Photo: Robert Watson
The Irish word Rún can mean secret, mystery, or love, or perhaps some elusive combination of the three, reflecting the many aspects of life that defy easy explanation. In wrestling with these, it can become necessary to commit oneself entirely, to jump in at the psychic deep end in search of the vibrations and feelings at hand. This is where the band Rún come in.
Rún comprise firstly Tara Baoth Mooney – sometime Jim Henson voice artist, with a longstanding background in everything from folk and choral music to experimental film-making. Diarmuid MacDiarmada – Nurse With Wound co-conspirator and brother of Lankum’s Cormac, brings with him the experience of avant-garde collaborations with a plethora of artists stretching back over thirty years. Drummer, sound designer and engineer Rian Trench, meanwhile, has worked on everything from the psychedelic IDM of Solar Bears to auto-generative experiments to orchestral arrangements, and owns the studio – The Meadow on Ireland’s east coast – in which their self-titled album was made.
The disparate artistic practices of the three members of the band collude in this context to create something no member could have foreseen. Improvisation is the primary method here in channelling spirits from this realm and others, hospitable or not. “When we get together to work, we often engineer particular atmospheres in order to bring ourselves to what we call the ‘deep’ place, this is the ‘finding’ phase of the process, where ideas come together with whatever stuff is in the ether”, the band relate.
Premiered today, ‘Your Death My Body’ projects exorcising vocal meditations through a musical prism that touches on the lineage of spectral beat-driven atmospherics that connects Portishead and Tara Clerkin Trio. Reflecting on the composition and development of the the track the band write:
Tara: “‘Your Death My Body’ is relentless, the piece is screaming for release from itself. The one element of it that remains constant is the driving kalimba cantus firmus which anchors the piece and allows contrapuntal flow. That rhythm is stuck in there holding the thing together that wants to scatter but cannot. So any iteration of this that we have ever done still has that energetic drive, even with shifting moods or dynamic changes. In that way, the sonic structure mirrors the barely-held-together body myth.”
Diarmuid: “The recording of the live session version of ‘Your Death. . .’ is a good example of how the material is always mutating, subtly or otherwise. Part of the work is to keep everything in creative flux and to resist the way in which documentation and observation tend to fix things in a particular way. The best position to be in is to be the kind of artist that people come to see knowing they’re only going to hear whatever the artist really wants to do, as opposed to the bands who are effectively tribute bands to their younger selves. It’s really gratifying to hear evolution in the work.”
Rian: “There’s nothing like a pulverising red-wine hangover to access the limp space required to slap this one together. I would add that maybe that the songs are inherently unarranged perhaps? So peaks and troughs always happen in unique places every time we play. It has less to do with intention and more to do with how the cards happen to fall.”
Rún by Rún is released on August 22 2025 via Rocket Recordings. Vinyl and CD formats can be pre-ordered here. Digital downloads can be purchased here.
Live dates 2025:
21 Aug • Galway • Roisin Dubh
22 Aug • Cork • Nudes
27 Aug • Dublin • Spindizzy Records (instore)
29–31 Aug • Birmingham • Supersonic Festival
6 Sep • Sligo • Minor Disturbance Festival
15 Nov • London • Rich Mix (w/ Sirom)
19 Nov • Glasgow • The Glad Cafe
20 Nov • Newcastle • The Lubber Fiend
