Aaron Corcoran aka Skinner released his debut album New Wave Vaudeville on January 7. He talks about playing open mic nights when he was in his mid-teens, his DIY ethos, his creative process and influences, and discusses making some of the tracks on the album.

Buy New Wave Vaudeville: https://skinner97.bandcamp.com/album/new-wave-vaudeville
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Press release:
Skinner is the project of the Dublin-based multi-instrumentalist, singer and producer Aaron Corcoran who was inspired by the New York No wave scene in the late '70s/early '80s for this debut record. The record's lead track "Calling In Sick" perfectly exemplifies this influence as he takes cues from the genre, while also carving his own path on the scene as well.

Speaking about "Calling In Sick", he said, "The song is about calling in sick to the world. Life is tough for most people right now and there is no down time for most of us. Some days just feel like you're hurtling towards destruction and I just wanted to write a song that captures that feeling of anger and frustration of having to say enough is enough. Fuck everything I'm just going to do me for today. And I think that's fair."

'New Wave Vaudeville', the song and album title, references the New Wave Vaudeville music variety freak show that took place at the 57 Club in New York from 1978 to 1983. The club was known for its free-form art shows, a debaucherous wild riposte to creeping commerciality of modern culture of the time.

"The ethos of the album is to celebrate the weird part of who you are and be proud of it," says Aaron. "You might feel strange in society but you don't when you're listening to your favourite music, and this record is a space for the outsiders to feel comfortable."

Skinner's debut album takes inspiration from the outsiders in alternative music who populate the greatest hits of no wave, dance-punk, Latin disco and post-punk genres - Liquid Liquid, A Certain Ratio, Kid Creole And The Coconuts and James Chance And The Contortions to name a few.

"I like the idea of mixing genres that shouldn't go together," Aaron adds. "That's probably why I like no wave music. It's just total and utter free expression of music without any constraint or rules. And it's not constrained by any societal ideals like a lot of other music can be. It's pure raw human emotion and expression."

Throughout the LP, Corcoran makes use of vocal training by Dara Kiely of Dublin noise-rock Gilla Band, who taught Aaron how to scream effectively while singing without losing your voice, as heard on the tracks "Calling In Sick", "Tell My Ma" and "When You Live In A Shoe".

Percussion also plays a big part in the record, with Latin American music and disco cited as an influence on the 10 tracks on the LP.

New Wave Vaudeville was recorded and produced by Aaron Corcoran at the Meadow and engineered alongside Rian Trench. The album was mixed by Sean Corcoran, and mastered by Tj Lipple.