Photos by Elliot Browne

Welcome is an independent club night that was founded in September of last year by Paddy Harkin, Hugh Mulhern, and Axel McHugh, and exists now as one of the most exciting nights in Dublin, standing as a bit of an outlier in a city that is oversaturated with nights trading in house and techno. The three met while in school in their native South Dublin, and accrued experience from involvement in other nights before forming Welcome. Their impetus in bringing the night together was largely to create something that catered entirely to their own tastes. They were appreciating what was happening in Dublin in terms of nightlife, but felt that they could add to it by creating something unique and representative of the music that they were listening to. “We were working on Welcome for like two months,” Paddy says. “Once we had the visual style, everything just came into place after that.” Finding a home in the Twisted Pepper (“RIP” Hugh quips at one point), Welcome had Kildare act Two Charming Men to headline and did “house in one room, techno in the other, and then hip hop in the café.”

Things moved quickly after their first show, and Eoin Cregan from Bodytonic approached Welcome after the night to ask as to whether they would be interested in hosting the grime, garage, and everything-in-between DJ Oneman as part of the Beatyard festival in the Twisted Pepper. Paddy says: “I didn’t know Oneman too well at the time so I looked him up and checked out his Boiler Room sets and fell in love with his selections and his way of blending genres. I especially connected with his love for hip hop — specifically the trap sound. I wasn’t listening to grime within the context of club music at the time but I was definitely feeling everything Oneman was playing. He was a gateway for us and helped us realise where we could really go with Welcome in terms of expanding out into different genres, and for myself personally to play far more genre-diverse sets. It’s weird when we look back because obviously all of these sounds work, and are even made for being played in a club, but we were by no means the first to do it in Dublin.” With encouragement from Eoin Cregan and with a new confidence to blend genres as befitted their tastes, Welcome from this point on embarked on a new direction, and from thereon in they adopted what could now be called the signature Welcome sound — emphasising instrumental grime, taking in strains of underground hip hop, trap, and garage, but really, above all, embracing an attitude of openness to all forms of club music. Since then, they’ve hosted some of the biggest and most exciting names in instrumental grime, including Murlo, Mumdance, Glacial Sound, MissingNo, and Shriekin.

The division of labour in Welcome is in a sense trifold, although Paddy is quick to assure that “we’re all involved in every process” and that “nobody just goes off and does anything without talking to the others.” However, each member of the team has his own area of specialisation. As mentioned above, Paddy DJs and produces his own music, now under the moniker Tjugo Lax, while also managing bookings. Hugh handles video and media, and in the earlier days filming sets. Axel then designs the completely characteristic posters and graphics. Axel was unfortunately absent for the interview, but Paddy is right to describe him as “crazy talented.” His promotional posters and graphics are perhaps the best in Dublin, noted for their vibrant colour palette and bold feature imagery.

The Dublin take on grime, as promoted by Welcome, is subtly different to the mainstream sound as centred on London. With regards some other nights in Dublin, Hugh says: “there’s almost this attitude where some people want to try and bring Berlin to Dublin. And we never really thought consciously that we wanted to bring London to Dublin. This is a Dublin experience. Obviously we’re taking music, and bringing over producers and stuff, whatever, and like the scene in London is huge and amazing, and we’re more niche over here. Well, maybe not anymore — it’s a growing thing. You’re seeing grime being played at a lot more shows, and Paddy is getting asked to play more sets, particularly grime sets as well.” Dublin has its share of producers and DJs, but as of yet it hasn’t really witnessed an upsurge in people from Dublin taking up microphones as MCs. This is something that Paddy expects to change: “It’s cool that this stuff hits home in Ireland, and grime definitely is getting popular now. So there definitely are going to be Irish MCs popping up.”

Welcome is anything but a business for the trio. They only book acts that they themselves are genuinely excited about and would want to see themselves, rather than attempting to pander to a crowd. Paddy explains: “These slightly more underground acts might even be at the very start of their career and are easier to book, so we don’t have to break the bank and charge ridiculous prices on the door to make it happen. And at the same time we will be just as hyped about bringing over someone with zero fan-base as someone into house or techno might be about bringing over a huge name like Ben Klock. It’s great to introduce people to new music; a lot of the time people will come in [to Welcome] and say they don’t like grime, but then they’ll be dancing to some Murlo and stuff and be like ‘Oh, is this grime?’ With the way genres fuse with each other nowadays more than ever it’s important to not get caught up in the ‘what’s what’ and to just have an open mind.” This faith in their own tastes has generally paid off; they held their biggest party to date back in October when they hosted Murlo and Deadboy in District 8. Hugh laughs as he explains that: “We don’t make money! We make a bit of profit or whatever, but it’s not a job. We do a party a month, and the money we make from it is not justifying a month’s work. Initially yeah, we had the idea that we could do something we love and make a bit of cash on the side; now, that idea is gone.” Rather than being a source of revenue for its founders, Welcome has offered the trio instead a chance to flex themselves creatively. Paddy is now looking to start releasing his own music as Tjugo Lax and talks about his ideas for his own record label. Hugh has already done music videos for the likes of Dah Jevu and Luka Palm, and in July filmed a soon-to-be-released music video for Bobby Basil. In the coming spring he is going to be working with an as of yet unannounced artist from the UK. As such, it’s been an independently created and curated springboard in which they’ve given themselves a chance to nurture their own artistic talents and to kickstart their careers.

Reflecting on their experience with Welcome thus far, Hugh says: “I think with Welcome we’ve had a great year, it’s been really good. We were really excited about last year, and I don’t think we expected the year to go where it went so quickly, and to have met all the people we’ve met, and all the friends we’ve made. But what we’re more excited about is the next few years, and about where we go next. For us, the last year was just one step into something a lot bigger.” The resounding message from Welcome is that if you want to do something creative, just go for it. Dublin in 2015 is a receptive city — we could even say a welcoming city — and if you have passion for what you’re doing, an exciting idea, and maybe a little bit of luck, then you’ll find your space.