Set Your Mind At Cheese

Look into my pies…

t’s a long and winding road that took Paddy Cullivan from playing The Stables in Greystones to leading The Late Late Show house band and playing with the likes of Sinead O’Connor, Paul Carrack and that miserable feck, Russell Crowe.

And now, the former Church Road lad is having a sort of homecoming, with two very different gigs at The Whale this Christmas.

Not only will his mock rock band The Camembert Quartet be bringing some festive fun to The Whale on Saturday, December 16th, but Paddy’s fascination with Irish history sees his one-man show, The Murder Of Michael Collins, hit town on December 8th (waiting list here).

In the meantime, we asked Paddy to reveal the songs that can still make him break down and cry – and how that music bug first bit…

I grew up for a while in Greystones on Church Road, a time when I was in bands like The Way and Slime, often playing The Stables supporting the brilliant Baskerville Sisters. After NCAD, myself and Cormac Moore (bass player) started gigging around. The Camembert Quartet got together in Dublin at the start of the century and released an original musical comedy album Music Is War with a sprinkling of cheesy covers in 2002.

One of those, Anarchy In The EIRE, was given to Ryan Tubridy by Jim Lockhart – and the rest was history. We began to work with Ryan on his radio show and then became his house band for 5 years on Tubridy Tonight, from 2004 to 2009.

To celebrate, we released our second album, The Camembert Quartet Sell Out, in 2004, a fully original masterwork that took no prisoners, from terrible Irish teen chart fodder (Boybands are C**ts), miserable singer-songwriters (Gimme Some of that Cheese), German techno (Battaburger) and teenage angst (Gimme Medicine). We’ll be doing a host of these songs in the Whale Theatre in anticipation of the album’s 20th anniversary in 2024…

When Ryan moved to The Late Late Show, we did too. We spent 10 incredible years backing everyone from Sinead O’Connor to Buddy Greco, to Russell Crowe. And now we are one of the busiest bands in the country, performing at awards ceremonies and corporate events worldwide. Which is why The Whale Theatre is going to be a great opportunity to let loose and have some fun with original comedy material, choice covers and even some alternative Christmas classics!

Get ready for a show like no other!

In the meantime, here’s some of my favourite selections from our diverse career – all of them make me cry, because since Spotify, we’ve made no money from them!

The Camembert Quartet Stony Grey Soil
When we started, we were known for doing jazzy, swing covers. The oddest one we did combined my love of Patrick Kavanagh with Buddy Greco. Stony Grey Soil, as you’ve never heard it – and a great way for Leaving Cert students to remember it by heart. I don’t know what we were on, but I’d like them to start making it again.

The Camembert Quartet Gimme Some O’ Dat Cheese
The opening song from our masterpiece, Sell Out. 2004 was a mess of terrible boybands, awful, mumbling singer-songwriters and deodorant-free, climate-change Cassandras. Just like today! In fact, the scary thing about the whole album is that you could release it today and nothing we have complained about has changed, bar the introduction of social media. Complaining is now on an industrial scale, except in restaurants where, the Irish say ‘It was lovely!’ about a terrible meal so as to not cause any trouble.

The Camembert Quartet Gimme Medicine
A great track from Sell Out that captures us at our catchy but satirical best – in this case, all that angsty teenage music that rocks really hard while being whinier than an unfed cat. My Elvis here is not too bad – though I wouldn’t ask Cliff Richard to comment.

The Camembert Quartet Battaburger
Our techno masterpiece dedicated to those who love dance music, don’t do drugs and instead eat fried food at 3am. You know who you are. We can see you rolling around, as happy as Larry, reeking of garlic sauce yet somehow meeting other barbaric epicureans, falling in love and creating the next generation of spicebag sybarites…

Paddy Cullivan Mandalorian Theme (with funny lyrics)
The Mandalorian was a great reboot of the Star Wars franchise, with Ludwig Goranssen’s magnificent theme tune to double-boot. I love adding lyrics to instrumental music and in this case I think I captured the essence of the show…

Professor Patrick How To Sing Like Bruce Springsteen
I’m a good mimic, and have written and performed for Oliver Callan on his brilliant Callan’s Kicks. But I really love imitating singers. Michael McDonald, Bowie, Van Morrison, Adele and Prince spring to mind. But during Covid, my alter-ego Professor Patrick figured out how to perfectly imitate Bruce Springsteen, the patron saint of South County Dublin. It’s easy!!

Sinead O’Connor 8 Good Reasons
Sinead was one of our favourite people – we met at the Lincoln premiere in 2013 where she jumped up and sang with us. From then on, we were pals and her choice of band whenever she did Irish TV. She was great craic but also a fastidious musician who knew exactly what she wanted. She even asked us to do a world tour with her – because of The Late Late commitment, we couldn’t do it. We played her classics many times but I always loved when she brought a new song in like 8 Good Reasons (2014) – proof she wrote great songs right up to the end.

Squeeze Tempted
Paul Carrack is one of our favourite singers and this is one of our favourite songs. It was a privilege to work with Paul on this classic from Squeeze’s East Side Story (1981). This is the kind of music we love, cleverly composed music with verses, bridges and choruses, unlike today’s artless rubbish. And with a lyric both humorous and devastating. Top class stuff.

Russell Crowe Folsom Prison Blues
One of our infamous moments on The Late Late Show – when Russell Crowe surprised us with his rendition of the Johnny Cash classic and proved that there are lead singers out there almost as grumpy as me!

Ian Dury & The Blockheads Hit Me With Your Rhythm Stick
One of our favourite songs where everyone in the band gets to show off. We really take pride in the fact there are four virtuosos in the band – and me. I mean, I’m a vocal virtuoso, but there are other factors to being a bandleader. Ruling with an iron fist, being feared and loathed in equal measure, and my James Connolly-inspired insistence on paying myself more than anyone else – that’s really what has kept this band together longer than most marriages.

You can catch The Camembert Quartet at The Whale on Saturday, December 16th. You can find out more about the band here, and about the Cullivan lad here.