A Night at Limerick’s Acoustic Club - LIMERICK
Songs in the City
A Night at Limerick’s Acoustic Club
by
Kieran Beville
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On a cold Tuesday evening in Limerick city I ducked into the Number Three Bar on Glentworth Street. It was open-mic night at The Acoustic Club—a weekly gathering that has quietly grown into one of the most democratic stages in the city.
Every Tuesday from 9pm this modest space transforms into something halfway between a cabaret and a confessional booth. The crowd is a mixture: some attentive, others talking over the music, pint glasses clinking, oblivious. That, perhaps, is the charm of open mics: the attention of the room is never guaranteed—it must be won.
The Curator and the Chronicler
Dominic Taylor,
poet, songwriter, and the club’s tireless organiser, opened the evening. With
fellow musician Fergal Nash providing guitar support, he launched into ‘Conspiracy’—a
sharp-edged catalogue of the myths and suspicions that continue to swirl around
events like the 1969 moon landing.
Taylor isn’t
simply the night’s host. He’s also its historian. The Acoustic Club began in
2014, during Limerick’s City of Culture celebrations, when it was known as The
Acoustic Café. From café corners in the Milk Market to residencies in The White
House and Charlie Malones, to the Record Room of the Commercial Bar, the club
has always found new stages.
Since 2024, it
has been rooted at the Number Three. Along the way, it has birthed compilation
albums, supported charities, and hosted heavyweight names like John Spillane,
Denis Allen, Mick Hanly, and Don Mescall.
But the heart of
the project is not the guest stars. It is the weekly opportunity for new voices
to be heard. Taylor, alongside volunteers like Eugene Nolan (producer of the
club’s compilation CDs) and Keith Harris (who records and uploads every show),
ensures that each songwriter not only has a chance to play but also to document
their own progress. In a scene where many early gigs disappear into the ether,
The Acoustic Club functions as both a stage and an archive.
Nash and the Curragh
After Taylor,
the spotlight shifted to Nash himself. Known in Limerick as a busker with a
knack for accessible songwriting, Nash has released an album available on
Spotify. On this night, he sang of Curragh Chase—the wooded estate west of the
city that was once home to poet Aubrey de Vere. Nash’s performance carried the
lilt of someone used to singing to strangers on the street, coaxing them into
pausing mid-stride.
Winning the Room
Then came Fergus
Moloney. If the earlier performers had to fight for the room’s attention,
Moloney simply took it. His playing was deft, his voice strong, his presence
quietly magnetic.
He introduced a
song titled ‘Sarajevo’, written in memory of Julie, a nurse from Devon killed
during the Bosnian-Serbian war of the 1990s. The lyrics carried the weight of
witness; the melody, restrained and haunting, demanded silence. It was one of
those rare open-mic moments when the chatter evaporates, and the room becomes a
single ear.
His second
offering, ‘Bandstand’, was a love song, proving that his storytelling wasn’t
confined to history’s tragedies.
Moloney’s set
reminded everyone of the stakes of song writing: it is not always
entertainment, but testimony. The Acoustic Club, with its anything-goes policy,
makes room for that.
Poetry Meets Melody
If Moloney had
stilled the room, Dublin-born songwriter Ruth Egan brought a different kind of
vulnerability. She introduced a piece inspired by Gerard Manley Hopkins’ poem ‘Spring
and Fall: To a Young Child’. Hopkins’ meditation on innocence, grief, and the
inevitability of mortality is not obvious material for a song, yet Egan leaned
into its rhythms.
In truth, one
imagined the piece soaring higher in the hands of a stronger vocalist—but her
willingness to translate Hopkins into melody was itself a small act of daring.
Too often, open mics are weighed down by cover versions of well-worn classics.
The Shape of the Club
This, in
essence, is The Acoustic Club: a forum where polished acts and tentative
experiments share the same bill. Newcomers are invited to play up to three
songs or 15 minutes, and the door is open to all genres. The club has produced
five compilation CDs and even run workshops with heavyweight songwriters like
Spillane and Don Mescall. But the ethos remains disarmingly simple: equal time,
equal opportunity, and no velvet ropes.
Open mics, by
nature, are equal parts rehearsal room and public performance. They allow
seasoned musicians to road-test new material, and they give first-timers a
stage that isn’t hostile. What sets The Acoustic Club apart is its archival
instinct—its determination not just to provide a platform but to document, to
give fledgling songwriters footage of their own work, a mirror to grow against.
And yet, despite
its longevity and reputation, one challenge remains: representation. Female
voices are rare here. Taylor and his team are actively calling for more women
singer-songwriters to take part. The audience, largely supportive, would surely
benefit from a wider spectrum of perspective and sound.
Between Cabaret and Communion
What struck me
most in the hour I stayed—from 9pm to 10pm—was the predominance of original
songs. In many open mics, covers dominate, but here the four performers shared
material of their own making. For that alone, kudos! It transforms the night
from casual entertainment into something closer to a songwriters’ laboratory.
But the
experience isn’t seamless. At times, the atmosphere veers towards cabaret, with
talkers in the corner unbothered by the lyrics unfolding before them. At other
moments, the silence is reverent, like a church stripped of its doctrine but
not its devotion. The push and pull between distraction and attention is what
makes the night feel alive.
The Wider Context
Limerick has
long carried the weight of being “Ireland’s third city,” often overshadowed by
Dublin’s industry and Cork’s bohemian sheen. Yet beneath the headlines, the
city has nurtured artists who are fiercely independent. The Cranberries may be
its most famous export but a whole generation of songwriters, poets and
performers has cut their teeth in smaller venues like this one.
Spaces such as
The Acoustic Club matter because they resist homogenisation. In an age when
musicians upload their songs into the endless churn of Spotify playlists, the
club insists on presence: a body in a room, a voice in the air, an audience
that may or may not care but is there. The stakes are higher because the
feedback is instant, and the connection—when it happens—is electric.
Looking Ahead
Taylor and his
team are determined to keep pushing the club forward. Beyond the weekly
sessions, they have collaborated on charity CDs, brought in national figures to
share their craft, and maintained a strong ethos of community. Yet their appeal
for more female songwriters is telling. For the scene to thrive, it must be as
diverse as the city itself.
The Acoustic
Club is also positioning itself as a bridge. For the emerging songwriter, it is
the first step out of the bedroom. For the established musician, it is a chance
to trial new work before risking it on a paying audience. For the casual
listener, it is a reminder that songs are not manufactured artifacts but
living, changing entities.
Limerick – A Cultural Hub
In a city still
fighting for recognition as a cultural hub, spaces like The Acoustic Club are
vital. They offer what streaming platforms cannot: presence, risk, the
electricity of the unedited moment. They remind us that music isn’t just a
product but a process, and that the distance between a songwriter’s bedroom and
a stage needn’t be a chasm.
The Acoustic
Club is not glamorous. The Number Three is not Madison Square Garden. But when
Moloney’s ‘Sarajevo’ hushed the bar into stillness, or when Taylor’s
‘Conspiracy’ drew wry smiles, or when Ruth Egan risked reshaping Hopkins’ grief
into melody, the scale didn’t matter. What mattered was the room, the song, and
the fragile bridge between them.
On that cold
Tuesday, Limerick sounded like itself—creative, resilient and bursting with
fledgling talent.
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