Fontaines D.C. - Dogrel

From playing in dodgy South London pubs to announcing a headline tour that takes in 1000 capacity venues in just under a year, you can’t fault Fontaines D.C.’s ambition. But can the shouty Irish punks break out of Dublin?

With their debut album ‘Dogrel’, the band make clear that even if they could, they have no intention of shedding their links with the city that birthed them. References to the Irish capital abound – the first word on the entire album is ‘Dublin’ – and Irish traditions run deep in their approach to storytelling, especially evident on tracks ‘Liberty Belle’ and ‘The Lotts’. That’s without mentioning singer Grian Chatten’s unashamedly thick accent, which acts as a middle finger to anyone who says regional accents don’t play well if you want to be successful.

The album itself is a mix of previously released singles (re-recorded for the album and sounding better than ever) and new material. ‘Hurricane Laughter’ and ‘Too Real’ remain as powerful as ever, the audio equivalent of a brick through your window, but it’s not all snarling violence. ‘Roy’s Tune’ and ‘Dublin City Sky’ are beautiful and nostalgic, at times even genuinely moving, no mean feat for a band more well known for mosh pits than emotions.