Legendary Irish rock band The Horslips, often described as the founders of Celtic rock, will be honoured with the RTÉ Choice Music Prize Classic Irish Album Award on Thursday, 5th March.
The award is for their second full-length album, The Táin, a concept album centred on Irish mythology. Their pioneering spirit was further evidenced by the record first being released on their own label in Ireland back in 1973, before going out on RCA across the UK and Atco in the USA.
This year’s panel of judges for the RTÉ Choice Music Prize Classic Irish Album, in association with IMRO and IRMA, comprised Dave Fanning (radio and TV broadcaster), Caroline Henry (artist management), and Stevo Berube (artist management and music publicist), with Paul Russell (radio producer, formerly RTÉ 2FM) as chairperson.
They gave their reason for awarding the album to The Horslips, stating: “Horslips lasted 10 years, 1970 to 1980. Their impact was immense. They literally changed the course of music in Ireland in the seventies, not just because they fused traditional Irish music with rock and in so doing inspired many local and international acts, or that they released 10 albums in that 10-year period, leaving a legacy much bigger than that of the defining band of the so-called Celtic rock genre.”
“We can’t believe it, really,” commented The Horslips. “We knew at the time that The Táin was a different kind of album. And we could see that ‘Dearg Doom’ had a great riff going on. We just didn’t think that it would sustain in the way it has. Both Italia ’90 and Saipan have served to keep the album and the single surfacing, but even without that, there seems to be an inbuilt determination to survive in both. 50 years is a good innings!”
U2‘s Larry Mullen Jr. incorporated the iconic guitar riff from Horslips‘ ‘Dearg Doom’, originally performed by the late guitarist Johnny Fean, into ‘Put ‘Em Under Pressure’, Ireland’s 1990 World Cup song. The riff itself draws from the traditional Irish air ‘O’Neill’s March’. Fean sadly passed away in April 2023. Surviving members of The Horslips are expected to be in attendance on 5th March to collect their award.
