Photo by Audrey Gillespie
By Clare Martin
The list of activities we miss could span the island, but karaoke is near the top. There’s nothing like rushing up to the mic with your mates a couple pints deep and belting out your favourite tune, or realising part way through the song that maybe you didn’t know the lyrics quite as well as you thought. Either way, you’re all up there together, sweaty and dancing and revelling in your moment onstage.
Morgana MacIntyre and Gemma Doherty, better known as Saint Sister, know this feeling well. Today they released their poppiest single yet, “Karaoke Song,” inspired by a night out two years ago when the pair celebrated MacIntyre’s birthday by singing Tom Jones’ “Sex Bomb” in a Parnell Street karaoke bar. Over heavenly, strummed harp and zinging synth, the pair recall, “Somewhere in between you and the television screen / I got down on my shaking knees / And serenaded you with a Britpop dream.” The track comes from their sophomore album Where I Should End, out on June 25th.
“Gemma had this gorgeous instrumental and I was trying to work in a load of grandiose lyrics that always felt clunky and out of place,” singer/songwriter MacIntyre says of her and harpist/arranger Doherty’s process crafting the single. “At the end of a particularly tiring day spent writing, I started using the song as a way to make fun of the night we had recently shared singing karaoke. I kept thinking ‘no one will take this seriously’ and then I realized maybe I don’t want them to, that’s not the point of the song.”
That sense of carefree fun bursts through on the glittery music video made for “Karaoke Song,” directed by Janna Kemperman and Kevin Freeney. MacIntyre and Doherty are having the time of their lives, with coordinated dance moves and a whole host of flamboyant costume changes. The candy-bright colours and iridescent, kaleidoscopic visuals pull you into the party atmosphere. The video is an ode to nights out, drunken sing-alongs, and friendship.
Check out the music video for “Karaoke Song” below, as well as the album artwork and track list further down. Saint Sister’s self-produced and self-released record Where I Should End can be pre-ordered here.
Where I Should End album artwork
Where I Should End track list:
- My Brilliant Friend
- Dynamite
- Karaoke Song
- The Place That I Work
- Irish Hour
- Date Night
- Oh My God Oh Canada
- Manchester Air
- House 9
- Any Dreams?
Nameless Faceless 