The Mayo alt-pop singer-songwriter Rachel Walsh, better known mononymously as RACHEL, has been enjoying a lot of success recently, marked by sold-out headlining shows at venues like Dublin’s iconic Whelan’s, and having her singles hit the top of various iTunes Charts. “It definitely took me by surprise!” RACHEL tells Post-Burnout.

“I mean, I never expected anybody to listen to me at all, when I released my first song. And, yeah, to have that reaction, to have four number-one singles now, it was something that I never, ever expected and not anything that I ever intentionally set out to do. So, when the first one went well, it definitely gave me an incentive and encouragement to go ahead and to keep doing it, but it definitely took me by surprise, too, that people cared enough to listen. [Laughs]”

RACHEL’s musical background is primarily as a classically trained pianist. She learnt to play the piano at five, was taught the guitar and banjo at eight by Lisa Canny, finished her piano grades at the Royal Irish Academy of Music at thirteen, and began teaching piano at sixteen during her Transition Year. “I think without having the basics from classical music, I really wouldn’t have learnt how to write music, as well,” she says of this experience. “Because if I didn’t know how to read music, if I didn’t know what chords were, I definitely wouldn’t have the skills to write music. So, that was really helpful to me.”

Yet, during the time that she was learning classical music, her heart yearned to create and perform pop. “I think I always just viewed it as a hobby, growing up,” RACHEL says on writing music and performing. “So, I started writing music when I was about twelve, and me and my best friend, who lived down the road, would just meet up on the weekends and we used to enter lots of different talent shows. Then, of course, we started to upload our original music up to YouTube and things like that.

“Now, one of our songs in particular, or one of our videos in particular, had over 100,000 views and we loved the idea of just putting stuff out there and just seeing people’s reaction. So, you know, [that’s] when I got a little taste of that and what it was like to, I suppose, share your music with people and see the reactions that it would get from people.”

RACHEL began teaching music to schoolchildren, as a means of paying forward the opportunities which were available to her, and eventually became a primary school teacher. Throughout secondary school and college, she kept writing songs, mainly as a therapeutic exercise. “I was doing it on the side to process my own emotions,” she says. “Then when I actually performed the songs and people related to them, I really liked that, too.

“So, I didn’t start really performing on my own, my own original music, until I got to college, and, of course, I was studying to be a teacher, so having the songwriting on the side – it definitely was on the side because I had to focus on my college – and it was lovely to be able to meet so many people in my college that also loved music, and I could songwrite with lots of other musicians, as well, and it just became a really nice part of my journey through my early twenties.”

Whilst in college, a fellow student, Mayo musician, and singer-songwriter, Con Murphy, whom RACHEL had performed with in college, asked her if she would support him at a gig in Whelan’s, which helped RACHEL catch the attention of the famed Galwegian producer Dave Skelton, who encouraged her to persist in a music career. RACHEL began working with the multi-instrumentalist musician and producer Dylan Connolly, who, through a truly collaborative partnership, aids the music that RACHEL writes with top-notch production. This collaboration has proven successful with the six songs RACHEL has released thus far enjoying critical acclaim.

Today, a seventh song in her discography drops, titled “No Returns Policy.” The song uses clothing as a metaphor for examining one’s own self-worth. “I love metaphors in my writing,” says RACHEL. “And I’ve kind of done that with a lot of my other tracks. Like, ‘Gravity’ would’ve been based on aeroplanes and waiting at an airport, and kind of symbolism like that. But, in this song, in ‘No Returns Policy,’ it’s definitely like you could consider it as if I wrote it in a shop, because I talk about receipts and, you know, ‘Take your bags, it’s time you leave.’

“It is very much about realising who I am as a person and what I deserve, and there’s a lot of reflection based on past relationships, too, and maybe not re-entering past relationships because of those reasons that I’ve stated in the song. Again, like, it’s a form of therapy for me to move and to grow as a person, but also to have a product to come out of it.”

The song is the second (and final) single to be released prior to RACHEL’s upcoming five-song debut EP, Would You Be Happier?, which is expected to be released in late November, with a launch gig in mid-December. “People will have time, hopefully, to listen to it before our launch gig,” RACHEL says. “And the gig itself is December 16^th in Dublin, in The Sound House, and I’m really excited to be joined by musicians, such as my producer, Dylan Connolly; Evan Barrows on the drums; a really close friend of mine, Doireann Kelly, who plays the cello; and another really, really good musician, who plays bass for Darragh O’Dea, called Richie, is going to be joining us, too.

“So, we have a nice group of people together for this band, and we’re going to be rehearsing the next couple of weeks, intensely, for it. So, it’ll be a launch of hearing all of the music on the EP and the two singles, I suppose, that we released, as well.”

RACHEL’s latest single “No Returns Policy” is out today. Tickets for RACHEL’s EP launch at The Sound House are not yet on sale, but you can follow her on Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook to get them as soon as they are! You can also hear RACHEL on today’s episode of POSTBURNOUT.COM Interviews… at 14:00 on YouTube, Spotify, Apple Podcasts, and Amazon Music Podcasts.

Aaron Kavanagh

Aaron Kavanagh is the Founder and Editor-in-Chief of Post-Burnout. His writing can also be found in the Irish Daily Star, Buzz.ie, Totally Dublin, The GOO, Headstuff, New Noise Magazine, XS Noize, DSCVRD and more.