In 1988, the thrash metal band Megadeth was touring in Northern Ireland and was set to play a show in Belfast. Before the band got on stage, one of the security guards came up to lead singer Dave Mustaine and informed him that a kid was busted for selling unlicensed t-shirts.
Curious about why this kid was selling the shirts, Mustaine asked a crew member who said the kid was trying to support “the cause”. The cause? The IRA (Irish Republican Army) and their fight to unite Ireland. Mustaine had only been briefed on the overview and just knew about the religious differences between the Irish and British, but didn’t know the full extent of the problem.
Right before Megadeth started to play their cover of “Anarchy in the UK” by the Sex Pistols, Mustaine shouts, “Give Ireland back to the Irish! This one is for the cause!”
Mustaine recalls that the crowd split in half, right down the middle, separating the Protestants from the Catholics. The British police were prepared due to the long standing conflict in Northern Ireland, so a riot didn’t break out. However, Megadeth had to leave immediately in a bulletproof bus and drive to Dublin, which is in the Republic of Ireland.
This prompted Mustaine to write one of the most iconic songs from Megadeth: “Holy Wars…the Punishment Due”, off one of the most influential thrash metal records of all time, “Rust in Peace”. In the song, Mustaine discusses not being aware of religious tensions in foreign countries. I think many can relate to Mustaine not knowing about the history of Ireland, in particular.
With the St. Patrick’s Day season beginning to set upon us, I wanted to talk a little about the complicated history of Ireland. More specifically, I want to talk about the cultural genocide of Ireland that was created by the British and the resilience of the Irish people.
The Famine
One of the most important and talked about pieces of Irish history is the potato famine of the 19th century. I often hear jokes about the famine and how the Irish only ate potatoes. In reality, the famine was about Irish people not being able to eat potatoes.
I remember learning about the famine in my 6th grade history class, but never why it happened. How can potatoes, a vegetable that’s not even native to Ireland, impact a nation so greatly?
The potato was brought over to Europe by Spanish Conquistadors in 1536 and then introduced to Ireland by Sir Walter Raleigh in 1589. Raleigh spread it amongst the landed gentry, who were mostly of English descent and landowners. Later, it became a staple of the poorer Irish Catholics, who mostly were tenant workers for the landowners. In 1845 phytophthora infestans, a water mold, began to spread to potatoes in Ireland.
Sinéad O’Connor was an Irish singer/songwriter and activist. She is probably most famous for her cover of Prince’s “Nothing Compares 2 U” and ripping up a picture of Pope John Paul II on SNL, saying that people should “fight the real enemy.” That caused her to be banned from the show for life. Always the controversial subject, O’Connor was never afraid to shy away from political subjects, even if she was harassed for these beliefs.
One of her songs is called “Famine" in reference to the Irish potato famine. O’Connor’s lyrics claim that “All of the other food / Meat, fish, vegetables / Were shipped out of the country under armed guard / To England while the Irish people starved.” According to History.com, historians found that “Ireland continued to export large quantities of food, primarily to Great Britain, during the blight” and those exports may have increased during the famine.
The effects of the famine were massive. Not only was most of the population diminished because of complications from starvation and disease from the potatoes, but also the Irish diaspora to places like the United States and Australia. This also affected other parts of the culture, like the decline of the Irish language and dance.
The Language
The Irish language has been around for centuries, through the Viking, Norman and English invasions of Ireland. Following the famine and towards the end of the 19th century, the number of people who spoke Irish “had declined to 600,000” when the population of Ireland was around 4.5 million, according to the “Estimated Population of Ireland in the 19th Century” by Frank O’Donovan.
Part of this was because of the diaspora, but the Irish language was brought with Irish people there, too. This involves American-Irish songs like “Too-Roo-Loo-Ra-Loo-Ral (That’s an Irish Lullaby)” which was written by James Royce Shannon and made popular by Bing Cosby, who is of Irish descent. The name of the song is written out phonetically, but is derived from Irish. It translates to “goodbye” or “I’ll be seeing you”.
The decline of the use of the Irish language could also be attributed to the rise of National schools. These schools were for primary education and established by the state in 1831. Students were taught English and beaten with a “tally stick” if they were caught speaking Irish. Most Irish parents were fine with their children not speaking Irish because English was seen as more “economically useful.”
One can draw similarities between the Irish National School system and the American and Canadian residential schools. In both situations, these schools were mostly supported by the Catholic Church and children at a young age were abused and taught not to speak their native language. It should be noted that the Irish children were not forcibly removed from their homes like the Native peoples of the United States and Canada.
Despite this, the late 19th century also brought about Irish nationalism. People had a renewed interest in old folklore and the language itself. Most of this can be credited to the Gaelic League.
Dance
Irish dance has roots with the Celts in ancient times. The Celts were sun-worshipping pagans who danced in circles around stones (like Stonehenge). There are many documentations of Irish dance by Norman invaders and later English invaders in the 15th century and beyond. Later, Irish dancing and the playing of Irish music were banned during the Penal Time, a period from the late 17th century to the late 18th century to suppress the culture of Irish Roman Catholics. These laws were created by the Protestant Parliament in Ireland. Thankfully, Catholic relief efforts led to the repeal of the Penal Laws in 1793.
The Gaelic League, or Conradh na Gaeilge, was founded in 1893 to restore Irish culture. The Gaelic League later founded the An Coimisiún le Rincí Gaelacha (CLRG) in 1927 to better organize Irish dance. Teachers and adjudicators have to pass exams that were established by the CLRG in order to teach and judge Irish dance. Irish dance and the Irish language go hand-in-hand because teachers and adjudicators in Ireland are required to pass an Irish oral exam. It is optional for people outside of Ireland.
Local Irish dance competitions, known as feis (pronounced fesh) also feature music, Irish speaking and baking competitions. Irish dance not only depends on the dance, but also the music. There are many different types of dances like hornpipes, treble jigs, reels, etc. that feature different steps on top of different songs and time signatures. Ceili (pronounced kay-lee) dances are some of the most traditional dances because they are group dances.
An important part of the evolution of Irish dance was the phenomenon of Riverdance. One of the first times Irish dance was shown to the masses was during the 1994 Eurovision Song Contest during an interval act. It was a seven minute performance featuring the vocal group Anuna, the Raidió Teilifís Éireann (RTE) Concert Orchestra and Irish dance world champions Michael Flatley and Jean Butler (who were both American). The performance featured a score composed by Bill Whelan. You can watch the original production of Riverdance here.
The Riverdance single topped the charts in the UK and Ireland. The ensemble began to tour in the UK and Ireland, eventually touring North America in a now 96 minute full show. Riverdance continues to take the world by storm, touring all across the globe. Michael Flatley is the face of Irish dancing and has many other tours like Lord of the Dance, Celtic Tiger and Feet of Flames. Lord of the Dance and Riverdance still tour to this day.
Though Irish dance has evolved throughout the years, it still is a huge part of Irish culture.
Surely, the Gaelic League would be ecstatic to know that Irish dance is now a global phenomenon. There are schools in countries like the UK, Ireland and the USA, as well as in Australia, South Africa, Japan, Mexico and many more.
There have been many songs by Irish artists that touch on The Troubles. The Pogues have a song called “Streets of Sorrow/Birmingham Six” which is about six men who were wrongly arrested for the bombing of a pub in Birmingham city in 1974. Those men were sentenced to death in a 1975 trial, but were acquitted in 1991 because of the work of an investigative journalist.
U2’s song “Sunday Bloody Sunday” is about the shooting in Derry in Northern Ireland. People were protesting and the British Army Parachute Regiment was there to redirect and block the march. Protesters started throwing stones at the army and the army responded with tear gas and open fire. Thirteen people were killed and fifteen people were injured. All the protesters were unarmed.
The Cranberries’ song “Zombie” is an anti-war song about the IRA Warrington bombing that killed two young boys in 1993. Dolores O’Riordan wrote it as a lament of the horrors of warfare and especially a mother’s loss of her children. Many Irish artists have been trying to spread the message of what was going on in Ireland.
I feel like many often forget that Ireland was one of the first places that the British colonized. Even as recently as February of this year (2025) a penal law from 1737 that made it “a criminal offence to use any language other than English” in Northern Irish courts was repealed.
As difficult as it is to talk about these issues, it’s important to acknowledge them as well.
Information gathered from various sources and linked throughout article.
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