Kneecap - Fenian
★★★★
HEAVENLY RECORDINGS
After last year’s Coachella festival Kneecap became the most talked about rap group on the planet. After accusing Israel of genocide and leading the American crowd in chants of “Free Palestine”, the West Belfast trio went viral, with Fox News calling for their visas to be revoked. Condemned by Keir Starmer, events escalated when a terrorism charge was brought against rapper Mo Chara for allegedly displaying a Hezbollah flag at a London show in 2024. The charge was eventually thrown out for being ‘unlawful’ in September 2025.
International notoriety was a quantum leap for a previously cult force who started perfecting their bilingual Irish/English raps in the late 2010s. As with Jason Williams’ grouchy Notts brogue in Sleaford Mods, Chara and Móglaí Bap have used their accents to their advantage. They also share the Mods’ satirical impulses and minimalistic sonic formula – in thrall to UK hip-hop and early grime but with a persistent undercurrent of ’90s rave. If 2024’s debut Fine Art was the story of a wild night out in Belfast, Fenian – written against the backdrop of the prosecution – feels like the aftermath, hilarity tempered by encroaching darkness.
Based around a brooding, Portishead-like percussive motif, Carnival tackles Chara’s terrorism charge head-on, comparing him to the Guildford Four’s Gerry Conlon, sweetened by a ridiculously catchy chorus. They waste little time upending Irish stereotypes amid the Young Fathers-y jagged synths and sirens of Smugglers & Scholars, while the deep growling raps of Liars Tale are even more pugnacious and attritional, lobbing c-bombs at a prime minister they dismiss as “Netanyahu’s bitch”. Solidarity is reasserted on Palestine, an urgent techno-driven duet with Ramallah-based rapper Fawzi.
Elsewhere, punk instincts take over; rallying for the Irish language (the dancefloor skank of Gael Phonics) or in boisterous takes on hedonism’s downside (Headcase’s prescription drug psychosis, the swirling insomnia of Cocaine Hill). The biggest anthem is the title track, an unabashed hands-in-air singalong, collectively spat out over a riot of Theremin-like synths.
While Fontaines DC producer Dan Carey keeps proceedings brisk, hook-laden and on-message, he pushes Kneecap into unexpectedly reflective territory on Occupied 6, using a clanging pulse to count the cost of paramilitary violence: “Who was shot?/Was he known?/From the shop coming home/Another Ma on her own.” Closer Irish Goodbye is more tender still, a grief-flecked duet with Kae Tempest built on a skittering groove and a melancholic piano.
There are other precedents for Kneecap’s rap as Gaeilge. Both Marxman and ScaryÉire signed major deals in the ’90s, only to have their thunder stolen by House Of Pain’s megahit Jump Around. Like that Irish-American trio, Kneecap are PR savvy: see last year’s boisterous self-titled biopic and this album’s visceral cover art – DJ Próvaí in his trademark tricolour balaclava and a blindfold. On Fenian they back that shrewdness with songs of depth and substance, capturing an explicit Emerald Isle that’s not in any tourist guide.
Fenian is out May 1 on Heavenly Recordings.
ORDER: Amazon | Rough Trade | HMV
Tracklisting:
1. Éire Go Deo
2. Smugglers & Scholars
3. Carnival
4. Palestine (feat. Fawzi)
5. Liars Tale
6. FENIAN
7. Big Bad Mo
8. Headcase
9. An Ra
10. Cold At The Top
11. Occupied 6
12. Gael Phonics
13. Cocaine Hill (feat. Radie Peat)
14. Irish Goodbye (feat. Kae Tempest)
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