We sat down with Pat Donnelly to discover more about his musical process, after the release of his new album 'Reading You Closely'. Be sure to check out his music at the bottom!
Thank you for sitting down and talking to FLEX, can you tell us a bit about how you got into music?
I discovered nu metal in the early 2000s when it was big and immediately wanted to learn guitar shortly after I discovered Blink-182 and began my love affair with music and songwriting soon after.
Who would you say are your biggest musical influences?
Blink-182 would be my biggest however I do listen to all genres and I try to take influences from everywhere.
Congratulations on your brand-new album, Reading You Closely - What inspired this particular project?
I had written a number of songs from years ago when COVID hit I was struggling to fill my time. I ended up picking up my guitar and wrote the track Heaven Seems. Then other songs followed very quickly and I said it was time to make an album and put these songs out into the world.
How do you channel personal experiences into your songwriting, and what do you hope listeners gain from connecting with your music?
I never really plan on what I am going to write about, I just write lyrics that come to me naturally without any thought. In my case, the lyrics are always about love and relationships. Some songs are about personal experiences which I very much enjoy but others are more about love and relationships in general. I do find personal experiences make the songwriting process somewhat easier, especially when it comes to the lyrics. Writing about non personal experiences can be more challenging however once I get the lyrics written it's a great sense of satisfaction.
Each aspect of music - writing, recording, practising, and playing live - offers something different. Can you share a particularly meaningful moment from each?
When it came to writing, I had Seeing Your Face Again written on guitar, then played around with some piano ideas and when I realised how good it sounded I felt a sense of euphoria, it was a great moment. Recording can bring about ideas you would have never thought of. When recording Stay Right Here I figured out the clean guitar and distorted guitar sounded amazing together, a real sense of wow that sounds awesome! Practising is probably more relevant to my days playing in bands. Probably the first time me and three other people got together in a room and made live music, was a very cool thing to experience for the first time. Playing live would have to be my first time playing live solo. Years of playing in bands you don't feel alone on stage like you do when solo. You can feel all the attention on you and definitely more pressure. But the first time playing live solo was actually in a school concert and having all eyes on you for three or four minutes was definitely a meaningful moment.
Is there a song in your repertoire that holds a particularly deep personal meaning for you? Can you share the story or inspiration behind it?
I would probably say Stay Right Here as it is one of the first songs I wrote and did so very quickly. The whole process just flowed and the song is about someone I was good friends with who moved country and I wrote the song around that exact time. So it's one of the most personal tracks I've written and was one that got me on my songwriting journey.
What are your goals for the future with your music?
My main goal is to keep writing and releasing music and to have as many people hear it as possible. The reception to this album has been so positive so I'm excited to see hopefully the same for future music
What message or feeling do you hope listeners take away from your music?
I hope my music will resonate with people in terms of the topics I write about. I think these topics are ones everyone can relate to and hope they get that when listening
To wrap things up, is there anything else you’d like to share with our readers?
Just hope everyone likes the music and I hope that people can connect with it.
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