Review
Genre and Mood
Phil Kieran’s Blinded By The Sun is electronic music made with a band. Discogs files its album under electronic and pop, with house, tech house, techno and indie pop among its styles. The feelings come from Kieran’s own account of the record: raw, the word he used for what he wanted to capture, and escapist, for music as a way out.
Song Summary
This is the title track of Kieran’s fourth album, the third of its ten tracks, 3:53 long. Hot Creations describes the album as a ten-track narrative drawn from more than a decade in the electronic dance scene. Kieran said he wanted to capture something very real and raw, like the feeling at the end of the night, jumping in a car from one after-party to another through London or New York when the music comes on the car stereo. The album’s credits put live players on this track: bass guitar, guitar, cello, violin and percussion, with Jess Brien and Kieran singing.
Musical Breakdown
No source we found describes the arrangement of Blinded By The Sun section by section or times it, so this guide follows its credits.
The Voices
Jess Brien and Phil Kieran are both credited with vocals; Brien sings on almost every track of the album.
The Players
Herb Magee plays bass guitar, Enda Strathern guitar and Thomas Tetty Annang percussion: a rhythm section of people rather than only programmed parts.
The Strings
Zarah Fleming’s cello and Rachel Boyd’s violin complete the line-up, the same pair heard across much of the record.
Concepts in Focus
The album comes out of club culture. Kieran started DJing at Belfast’s Limelight in 1995 and was a resident at Shine from 1998, and the record is, in his words, about the end of the night and the after-party. Its label, Hot Creations, also released Funky Fat & Digitaria – You Bring Me Down.
A remix series sent the album back to the dancefloor. In 2017 two remix EPs followed, with Roman Flügel, Andrew Weatherall, Mano Le Tough, Matthew Herbert and David Holmes reworking other tracks of the album; Flügel’s touch can be heard in C.A.R – Idle Eyes (Roman Flügel Remix).
Artistic Context
Phil Kieran was born in Belfast in 1978. His debut solo album, Shh, came out on Cocoon in 2009; he has released on Skint, Cocoon, Hot Creations, Soma and Optimo, among others, and presented BBC Radio 1’s dance show in 2014 and 2015. Jamie Jones picked up Blinded by the Sun and signed it to Hot Creations, which released it in October 2016. Kieran has since scored films, among them Nightride in 2021.
Impact and Reception
Kieran explained the album through where he grew up: in Northern Ireland, surrounded by hate and love, where music was a way to escape hatred and bigotry, and where, he said, love and music can win in the end. Listen for the band inside the machine, and play it on the drive home.
