As we retreat for Christmas, and hopefully pile up with books and other art, it’s a good time to take stock of a year in Irish culture. What struck me this year is how Irish art makers are increasingly pulling their avant-garde intentions into the mainstream.

Boundaries are being pushed, and the results are drawing from Irish identities and our past.

One of the best Irish songs of the year was a cover, Lankum’s astonishing rendering of The Specials’ Ghost Town, accompanied by a stunning music video directed by Leonn Ward, with Robbie Ryan as the director of photography, and also featuring the captivating Oona Doherty. All Tarkovsky and Wicklow, no one does invigorating menace nor ecstatic doom like Lankum.

There was Maria Somerville’s perfect album, Luster, released on 4AD in April. Another Galway artist, Dove Ellis, released his debut album, Blizzard in early December, a captivating collection of songs recalling the tenderness and prowess of Jeff Buckley.

There were ghosts in the album of the year, CMAT’s Euro-Country, the trauma of the Great Recession pulled into its title track’s blistering lyrics, waving formative economic trauma as both banner and funereal shroud.

There were ghosts all over the book I enjoyed most this year – although actually from autumn 2024 – Maurice J Casey’s

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