Back in 2011, the television advertisement for the Francis Lawrence romantic drama, Water for Elephants would become very prevalent during ad breaks but what caught my attention was the music playing in the background.

The song was Please Don’t Go by the Seattle based piano rock band, Barcelona. The mix of atmospheric piano and haunting vocals successfully created a sense of mystery around the single and it would become a key part of the soundtrack of the last few months of my second year in University College Cork. The single would go on to feature on the independently released debut LP from the band, Absolutes.

The band originally came together in 2005, when Brian Fennell, Chris Bristol, and Rhett Stonelake, who had all attending Seattle Pacific University, posed as students of the college to gain access to free recording space. On formation they immediately began touring.

In recent years, guitarist Brian Fennell has began to busy himself with a moodier and darker side project, performing under the title of SYML.

October 2015 would see the debut release by Fennell under this guise with the Hurt For Me EP. The EP would clearly demonstrate the new sound that Fennell was going for.

The EP was followed up a year later with a collection of acoustic versions of the songs.

MK