Kilkenny’s Battle of the Bands makes its long-awaited return today (Sunday, 6th Oct).
The weekly contest which offered a platform for up and coming musicians in a non-alcohol environment, was a huge feature of the city’s social scene until it stopped in 2009.
Set up and run by the now Mayor Andrew McGuinness, he’s co-ordinating the new run which gets underway at 2 o’clock this afternoon upstairs at Tommy Hackett’s bar and it seems four acts are up first; “Don Monte, The Donnys, Adam Nolan and Infrared and it’s great to be back in the driving seat for the Battle of the Bands in Kilkenny after almost 15 years of not doing it, it’s great to see the support we’re getting from our sponsors at Cross Roads Recording Studios, Broderick’s Music Warehouse, Essaness Music and support from the likes of yourself at KCLR and the Kilkenny People and all our local media, it’s great to be back doing it again and to provide the platform for young people to display their talents”.
Mayor McGuinness adds that more will be introduced after today’s session; “It’s going to run for a few weeks, we have eight bands so far in the Battle of the Bands, so the following Sunday (13th Oct) will be the second heat and then we’ll have the final a week or two weeks after that so it’ll be all on social media and we’ll keep you in the loop as we did all those years ago so looking forward to it, really looking forward to it”.