67 - The Night Belfast Went Into Orbit — Orbital, David Holmes, Iain McCready x Teenage Wasteland
Teenage WastelandShow Notes
In May 1990, a young David Holmes brought Orbital to Belfast Art College. After the show, Paul Hartnoll handed him a cassette of unfinished demos. Holmes and his friends played one track obsessively while driving around Belfast. It had no title. That track became 'Belfast' This episode traces Sugar Sweet, Space Base 4, the arrival of rave culture in Belfast, the Hartnoll brothers before Orbital, 'Chime', the lost cassette and the road to the Green Album.
Research Sources & Further Reading Conversation with Gareth McConnell Stuart Bailie, Trouble Songs: Music and Conflict in Northern Ireland, Bloomfield Press, 2018. Stuart Bailie, 'The Ideal Holmes Exhibition'. Hot Press. Richard Fitzpatrick, 'Culture That Made Me: David Holmes on Orbital, Sinéad O’Connor and La Dolce Vita', Irish Examiner, 17 June 2024. Paul Hartnoll, 'Belfast and the Other One', Starting Again, 6 September 2015. Dray Morgan, 'The Tale Behind Orbital and Their Track ‘Belfast’, District Magazine, 7 June 2024. 'Aural Alchemy: A Brief History of Clubbing in Belfast', Technology Stole My Vinyl, 13 June 2014. Orbital, Green Album, official Orbital discography. 'How Orbital Created the Blissful Masterpiece ‘Belfast’', 909originals, 7 January 2021. Stuart Aitken, 'Mistletoe and Chime: The Story of Orbital’s Acid House', The Guardian, 16 December 2013. 'Orbital’s Paul and Phil Hartnoll Look Back', The Guardian, 10 February 2024. Teenage Wasteland — a podcast about the best music in the world.
More from Teenage Wasteland
Cam Cole traces his journey from a four-quid childhood guitar to captivating crowds worldwide. We explore his teenage influences, from Cream to Sepultura, the evolution of his extraordinary one-man band, life on the road, American juke joints, and the heavy blues and psychedelia of his new album, Lost in Creation. Plus, that unforgettable Ted Lasso appearance.
Arborist joins Teenage Wasteland to trace his journey from growing up in Ballymena in the ’80s and ’90s to making his superb new album, Looking for Love. We explore a musical education shaped by his parents’ country records, his siblings’ dance and pop collections, and his own discovery of Britpop, Snow Patrol and The Divine Comedy. From his Pixies-loving first band, Pilgrim, comes a teenage dream realised - collaborating with Kim Deal. Mark also reflects on The Holy Innocents, becoming Arborist, and how producing Looking for Love himself compared with recording alongside Matthew E. White in Virginia and at Peter Gabriel’s Real World Studios.
Paddy Hanna joins Teenage Wasteland to talk Thin Lizzy, growing up in Castleknock, childhood horror films and finding his way into music through friendship, Radiohead and an Elvis Costello-inspired guitar. From the wild days of Grand Pocket Orchestra to his solo work, we trace a musical life shaped by curiosity and perseverance. At its heart is his beautiful new album, Paddy Hanna’s Bacharach Show Volume One, out November 20 via Strange Brew. Plus - sharing a stage with Burt Bacharach, and why Tom Waits’ 'Flower’s Grave' is his favourite song of all time.
In this episode of Teenage Wasteland, 'Blue Jay Way' becomes a road into the curious mythology of Los Angeles. From The Beatles and Pink Floyd to Death Grips, Frank Black and the Pixies, Mike Davis’s City of Quartz, David Lynch and Naomi Watts, Chinatown and William Mulholland - we follow a single Hollywood Hills address outward into music, movies, water, power and the city itself - and ask how one Beatles song can contain so much of Los Angeles.
Darren Morrissey and Greg Marshall left Dublin for London with two acoustic guitars, a pile of songs and not much of a plan. What followed was busking, chance encounters, beautiful two-part harmonies, two albums, years on the road - and then, after a final show in Mumbai in 2019, silence. Now Morrissey & Marshall are back. In this episode of Teenage Wasteland, we trace the story from their early days in Dublin and the move to London, through being discovered by John Reynolds, recording And So It Began and We Rise, and the strange chemistry that happens when two voices lock together.