JAPE, THE solo indie-electro project of singer-songwriter and Redneck Manifesto bassist Richie Egan, returns in 2015 with a new album and an Irish tour that includes the Róisín Dubh.
Jape, the only artist to win the Choice Music Prize twice - Ritual in 2008 and Ocean Of Frequency in 2011 - releases his fifth album, This Chemical Sea on January 23. The theme of the album is “the place we all live, somewhere between shallowness and depth”, and tasters have come via the recently released ‘Séance of Light’, due to be the album’s opening track, and the album’s first single ‘The Heart’s Desire’.
‘The Heart’s Desire’ was the result of Richie’s primary instrument - the bass guitar. “It came from a bass riff,” he says. “I’ve played bass with so many bands - The Redneck Manifesto, Villagers, David Kitt - and it’s my favourite instrument to play so I figured I should use it more for this record.”
This Chemical Sea was written in Malmö, southern Sweden, where the Dubliner has been living since 2012. It was recorded with fellow Irish musician Glen Keating and mixed by David Wrench (Caribou, FKA, Twigs, Jungle ), who Richie says “was probably one of the few people I would have trusted to mix because this record means so much to me”.
Another collaborator of note is Villagers’ Conor O’Brien, on the track ‘Ribbon, Ribbon, Ribbon’:
Jape plays the Róisín Dubh on Friday February 20 2015. Tickets are available at www.roisindubh.net, the Ticket Desk at OMG Zhivago, Shop Street, and The Róisín Dubh.
