Wolfe Tones singer says band ‘stood up for demonised Irish communities’

Wolfe Tones front man Brian Warfield has said that his band were the only people “standing up” for Irish communities abroad during the Troubles.

The legendary rebel group have chosen to commemorate their 60th anniversary as a band by formally calling an end to their career with a run of final concerts in London and Dublin.

Brian said that rebel music is now much more acceptable in society than it was.

“There was a lot of demonisation of Irish communities, and the only people speaking up for them at the time was The Wolfe Tones,” the lead singer told NME in a new interview.

“We went through The Troubles in Ireland, which were very hurtful to the Irish people and to Irish communities abroad. I suppose a lot of things were taken out against the Irish community – people would say, ‘Oh, they’re Irish, they’re bloody bombers’ or whatever, you know?”

Brian says that the band’s retirement is the only thing they’ve “ever planned” properly.

“There’s been a wonderful response all over Ireland, and all over England as well. We’ll always have a huge crowd, but we just can’t go on forever,” he said.

“We haven’t shut the door; something might come up that we can do as a one-off in the future, but at the moment, that’s the plan.

Mr Warfield described how the Wolfe Tones blended culture with history in a musical context.

“We have been very lucky that we’ve carried the young people of each generation with us. It was very important for the young people of Ireland that they had something with the Irish spirit and an Irish story that they could relate to,” he said.

“It wasn’t just pop songs or pop music, it was a story with a message and with historic content.

“We tried to make Irish people proud, both in Ireland and across the diaspora in England, Scotland, Wales, America, Australia, New Zealand and across Europe.

“We’ve really had a wonderful time, we’ve seen hundreds of thousands of people. I think we’re very special to the Irish diaspora and they’re very special to us.”

The singer added the Wolfe Tones disliked seeing Irish people “hurting”, no matter where they were in the world.

“During the time of the Guildford Four and the Birmingham Six and all that, we did a show in the Hackney Town Hall to highlight the fact that these people were innocent of the crimes they were accused of,” he said.

“No-one wanted to listen at that stage. One of those jailed once told us, ‘You wouldn’t realise, Brian, what it meant to us in prison when someone came out with a song supporting us. It gave us light at the end of the tunnel, it gave a hope that we would at last be exonerated from something that we didn’t have anything to do with’.”

The Wolfe Tones’ sold out final shows will take place in Dublin’s 3Arena on October 11 and 12.

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