school, and it’s just kind of finding the time to practice and finding a space and time to practice is probably the biggest struggle, but you know, we’ll always be able to find even like two or three hours on the weekend”.
That being said, Sara highlighted how the band “Is an outlet. It’s something to kind of take our minds off of all the stress of everything else.” She describes the band scene in Dublin as being “very friendly and forgiving and, you know, you come across the same bands again and again, and they’re always lovely to deal with, you know, and it’s quite supportive, because everyone has to start somewhere.”
Humpday band consists of Isa (lead singer), Rosin (keys and saxophone), Lunna (bass guitar and backing vocals), Liz (drums and backing vocals), and Joss (lead guitarist). All of whom are currently studying at UCD. The band draws inspiration from artists like Radiohead and Alice in Chains, blending it with their own jazz talent to create a diverse sound for their covers and songs.
They faced similar struggles balancing their band schedule with school, but particularly found UCD to be less accommodating to student bands than it could be. Joss notes how in the “Students centre, there’s a music practice room, but it’s permanently booked out, and we went in there, I mean, maybe it’s under construction at the moment, we checked it out, and there’s no one in there. It’s just not in use at the moment. I don’t know what’s going on with it.”
Rosin said, “I think it’s difficult for students and for musicians in UCD who don’t want to do individual practice, who want to actually get together, to actually find a space to do that without going out of their way. We have to go into town and pay for a practice room together. Which is not ideal, but it’s just kind of the way things are.”
While many student-fronted bands are struggling, the music scene in Dublin is looking positive. There is clearly a supportive community behind these bands, even if school can cause issues along the way.
Christina Murphy – Contributor