The self-described “slacker rock” Galwegian musician Ruth Mac, through her transcontinental travels of Europe, has garnered a lot of buzz from outlets, both domestic and abroad. Yet, it couldn’t have started without the support structure of her home village. As Ruth tells Post-Burnout: “I grew up in Kinvara; it’s a very small village in Galway, but a lot of musicians live there, so it’s a very musical place. I actually think I started with classical piano when I was quite young – like eight or so – but didn’t really take to it as much, and, a couple of years later – I’d say around eleven or so – [I] turned to guitar, and had lessons with a local musician, and started learning just more…contemporary songs, songs I liked, and that’s really what kind of got me into it, at first.”

While Ruth learnt guitar by playing acoustically, it was specifically the introduction of the electric guitar into her repertoire which, for her, really set off the endless possibilities of what she could create. “I loved it,” she explains. “For me, it was quite mind-blowing. There’s this new space to explore sound a lot more with. I think at that point, I was listening to a lot of garage rock, maybe indie or soul stuff as well, and I could get a bit closer to that sound [with] the electric, as well.”

Having fostered her when she wanted to learn to play music, the village would also give Ruth her first opportunity to perform in front of an audience. She says, “In Kinvara, a group of local musicians set up an open mic for teenagers specifically, which was once a month and, yeah, you had to be in secondary school or something; that kind of age, where usually there aren’t that many opportunities to start performing and get in front of people. So, I went to that, and that was, like, my first, I guess, taste of performance.”

At these early gigs, Ruth played covers of what she was listening to at the time. We asked her when she began to write and perform her own music. “It was a bit later,” she responds. “I was in college – I didn’t study music or anything related to it – but went on Erasmus in my third year of college. I was in Spain, and also just fell into an open mic scene there, as well, and that was the first place I would have performed original music. I think I’d been writing music for a year up until that, but never wanted to share it. I was just keeping it to myself. I guess I was quite nervous about the idea of sharing it with others, but I kind of felt like, in Spain, I didn’t know anyone, no one knew me. I had this more freedom to try it out.”

With some live performances of her own music under her belt thanks to this trip, Ruth returned to Dublin to finish her degree. In 2018, in the lead-up to Ireland’s referendum on reproductive rights, Ruth began playing some of her first Irish gigs comprised of her own music to fundraise for the pro-choice Repeal the 8th campaign. Soon after the successful repealing of the Amendment, Ruth would travel to Lisbon to play a month-long residency. Then, in October of that year, she moved to Berlin, where she still resides to this day.

“Obviously, the music in Berlin is huge, but electronic music, techno is for sure the most dominant scene or industry, I would say,” says Ruth on how the music scene differs in Berlin. “And then the likes of what I do – maybe that bit more band-, guitar-, live-oriented stuff – it’s a smaller scene within Berlin, I would say, where it’s the most dominant or the most popular in Dublin, for example. So, sometimes it feels almost – I wouldn’t say it’s ‘underground’ or anything – but it definitely feels like you’re this subset or, like, smaller little scene.”

With Berlin being one of the largest music centres and stops for any act touring the European continent, Ruth has had some great live opportunities, including the opportunity to support the legendary synthpop act Hot Chip at the world-renowned Huxleys Neue Welt. Ruth also supported a touring British band when they were in Berlin. The band were on the London-based independent label Beth Shalom Records, and they recommended her. The label released her debut EP, Living Room, in 2021, which enabled her to perform in the UK for the first time.

Now Ruth stands as an experienced and well-travelled musician. Once again self-releasing her music, her first single since Living Room, “Home From Home,” releases today. “It was a trip home – I’m pretty sure it was during a lockdown – so Dublin was just – like anywhere else, any big city – was dead,” describes Ruth when explaining the background to the song. “Certainly, my friends or a lot of people had left to, I don’t know, go elsewhere, be it home or wherever it may be. And I reckon I had been away from Ireland for maybe at least three years at that point. I had always been coming back quite regularly, but I think on this particular trip, it was, like, the first time – in Dublin, specifically – kind of feeling this disconnect with the city.

“It’s somewhere that I…I mean, Dublin, I went to college there, they were very great years for me; like, important, informative years. [I] always felt very at home, as soon as I moved there. I just loved being in Dublin, but it was the first time that I just felt like a stranger, really, and feeling like, ‘Oh, this whole time [that] I’ve been moving on with my life in Berlin, Dublin has too, and it’s changed form, and it’s changed energy.’ For me, personally, I’m not as much a part of the city anymore, but then, also, I guess Dublin, specifically, has changed so much, in terms of…infrastructure or just the living situation, the housing crisis, the cost of living; just parts of it aren’t as recognisable anymore, to me. I think the song itself is more about my relationship with the city or with a place that used to be familiar, used to be home. I think it’s particularly interesting to write it about Dublin that’s also changed itself so much.”

With a new musical direction set by the release of “Home From Home,” which took a much more bare-bones approach to the instrumentation and production than previous Ruth Mac releases, and the promise of new music to come in the New Year, Ruth will return to Dublin for two shows: one tomorrow night at The Grand Social as part of Ireland Music Week, and a headline show at The Workman’s Cellar on December 5^th. “They’re going to be fun!” says Ruth. “It’s my first time bringing a full band to Ireland. It’s the first time, for me, playing with a full band in Ireland since I moved to Berlin. Travelling back, it’s just been easier to do solo stuff. So, full band. It’s pretty much all new music; like, I’ll have more new music in the New Year, and that’s now the biggest chunk of the set. And, yeah, just fun. A good time! That’s where I’m happiest, is [where] people are enjoying the music in a live context.”

Ruth Mac’s latest single “Home From Home” is out and available to stream from today. Ruth plays at The Grand Social, Dublin tomorrow as part of Ireland Music Week. Tickets are available here. She also headlines The Workman’s Cellar, Dublin on December 5^th. Tickets for that show are available here. You can also follow Ruth on Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram.

For a more extensive interview with Ruth, where we go into further depth on the topics discussed in this article, as well as her new direction, how she feels Kinvara has changed since she’s been away, self-releasing music versus releasing on a record label, how Irish crowds compare to German crowds, singing with an accent, and more, tune into today’s episode of POSTBURNOUT.COM Interviews… today at 17:00 (IST) 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.