Jimmy Monaghan

Jimmy Monaghan is an Irish musician from Belmullet, Ireland. He is the lead singer, guitarist and songwriter for the Galway based anti-folk band Music for Dead Birds. He also releases music under various other titles, including "The Crytearions".

Biography

He was born in Danbury, Connecticut and moved to Ireland as a child. As a teenager he was an amateur boxer, winning four Irish national titles. He won a silver medal at the 2004 Four Nations tournament boxing for Ireland and received the Western People Sports Star of the year award the same year. His first album with Music for Dead Birds was released in 2009 by the Irish record label Rusted Rail. In July 2012 Psychonavigation Records released an album of his instrumental piano recordings under his Irish name Seamus O'Muineachain. The Irish Times reviewed the album positively, calling it "a tremulous if tranquil success." Bleep.com said of the album "He reveals ten tracks of delicately crafted classicism, a unique piano soundtrack indebted with heart-wrenching cinematic emotion." To promote the album he performed at The Electric Picnic festival in 2012. The album received radio play on the Australian Broadcasting Corporation and the song 'I Am Always In Your Power' was used in the Emmy Award nominated series Beat Girl. In 2013, he began releasing lo-fi punk music under the pseudonym 'The Crytearions'. Having only giving one performance under this name, the recordings found a following on-line from internet radio stations such as Dandelion Radio and music blogs including Tiny Mix Tapes. In 2015 he appeared in a Maltese stage production of Butterflies Are Free which ran at Saint James Cavalier in Valletta.

In 2016 an image of him cycling on the Aran Islands was used on an Irish post stamp.

Discography

With Music for Dead Birds

• And then it rained for seven days 2009, Rusted Rail
• The Pope's Sister, 2011
• Vitamins, 2014

With The Crytearions

• The Crytearions, 2013, Dramacore
• I See What It Is And I Am Scared, 2013
• These Songs Hate You, 2014

Other

• Seamus O'Muineachain, Psychonavigation Records 2012
• Christian Bookshop, Owl & Hat Records 2012

• http://www.dramacore.com/info/136.htm
• http://thefirenote.com/2013/11/05/the-crytearions-i-see-what-it-is-and-i-am-scared-album-review/
• http://bandjack.com/crytearions-these_songs_hate_you/