PRESS RELEASE–Drowning and what comes Afterwards (or My Time Underwater): Michael Denis Ó Callaghan’s Debut Album Is Released on cmntx records

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE: MARCH 25, 2022

New York, NY – Cmntx records is proud to release Drowning and what comes Afterwards (or My Time Underwater) by Michael Denis Ó Callaghan. In his ambitious debut double album, Ó Callaghan reflects on two different states of suffering: the time within suffering (My Time Underwater) and the challenge of understanding suffering and moving forward (Drowning and what comes Afterwards).

“There is a quietness, I feel, that exists when you hear sounds of water in the ears,” says composer and sound artist, Nyokabi Kariuki in her liner notes for the album, “this record felt like water was next to you; nudging you along, enveloping you, pacing your body’s heartbeat against gently oscillating ripples.”

Michael Denis Ó Callaghan is a composer, trumpeter, vocalist, lyricist, and educator with a knack for subverting expectations. Blurring the boundaries between composition and improvisation, his music explores the space between eclectic artistic influences-simultaneously paying homage to musical traditions of the past and moving towards a unique, authentic sound of his own. Michael explores the spectrums between musical dualities: consonance and extreme dissonance, simplicity and complexity, perpetual motion and stillness, detailed notation, and free improvisation.

Ó Callaghan’s cover of the 1969 Crosby, Stills, and Nash song, Lady of The Island highlights the composer and performer’s eclectic range of influences and ability to divert assumptions within each individual piece and throughout the entire arc of the album. The broad personnel of the album adds prodigious depth to the project’s dense

sound palette and fervor. Heard on the album are Alex Ring Gray, Angie Rosado, Blake Opper, Colin Walters, Dan Langa, Dmitry Glivinskiy, Dorothy Carlos, Evan O. Adams, Harper Randolph, Hannah Donnelly, Joe O’Callaghan, Julien Monick, Laura Reyes, Nate Giordano, Owen Bologna, Sam Beckwith, Samantha Lake, Seth Fox, Steven McArdle, Tyler Campbell, and Yaz Lancaster.

Drowning and what comes Afterwards (or My Time Underwater) is available for purchase on Bandcamp and is streaming everywhere now. For more information, visit cmntxrecords.com/records/drowning.

###

About cmntx records – cmntx records is a New York City-based label committed to supporting the music and careers of artists who are defining their own craft. With a continued devotion to the spirit of creativity, cmntx forms a community of artists supporting one another through a collaborative DIY means of production, elevating each other’s outputs to new heights.

cmntx records is artist-run, founded in 2021 by Alex Ring Gray, Dan Langa, Evan O. Adams, and Michael Denis Ó Callaghan.

For more information visit www.cmntxrecords.com