Alice Costelloe

It seems Alice Costelloe was destined to be a singer. Not only did she hail from North London - an area known for breeding the likes of Adele, Amy Winehouse and more recently Raye -  she comes from a rich family of artists. Her grandfather Lucian Freud was a renowned painter and her great-great grandfather Sigmund Freud was a famous psychoanalyst in the early 20th century. (If you have ever heard the term ‘Freudian slip’, that comes from him!) Costelloe’s ambition, however, is to forge her own path as a singer. The recent release of her new album ‘Move On With The Year’ has seen her climb to an impressive 45.6k monthly listeners on Spotify. With gigs coming up in Belfast and Whelan’s in Dublin, she seems an excellent candidate to emulate some of the greats of British Indie-Pop in the future. 

Born into a family full of talent, with her sister a fashion designer and grandfather a painter, Alice jokes that it’s a very un-musical family. “It’s a very creative family but everyone sucks at music. Maybe that’s why I had to go down that road, to distinguish myself.” Alice has been a singer for decades now, but her journey began at a very young age. For her, growing up in North London provided her the platform to not only fall in love with singing, but to hone and master her craft. In her youth, she was surrounded by up-and-coming artists who inspired and motivated her to pursue a career in music. “Bombay Bicycle Club and those kinds of bands were a few years above me in school. So, if you can imagine when you’re 12 years old and you’re seeing bands like this playing amazing shows, you just think ‘oh, this is something you can do.’”

For her, this album is the first time she has produced something fully on her own, an experience she has described as “so different, but in a good way.” Her vocals feel reminiscent of fellow North Londoner Lily Allen, but her music has a softer and often more melancholic feel to it. She jokes that this is a reflection of her personality and isn’t something she necessarily intends to stick to in the future. “I think I am naturally quite melancholic. That’s probably hard to stamp out!” While this album does feel like an honest expression for her, she is looking for ways to expand her music. “I am thinking more now about what is another authentic and honest way for me to write that isn’t so meloncholic.”

The songs in this album are undoubtedly very personal to her. This is something she feels stems from her shift from collaborative to independent work. “I think when you’re writing just by yourself sometimes the themes become a bit more intense”. Her tumultuous relationship with her father is often an underlying theme in her music and serves as a perfect example of this sentiment. ‘Is There Something’ is a moving song about saying goodbye to her absent father who suffered from addiction. Lyrics include “If it’s the end you had us going the whole time” and “at least I said goodbye”.

Her approach to writing is clearly what provides this authenticity. “I just tried to tune in to whatever was in my mind and whatever was coming naturally, rather than try to kind of challenge that […] I really just went with my natural instincts.” Having finished this album, she feels a sense of closure having explored her memories of hardships and expressed them in her writing. “I feel like I’ve completed that.”

Outside of music, Alice has a colourful life. She works as a Pilates instructor and in her own words has become a “fully obsessive” dog person, adopting a blonde sausage dog named Larry David. “I got home from a show last night at like 2am and basically just hugged my dog all night.” She also joked that coffee is “a high priority on [her] list” when discussing the most important things to her outside of music. But the thing she expressed most gratitude for in life was the opportunity to take her music on tour. “The biggest privilege of making music is getting to experience new places and meet new people and other cultures and foods”.

Alice will be playing in Whelan’s on the 1st of October, a venue she is well familiar with. “I played there before, but there was nobody there!”, she joked. Having opened for young pony club in a much smaller gig, she is looking forward to returning with a bang. When asked what her fans can expect from her live performance, she said authenticity is a priority. “We’re basically trying to make it sound as much like the record as possible without using track or any kind of trickery.” The aim is to keep the feeling of it, but make it as organic as possible. “I don’t like everything to be perfect.” She joked that while she can’t play any of the woodwind instruments while singing, there will be minimal additives involved.

Still just 32, Alice is vastly experienced in the music industry. At 16, she and American singer Kacey Underwood formed the band ‘Big Deal’, which gained much notoriety in the indie/rock scene in the early 2010’s. They split in 2016 having released three albums, most notably ‘June Gloom’ in 2013. The difference between the style of her solo work and Big Deal is stark. While both explore more melancholic themes, her solo work is undoubtedly more devastating. Costelloe attributes much of this to the isolation of writing alone and not having any creative interference. “Playing in bands, you’re kind of collaborating with other people so even if you come up with a song you’ve written, it still gets changed into something collaborative.”

It is this independence that makes this album so different to her other work, and what makes it so special to her. Regarding her best achievements in music, she said that while her role in Big Deal was arguably more high profile, this album feels like her biggest achievement so far. “With big deal, I think getting to tour stadiums was a mad experience and getting a taste of what it looks like to be that huge”. But she didn’t do it alone. “This is the first album I’ve ever done where it feels like this is 100% me and it’s exactly what I want it to sound like, and that feels like a crazy achievement to me having played music since I was a teenager.”

‘Moving on With the Year’ was released in February this year. It is the first taste of what will surely be a long list of independent music made by this exceptionally talented young British singer. Getting to play music in new places like Whelan’s is something that means the world to her, (maybe not quite as much as her dog though!), and she is looking forward to grabbing the opportunity with both hands. Alice’s soft indie songs are a pleasure on the ears in both good moods and in bad, and her mix of experience and freshness makes her album worth a listen for sure.

Tickets for her gig on the first of October are now available on Ticketmaster and Whelans website.