ON NORMAL — FIRST ALBUM, RELEASED LAST (April 2026)

I released my second album before my first. This is a small confession. A behind-the-scenes. Against the advice that people can't read anymore, that everything must be a soundbite — I'm going to trust you with the longer version.

Normal was recorded in Athens in 2021–22 with Nikos Kordelis, Jaakko Eino Kalevi and producer George Gaudy, after I escaped to the Greek island of Poros during Covid. When I finished it in June 2022, I sent it to someone in the industry who told me my voice was repressed and I needed to do work on it. I think they were right. I was still afraid to call myself a musician. I had lost my voice early in life and had a lot to heal around why — and yet my voice has been my teacher, in the art world, in Hollywood, and in music.

I did a lot of vocal training. By the end of 2022 I returned to Ireland, started making music on my own, and learned the guitar. My second album, Unlikely Sinners Make for Unlikely Saints, came from that period. When I worked with Teemu at Mutual Sound Studio in Athens in 2024, we made a conscious decision: one take, no autotune. I wanted my anger and my feelings to land. So much of contemporary music leaves me dissociated. We took the risk — and what people comment on most is how much they love the raw, vulnerable feel of the vocals.

So why release this album now — four years late, and against industry advice to always lead with your best foot?

Because my whole career has been about meaning, freedom and honesty over perfection. This album is like a sketch. A sketch is as valuable as finished work. Everyone starts somewhere.

Normal grew out of Nikos and me playing avant-garde improv in art spaces across Athens right before Covid, during my residency at ADASH Space — through to returning after Covid for a two-hour stream-of-consciousness improvised recording session at Mutual Sound. It was through a mutual friend, Nancy, that I met George Gaudy after that session, and he taught me how to structure improv into songs. Me and Nikos paid George whatever money we had — we recorded a song at a time, as we had the funds. John Kimble mentored me to retain full ownership of my music. We processed hipster culture and the gentrification of Athens during smoking breaks (I drank water while they smoked — I'm Irish, not Greek). And Jaakko graciously came in to record the drums and bring a beat to it all.

There was a plan for this album to be re-recorded for a feature film I wrote at the same time — The Lies We Have in Common. That film was blocked by an Irish producer who told me my script was "incoherent," while international producers I respected called it very well written. When I refused his invitation to join him in his hotel room, he went from calling me a genius to: "I thought you had something, but you will never amount to anything."

This album is dedicated to Sinéad O'Connor, who refused to be objectified or have her wings clipped. She shone too bright for those living in the dark. And it is in gratitude to the elderly jazz musicians I watched play in Harlem, who reminded me that their music was born from daring to speak up against the abuse of others — and who encouraged me not to be afraid to contribute.

This album is for you.

Available to purchase on itunes on Spotify‍ ‍and VEVO

Album: Unlikely Sinners Make for Unlikely Saints ( Released in 2025)

ON UNLIKELY SINNERS — A RECKONING

This album took a long time to find its shape — because the experiences that fed it took a long time to name.

For years I had been running. From institutions that turned on me when I refused to be diminished. From cities I had loved and had to leave. From an art world that wanted women visible on its own terms and invisible on theirs. I had accumulated a quiet store of exhaustion — the kind that builds when you keep showing up, keep making work, keep refusing to disappear, and still find yourself relegated to a room nobody looks into.

I stopped running when I went home to Cork for the first time since my father died. I walked around my old national school. Something in me that had been braced for a very long time began to let go. I went deeply inward and started writing — not to perform anything, not to package anything, but because I had run out of other options. The songs that came were about childhood, about fear, about what it costs to remain true to yourself when the world keeps presenting you with reasons not to be.

Before we recorded the album, I performed the songs weekly within an installation I created at the National Sculpture Factory in Ireland — MERKABAH. It was there the songs found their breath. People were sometimes brought to tears. Not because the performances were polished, but because something in them was recognised. That recognition told me the album was ready.

When Teemu Takatalo and I recorded it at Mutual Sound Studio in Athens, we made a deliberate choice: one take, no autotune. My voice was trained by then, and returning to my hometown had changed me. The album is more developed and more settled than Normal — not because I had more resources, but because I had finally stopped being afraid of what I had to say.

Available on Spotify, itunes, youtube.

This is my second album. The songs were developed in pre-production with producer George Gaudy in Athens, and recorded and produced by Teemu Takatalo at Mutual Sound Studios, also in Athens. Musicians who collaborated on this album include George Gaudy and Jaakko Eino Kalevi. I also created a film called "An Act of Love" in which all the songs from this album are the soundtrack: available HERE

Performing with Big City Folk at Plaza 33 in NYC. I also have performed at The Irish Arts Center, The Vale, Petes Candystore, Brooklyn, Bakerfalls, KGB &  Rockwood Musichall in NYC.

From an Improv Session in Athens.

Published on Oct 12, 2020

ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. © GROUNDLESS Films. 2020.

Music: Norah Dineen(voice, lyrics, percussion, glockenspiel), Nikos Kordelis (guitar, clarinet)

Music video: Norah Dineen

Performers; Norah Dineen and Eirini Kopanou.

Location: Athens, Greece + Paris, France.

From an Improv Session in Athens.

ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. © GROUNDLESS Films. 2020.

Music: Norah Dineen(voice, lyrics, percussion, glockenspiel), Nikos Kordelis (guitar, clarinet)

Music video: Norah Dineen

Performers; Norah Dineen, William Boehler and Eirini Kopanou.

Location: Backspace, Athens.

A film by Norah Dineen

ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. © GROUNDLESS Films. 2020.

Music:

Produced by Ladell Mclin

Voice + lyrics (COLD REFRAIN) by Norah Dineen (GROUNDLESS)

Music produced by Gabriel Suares.

Composed By Norah Dineen and Gabriel Suares

Produced By GROUNDless Films.

ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. ©Groundless Films. Berlin, 2018.