PJ Gallagher: “You’d never let anyone talk to you, the way you talk to yourself when you’re unwell”
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What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
Comedian, actor, broadcaster, author, father, human being. PJ Gallagher, you're very welcome.
Thank you very much. Thanks. Human being, I definitely feel qualified for on that list.
The rest, I'm not so sure. PJ, we're going to talk about five songs that have meant something to you in your life. Now, I often start by asking people about the music in the house when they were a kid. Oh. That kind of feels like asking, focusing on what the band were playing when the Titanic went down. People don't know you were adopted and it was into a chaotic kind of situation.
It was a pretty chaotic atmosphere that I was in. Yeah, yeah.
What songs have significantly impacted PJ Gallagher's life?
I mean, there was a lot of music that was very prominent. My dad had the most strange and weirdly eclectic sort of taste in music. He loved like James Galway and Boney M.
I'd say that's par for the course in a lot of houses back then.
Maybe it was, yeah, but it was very, like, confusing. Like, it could be absolutely anything, like the Fury Brothers one minute and then you're back to, like... Brown Girl in the Ring. Exactly. So, yeah, yeah, so it was a really mixed bag and then my ma would listen to Elaine Page and get all emotional about it and stuff. So it was, even the music ended up being quite dramatic in its own way.
Yeah, and come here, in terms of your own coping mechanisms then in the situation, how did you survive through it?
Well, I mean, I suppose I got started to get my own little bit of independence, like everybody does when they hit their teenage years, you know. And you get your first taste of being out in the house or out of the house and out hanging with your friends. And suddenly you see a world that's beyond your own front door. Because our house was pretty mad.
How did PJ's childhood and adoption shape his identity?
You know, we had six people who were living with us that were part of an experiment. at the time, who had their own mental illness problems. And then my mother and father, they drank a lot. So it was me and my sister and the family on one side and these six men on the other side. And you just get to thinking everybody's house is probably nuts, you know, because everybody will say my house was a madhouse. And you can go, I don't really think it was. But, you know, you go and then sit in someone else's house and you'd be so... transported to a different place, you know, you just, you became very uncomfortable in the silence. I think I've always and still am very uncomfortable in silence. Yeah, I think so.
Yeah, I definitely think so.
You need that background noise of chaos kind of going on.
Yeah, and it's a weird thing. I do hear music in my head like all the time. So I think I've used music as a distraction in one way or another for everything and still do. It's like, yeah, I just like, it's like there's a soundtrack running all the time, not in an intrusive way. It's actually quite a comforting thing.
OK, and is it the popular hits of the day or music you like or is it non-specific?
It's non-specific, genuinely. Very non-specific. I know it sounds like I'm confessing to something here, but it's pretty comforting thing. But there's always music in my head, always. To the point that I know I'm not in a great mood when I suddenly don't hear it. And that's been a constant through my life, you know. And I think then the beginnings of... getting out to gigs and meeting people. And a very specific time in the late 80s and 90s when I was just coming into my sort of former of teenage years. And there was a really... really, I think, important time in Irish music happening. People were pulling away from the traditional stuff and all these bands that were just having this huge influence on me.
Local people, people that you felt were like you, like Emotional Fish were out there. The Picturehouse were out there. The Stunning started to come on the scene. Ah, House were like the coolest people I'd ever seen. And the Frank and Walters were coming out of Cork. But there just seemed to be this... real happening band thing, you know, everyone was in a band.
What role did music play in PJ's coping mechanisms?
Yeah. Even if they couldn't play an instrument, they were going to get a bass guitar and join a band.
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Chapters
6 chapters
1
What is the main topic discussed in this episode?
0:00–0:33
2
What songs have significantly impacted PJ Gallagher's life?
0:33–1:33
3
How did PJ's childhood and adoption shape his identity?
1:33–3:28
4
What role did music play in PJ's coping mechanisms?
3:28–13:54
5
How did PJ Gallagher transition from lighting to comedy?
13:54–27:29
6
What challenges did PJ face in his early comedy career?
27:29–31:46