Almost three years and two weddings later, Picture This are back with a new album.
The fourpiece from Athy, Co Kildare have enjoyed consistent success since bursting onto the music scene – via social media – with breakout track Take My Hand almost a decade ago.
What followed is the stuff of dreams – two chart-topping albums and a third peaking at number two; a glut of hit singles; huge crowds at headline shows and festivals both at home and abroad, and constant adoration from what is [debatably] the most loyal fanbase of any Irish artist on the music scene right now.
I speak to the group ahead of the release of their fourth new album, Parked Car Conversations – an album that fittingly owes its own origin story to a car.
"We went on a road trip together the four of us, and we just went into Europe for two weeks. We drove from London almost as far down as Rome," says lead singer and lyricist Ryan Hennessy. "It was amazing and that was literally the start of this album. It was August 2021, right when Covid was ending."
Drummer Jimmy Rainsford chimes in, "We had no plans, we literally just drove," and says that the band stayed in "random places", each of which they booked as they went along each day.
Hennessy: "The first place we stayed, we slept on the floor of a yoga studio in Switzerland. There was no WiFi or phone coverage or nothing."
Rainsford describes it as "very Swiss": "The road ended at the top of this mountain and there was this studio, with cows with cowbells on at the side."
"It was the start of the next phase," according to Hennessy. "It was nice way to do it, just the four of us basically on a holiday really - we didn't go with any intention of starting the next album, but just had a car and started writing while we were having great experiences - it was really, really cool."
Reflecting on the Covid-19 period, the band acknowledges that while it was a "s***e" time in many ways, it also prompted a - in hindsight, positive - pause in proceedings for them as a band.
Hennessy says, "The good thing was that it allowed us to slow down for a minute and really take time to be like, when the world comes back, how do we want to come back? In what shape do we want to end up in? What kind of band do we want to be? How do we want to sound, how do we want to look, and all of that."
"If it wasn't for Covid, we never would have done that," he continues. "We would have just stayed steaming ahead, playing shows, so the forced break was actually welcomed by us."
Describing it as a "crucial point", he says, "At this point now, we could have been burned out the way we were going. So it really allowed us to recalibrate everything and assess."
Bandmate and guitarist Owen Cardiff adds, "It makes you appreciate things more as well, because we were on the go for so long, non-stop, non-stop - and then when you stop, you're like, 'Wow - we got to do all these cool things'. Then, going forward, you take it in more," he says.
So how did the album develop from riffs and jotting during an impromptu backpacking trip to a fully-fledged body of work?
Rainsford says, "It was all over the place really. I think something nice that we do is that we don't confine writing to a time, we don’t go, 'Let's write this.’ It just kind of comes at different stages, which was nice - spending or allowing that time to happen and not rushing into an album, you know?"
"I think some of the best songs… kind of come out of thin air and Ryan will just write it because he feels like it.
"We have tried and gone to places to write - we did two weeks in Nashville and we got nothing! But that can happen."
The album was recorded in a "a very remote location – a random studio on an island in west Norway, right in the Atlantic", according to Rainsford.
And the title? Hennessy explains that it was "born out of friendship".
He elaborates, "It came from a lot of conversations myself and Jimmy would have in the beginning of the band. Jimmy would always pick me up from my house and we'd go to his studio and we'd work through the night, and then he'd be dropping me off after.
"We'd sit outside my house and just talk for hours and hours... sometimes about the band and where we want to be, and sometimes just personal conversations," he remembers.
"I just kind of realized at a certain point that a lot of formative conversations in my life had happened in cars for whatever reason - breakups and arguments and then all of these amazing conversations that we were having - and the four of us have had as a band - in cars over the years."
He shared the title with Rainsford, with the intention of using it as a song title. "Unbeknownst to him, the song that I wanted to write was about our friendship."
The theme of loss features prevalently on the album, with Hennessy saying that "different kinds of loss" are explored. "Whether it's a loss of innocence, loss of youth... that more introspective loss than physical loss. And then there is the loss of relationships too."
The true bond between the foursome is evident, as demonstrated by an anecdote about one of the album’s songs - Best Thing, which stemmed from emotion felt by the band after Cardiff’s father passed away.
"I hope you don’t mind talking about it, Owen," Hennessy says tentatively. His bandmate nods, before Hennessy continues, "I'm very grateful that we got to do that because that actually came from Owen sending me a piece of music, a piano piece.
"I wrote this song over that piano piece and I sent it back to Owen. Do you remember what you said back?," he says to Cardiff.
"He sent a message back that said, ‘This really reminds me of my dad’, not knowing that's exactly why I had written it, and so it was just an amazing moment and a moment I’m very proud to have on this album."
"It's about loss, but it means that it will live forever in art. I’m very grateful that we get the opportunity to do it."
Cardiff gives his take. "Ryan’s obviously sent us loads of songs about loss and you don't know what way to take them - is it the loss of a loved one or just the loss of a relationship?
"But when he sent me that one… I've never had that feeling before. I just texted him back straight away saying, ‘This reminds me of my dad’. He still didn’t tell me for months after. It was months after!" he laughs.
"That actually was the weird thing about it as I’ve never had that feeling about any other song."
As well as maintaining their friendship, the group has done similar with their loyal fanbase – and then some. They’ve seemingly hit that sweet spot of both holding onto their original fans while also managing to grow a younger fanbase.
"On TikTok, I see a lot of young, young fans, which we never really had before," Hennessy comments.
"You do see the younger generation coming through, but what's really cool is seeing people growing with us - people that were in college and now you see them having kids and they're getting married and you're the first dance song for their wedding and all this stuff and it's so cool."
But of course, "cultivation" is important too - "new fans obviously are always welcome," he says.
One way this cultivation has happened is the band’s ability to build connection with fans through social media – something they did a lot of in the "early days". Is this something they put time into still, or have they let that go?
Hennessy responds, "You have to let a bit of it go. You do, just a small bit, just because if you go too far into it, the lines can start to get blurred and you don't ever really want your fans to think that your’re best friends.
"So you do have to keep a little bit of a disconnect - not a disconnect-," he corrects himself, "-But a little bit of distance. But it's still very important to us - we're always still online interacting, whether it's TikTok or Instagram or Twitter or whatever."
And they emphasise it’s not just for self-gain - "We actually find it interesting," Hennessy says. "We want people to know as well that we're just real people. We're just normal. We're not these people that you're never going to meet, like we just came from f*****g nowhere.
"We’re from Athy - very humble beginnings - and a lot of our fans are like that, so it's nice for them to know that we’re that way. It’s important to keep that connection."
While things are strong domestically, the band’s clout abroad is also on the up and up, with Rainsford saying he sometimes can’t comprehend the reach of their music.
"I was in Switzerland recently and I was talking to another band, and they were talking about our song, Get On My Love and they were like, ‘That song is so big here.’ I was like, ‘Is it?!’
"They said, ‘It’s huge, it’s always on the radio.’ That's so weird. I have no understanding of that."
The band won’t play any Irish festivals this summer, opting instead for three large outdoor shows in Dublin, Cork and Belfast. A big international tour beckons though, with the guys not jaded by the thought of it, but state that they have a wiser approach now to the physical tolls that touring brings.
Rainsford says, "I love touring - once we're prepared physically and mentally for how tough it is on your body. The gigs are great - every time we're on stage, it’s the best one ever.
"It's everything else - the travel, the sleep, the food. If you don't have that in order, it can ruin your life," he says.
"It's the sleep, really," Hennessy interjects, before Rainsford continues, "The last tour was bad! It was post-pandemic. It was the best craic ever but it had a toll."
Bassist Cliff Deane doubles down. "You think you will get better at looking after each other but I found the last tour was just...!" he trails off, laughing and shaking his head.
Hennessy says the band used to be "tamer" in the early days. "When the band was breaking, we were just so in the zone - we never really celebrated. So it's nice now to be able to celebrate and just enjoy it and let loose and blow off some steam – there’s nothing wrong with that."
He stresses the importance of fitness and good nutrition prior to - and during - a tour. "I only started doing it there on the last tour - getting the nutrition right - and it was the fittest I've ever been. It really benefits the shows because you have a lot of stamina and you need it, especially if you’re not getting decent sleep."
With so much success under the belts already, the question remains - where to go from here? I ask them if there is a collective goal they’d like to achieve as a group in the next few years, and they seem unanimous in their answer: "Croke Park".
But that ambition for more does not fuel the band, with Jimmy positing that while he is always hungry for more, the priority is "maintaining" the level they’re at now.
He says, "This is best fun ever - the best job, best lifestyle - that's my goal anyway, just maintaining that.
"If it stayed at this level forever I'm happy, because it's so much fun."
Hennessy agrees that fulfillment comes from satisfaction with the day-to-day. "I know there's people around the world playing stadiums who don't feel fulfilled, who don't even want to be there. So exactly what Jimmy said - I think it's just about maintaining that and that’s fulfillment and that’s success. It's easy to be happy actually when you're in this game because it's just the best."
Rainsford says he was asked before in an interview what it’s like being in a band. "I was being sarcastic but I said, ‘Imagine the best thing ever - it’s better than that’ - but it’s so true really. It's hilarious."
Hennessy says, "We had it last week - we just played small intimate shows around the UK, we've done that a million times - but we came offstage and we were just sitting around and we were all just like, ‘Isn’t being in a band the best?!’
Would they go as far as saying that they are the cliché of "living the dream?"
The collective response? "100%".
Parked Car Conversations, the new album by Picture This, is out Friday 26 April.
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