This is the transcript of an interview on Curt's Coffee Club
WAZZ1490AM
Fayetteville, NC, USA
St. Patrick's Day, March 17, 1999
I'd like to introduce to you at this time, from Dublin, Ireland. Mr Paddy Gibney. Paddy, good morning and welcome to Fayetteville.
Thank you, Curt. Good morning.
Hey, it's good to have you here. You say you don't normally get up this early because I know you entertain in clubs and all, and you're up pretty late, right?
Yeah, I'm a little bit of a vampire, you know. It's the life I've chosen. It's nice to see the sun though.
It surely is. Paddy, tell me, what brought you to America. I read the article in the paper, and - nice picture of you in the Saturday Extra this past Saturday - nice little article there. But, just curious... you're an entertainer but you didn't come over here to entertain did you?
Well, a different kind of entertainment, I suppose. I came over as a soccer player student, you know, to school.
You had a scholarship where?
We went to Fayetteville Academy for a year, and then we stayed local, enjoyed Fayetteville, enjoyed the people here, and we had a family environment around us, myself and two other guys, Jimmy Maher and Justin Carey who came with me. And we went to Methodist for four years.
You played soccer with those guys?
Played soccer, yeah, at the college. So, we've travelled beyond since then back and forth but we ended up back in Fayetteville.
Yeah. I think I read where somebody gave you a guitar...
Well, the coach at Methodist College had an old guitar and I used to pick on it every time I was over in his house, so he just told me: "Here, why don't you take it home."
And so that's how you learned to play?
Well, that was the first guitar I got, and I taught myself a few chords and quickly picked it up. Got my own guitar eventually and started to play songs at parties and in our house.
When did you find out that you could write music?
Well, it was a revelation from God. No, that's a joke!
You joke about that but you don't know how true you are.
Well, you know, it's funny the places in life you end up, you know. You start out doing one thing and you never imagine yourself doing the other. But you end up doing the other, you know. I always loved music, but I was an athlete. And I think when I started playing music and getting into other people's music and performing it, it just seemed to come naturally, you know. Like it's always been there but I never knew it, you know.
Something was kind of hidden inside, right, and it found its way out and, hey, that's fantastic! But, you brought a friend with you this morning?
I did. You know, since I started to write and work on my own stuff, I've met some great people, both in music and outside of it who've been supportive. Bill Ayerbe with me here is one of them. He became one of my good friends through music. We met in a bar - how appropriate!
That's where you were at the time?
Yeah, well... and of course that was not by choice, I want everybody to know.
You were entertaining...
Entertaining. That's my excuse. I have to say that for my mother's sake.
Of course.
Anyway, Bill was at a gig of mine a little over a year ago and I got him up to play with me and we've been together ever since and we've been writing and he's instrumental in my work now, on the CD we're doing.
You work together?
We work together and we're doing live gigs most of the time.
I notice here you gave me a little cassette tape that you're going to leave with me.
Yeah, we're gonna leave you a couple of cassettes.
It's got a picture of you and Bill here on the cover, and is this all you stuff that you've written?
No no, that's Irish music. It's mostly Irish party songs and pub songs. There's a couple of American songs thrown in there as well. It's a cross section of what we do when we play most of our gigs, especially in Irish bars.
What is the name of this bar? "Live.. where?"
It's called The Shanakee. It's in downtown Wilmington, North Carolina.
Okay.
So it's an Irish bar and we get a lot of Irish in there. Some of the songs are a little bit raunchy. Some of them may not be for everybody, but they'll give you a good laugh if you have, like, a pleasant demeanour.
I notice so many Irish songs have to do with the drink.
Isn't that a funny thing?
It seems to be a great activity in Ireland.
Well, it's wrapped up in the culture, the music, the drink.
It is. It goes back to the heritage.
You know, when I first... I remember living here in the beginning, when I first started playing music, Dr. Jordan who I used to live with as a student, used to say to me: "You Irish, all you sing about is killing people or drinking yourself to death. Don't you sing about anything else?" And I was saying: "Course we do." And when I thought about it, he wasn't too wrong, you know. It's kinda hard to find a song that wasn't about having a few beers or, you know, or else the struggle through time.
Well, you know, the Irish people - as you well know, I mean, having grown up in Dublin... But your history is one of struggle.
Yeah.
And it's a wonderful thing that you have overcome all the hardship and now there's some people living good lives.
Right now, this is a great period for Irish people, you know. It really is, and it hasn't been too long ago when it wasn't so good. Our economy at home is booming, young people are now no longer having to emigrate. Actually, they're moving back home.
How about that!
As an Irishman here in Fayetteville, in America, I've been very well treated and I love it here.
That's good. Well, we love to have you too.
Great.
We're delighted to have you here. Paddy Gibney is his name and you grew up in Dublin, right?
Grew up in Dublin, yeah. I went to school there, high school there, and I came over and did my senior year of high school here, you know. But one thing I want to say... My name.
Yeah, please help me with that.
You see on a lot of places around town in the States: "Come celebrate St. Patty's Day". P.A.T.T.Y. Never heard of it before. It's P.A.D.D.Y. I guess it's just an American kind of thing.
It is.
But I was speaking in a schoool yesterday to some children and I was saying, oh you make sure you.... I'll give you some inside information. When people say St. Paddy's Day...
Well, it's good that you can educate the folks here...
Ah it was fun.
Yeah, because you're the guy that knows and that's good. Now, your name is spelled P.U.D.D.Y. Is that a common name in Ireland?
PU?! PA! Curt, what are you doing to me?!
All right, it is P.A.D.D.Y.
Although, you know, Puddy might be a good... could be a good band name there, Bill.
Well, somebody made an error when they wrote that out for me. That's the reason I said that.
That's okay.
Somebody told me that. But it's Paddy?
Paddy yeah. It's actually quite a common name at home. It's short for Patrick, you know.
It's like Bill here, or something.
Like Bill being short for William, yeah. Or Guillermo as they say in Spain. Or Ecuador - sorry, Bill.
All right, okay. I'm gonna have these gentlemen entertain you here on the program, and we're gonna take just a little commercial break right here and we'll be back so don't go anywhere, because Paddy Gibney and Bill Ayerbe are going to provide some real live entertainment right here on AM1490
I'd like to introduce to you Mr. Paddy Gibney and I'm gonna let him introduce the rest of what he's about to do here for you.
Yeah, we were trying to think of a tune that would suffice for the show, and I think it's a bit early for the party songs, so...
Thank you.
Believe me, I don't want to hear them either. I'm sick of them at this stage. But we're gonna do a tune that I wrote and it's about what it's like, pretty much, to leave home. About me as a young guy, leaving Ireland and coming away, and dealing with that.
Sounds good.
So it's a song called "Where Rivers Run Green" and it'll be on our CD, on our album, which will be done in a couple of months.
And you're gonna send me a copy, right?
Will do, Curt. And it'll be in the stores. It'll be in Paradise Records and various places around town. I'd like, by the way before I start, I'd like to thank McFayden Music for allowing Mr. Bill Ayerbe to
~~Where Rivers Run Green with Paddy and Bill~~
I wanna tell you. Let me applaud you my friend because that was fantastic. You say you wrote that yourself?
Yes. I wrote that myself. Actually, I must admit, a good friend of mine, Timmy Godwin, is a local boy who came up with the original acoustic guitar music for it, and I put the lyric to it.
That is really great. You got something going here, fellas. I mean, this is not playing around. You're ready to step out into stardom. I can see you on national television.
We're very serious.... I'm not very serious about a lot of things in my life, but I am very serious about my music.
I can tell.
And Bill feels the same way and, yes, we have high hopes for our music.
And such beautiful lyrics telling the story about leaving Ireland.
I must tell you. It's funny, as a songwriter, when songs appear, because you have no control over them. That came after one too many Guinness on a Sunday afternoon after a night of "fun" many years ago, and one of those funny situations where a song arrives out of nowhere.
Well, we got about 5 minutes on the show. Have you got anything else that you could do in that short period of time?
Five minutes?
Let me just say that Bill over there has got a nice touch on that violin.
Bill is a maestro.
You've got a lot of talent, Bill. In fact, you and Paddy both. Tell me a little about yourself. Where are you from?
Bill - Well, I'm originally from New York and I did a lot of schooling with the violin up there. I studied for about 10, 15 years in an institute. And I joined the military, and it brought me down to Fayetteville.
Everybody gets here via the military. It's how I got here. And it's super. I'm delighted that you found your way to Fayetteville, and that you two.... I really think that it, it may be a little divine work on there to get you two together because you've got such a good sound.
Thanks, Curt. Thanks a lot.
It's really great. Do you do any instrumental? Any Irish jigs or anything like that? You you have anything that you could entertain us with?
Bill - Well, it might be a bit peppy for the morning.
As long as there are no words. Listen, we got people out there we need to wake up.
Yes, what's wrong with you people out there? Wake up, it's beautiful.
If you've got something peppy and you could do that, that would be good. As long as it's instrumental.
Bill's got a couple of great things he does. He's got a couple of great little violin pieces he does, little jigs I think would be enjoyable to do. If you feel like you could wake up to do it.
Bill - I don't know if I can jig this morning.
All right. Bill Ayerbe here on the violin. Let's go.
~~Bill on the Violin~~
I wanna thank you guys for getting up early on St. Paddy's Day and coming down and making our day. You really have contributed to our show and I just wanna thank you.
Very happy to be here. Thank you, Curt and thank you, Gerald, for asking me.