Tipperary band's Obama ditty has Universal appeal

MILLIONS OF viewers have heard it on YouTube, RTÉ, BBC and MSNBC in recent weeks

MILLIONS OF viewers have heard it on YouTube, RTÉ, BBC and MSNBC in recent weeks. It has graced the pages of the Los Angeles Timesand Newsweek.

And yesterday, Universal Music released There's No One As Irish As Barack Obama, the first single by the artists formerly known as Hardy Drew and the Nancy Boys.

For the Tipperary band, renamed the Corrigan Brothers, due to problems searching their former site on the internet, the "change" brought about by the Democrat's election has been "phenomenal".

Their tongue-in-cheek ditty, based on the president-elect's roots in Moneygall, Co Offaly, has generated interest from Kansas to Kyoto and a two-album deal placing them on the same label as Sting and The Rolling Stones.

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"We got lucky with it. It has captured the imagination and the fact he got elected was a great help," said lead singer Ger Corrigan. "We didn't have a song about John McCain ready."

Ger (43) and his brothers Brian (36) and Donncha (35), veterans of a number of rock and folk groups over the past 20 years, wrote the song in February "just for the fun of it" when news of Mr Obama's Irish ancestry emerged.

The song was released initially on YouTube, but only 25 people viewed it in its first month. However, as the presidential race hotted up, the song was noticed by media organisations across the world, eager to hear why Mr Obama was "as Irish as bacon and cabbage".

"MSNBC Hardballplayed the video to seven million viewers. Then it was on BBC, where a talent agent saw it and approached us about getting signed . . . It has had 600,000 views on YouTube now," Ger said.

What do the Democrats make of it? "Obama's team contacted us in June and asked us to send them the song. They thought it was very funny. We've been told he sings it in the shower, but haven't had the chance to see that yet," Ger said.

The Corrigan Brothers have been invited by the Irish American Democrats to perform at their inauguration night dinner in Washington on January 19th. Hillary Clinton is expected to attend. "The Irish American Fund also asked us to play it as his cavalcade passes on inauguration day," he said.

A follow up single, The Irish Invented Rock 'n' Roll, is ready and waiting, Ger said.

Steven Carroll

Steven Carroll

Steven Carroll is an Assistant News Editor with The Irish Times