- Chris ORourke
Dublin Fringe Festival 2018: Everything I Do
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Fly Me To The Moon
“Everything I Do” is a journey of sorts. A performance. Of sorts. A concert of sorts. Or a concept album. Of sorts. Starting out jumping on a moon-like trampoline, Zoe Ní Riordáin follows immediately with a series of songs while she plays an electric guitar. Exploring love, the cost of love, the need for love, or the need to escape love, each song brings her closer to the floor until finally she’s sitting against the wall. Remembering trivia from 1985, the year she was born, she addresses the audience directly. She sings more songs, talks about the boy she almost kissed in a bush, and regales with stories about guardian aliens as she relives and renegotiates heartache. But all this seems secondary to Ní Riordáin herself, whose delightful deadpan seriousness serves to highlight both her irresistible playfulness and the edgier questioning that’s taking place.
And then there’s the songs. Often beautifully rendered, quirky dislocations. Throughout Ní Riordáin’s voice is wonderfully engaging. If some songs prove to be fun curiosities, others are little gems. In the end “Everything I Do” sees Ní Riordáin deliver a quirky, thoughtful, light to the touch performance, sweetly directed by Maud Lee. Though Ní Riordáin does risk being seriously upstaged by Aoife McAtamney’s dancing, death metal Spiderman.
“Everything I Do” by Zoe Ní Riordáin, ran at The Project Arts Centre as part of Dublin Fringe Festival 2018 until September 15
For more information, visit The Project Arts Centre or Dublin Fringe Festival 2018
