Northern Irish singer-songwriter and producer Gareth Dunlop has never shied away from emotional depth, but his last EP, Live From The House Of I Don’t Know, took that intimacy to a new level. Recorded in a secluded 1970s house overlooking Strangford Lough, the mini album stripped back the lush textures of his previous record (Welcome To The House Of I Don’t Know) and let the songs breathe in their rawest, most exposed form.
With festival appearances at the Bangor Open House Festival on August 6th and 8th and the British Country Music Festival in Blackpool (August 29th–31st), before heading out for his own headline shows this November. It’s a chance for fans to hear the songs the way they were reimagined—quiet, warm, and unfiltered. We caught up with Gareth to talk about writing for the screen and why sometimes, the best take is the quietest one.
Hi Gareth, thanks for speaking with us! Let’s start with, why revisit these songs on ‘Live From The House of I Don’t Know’ in a stripped-down way? What made you say, “Let’s do this again, but raw”?The notion for it came about when we were in pre-production for the studio record… Me and the band spent some time working through ideas for the songs in a secluded old house on the banks of Strangford Lough.
Most nights I’d be sitting with the guitar and we’d all be singing out the songs in the living room… I think the idea to go back to that house and record them stripped back got talked about on one of the nights.
Once the studio record was finished we made some plans, packed the cars with some mics and headed back to make the live record.
You’ve been on some huge tours and had songs in massive shows. But what’s something small—a fan message, a lyric misheard in a funny way—that’s stuck with you?
One of the things thats stuck with me happened about 7-8 years ago… I was out supporting Michael Malarkey on a 3 week European tour and someone approached me after a show in Germany and asked if I could write some lyrics from one of my songs on her arm.
She asked for a few lines from an older song of mine called ‘Hold On’
She turned up the next night at a different show with my handwritten lyrics tattoo’d on her arm… I’d no idea that was her plan and it kind of blew my mind a bit!
When you’re writing, do you start with a lyric, a melody, or just a mood you’re in? Or is it different every time?
It’s different each time… I’ve never really had a fixed way of going about it.
Sometimes it’s a little musical idea that falls out onto the guitar or piano and I’ll try to build from there… other times it’s something specific I want to write about and I’ll start with a lot of words that usually don’t have much structure.
Has becoming a producer changed the way you write or perform your own songs? Or do you have to switch brains entirely?
I think it influences some decisions when I’m trying to put a song together… Most of the time it’s to do with the shape of the melody, the phrasing and less to do with the lyric itself. I was always told that production has to serve the bones of the song and if the song isn’t flowing well without a bunch of production… then more often than not – production just highlights the holes in it.
To be honest I try not to think too much about production ideas when I’m writing. If I can find something that feels good stripped back on the guitar or piano then I’m winning the battle.
What’s your guilty pleasure track—the one you’d never cover but secretly love?
Easy… Dancing Queen! Such a banger… I’m a big ABBA fan. The production, the hooks, the harmonies… all of it!
What’s the most unexpected place you’ve heard one of your songs playing?
A hotel room in Romania! I was at the end of a long tour… exhausted and pretty tired of the sound of my own voice… I checked in, lay down on the bed and flicked the TV on to a dubbed version of ‘Safe Haven’ playing the exact scene that uses a song of mine called ‘Wrap Your Arms Around Me’
It all felt a bit surreal.
What’s a bit of advice you’d give your younger self back when you were just starting out in Belfast pubs?
Write more! Write bad songs, songs that don’t make any sense, songs you hate… but write more!
If your fans take just one thing away from this new mini album, what do you hope it is?
For folks familiar with the studio album – I hope they hear this record and find new corners in the songs… maybe even hear the lyrics in a new light… that’s how I felt putting it together.
Tickets to Gareth’s Headline Tour can be found here: https://www.ents24.com/uk/tour-dates/gareth-dunlop