Gaga, the Spice Girls, Kylie; Bowie, Metallica, Springsteen. Not exactly names you might typically associate with Dublin. And yet, all these musical legends surely hold (or held) a special place in their hearts for an old converted warehouse in Ringsend, Dublin 4. The pale green door of Windmill Lane Studios may look unassuming, but behind it lies the surprisingly unexplored history of Ireland’s place at the very centre of global music megastardom.
A gallery of icons
Cross the threshold and take in the countless framed albums on the walls. Everything from Rolling Stones Voodoo Lounge to 50 Cent Get Rich Or Die Tryin’ is a revelation that so many ground-breaking albums of the past few decades were recorded not in London or LA, but right here, just south of the River Liffey.
Take a closer look and you’ll start to notice the familiar album covers of one act in particular: the piercing eyes of the kid on the front of War; the chaotic photo collage of Achtung Baby. And then the story of this Musical Mecca near Dublin’s docklands begins to make sense: as London’s Abbey Road was to the Beatles, Ringsend’s Windmill Lane is to U2.
Legends from home and abroad
It was back in 1980 when an unknown Bono and friends went to the studio to record their debut album, Boy. At the time, it was a much smaller operation, located in the docklands on a street called Windmill Lane. For both U2 and for the studio, the rest is history. The 80s was a time of phenomenal success, leading to the studio relocating to a much larger venue in Ringsend in 1990, where it continues to thrive.
Since then, it’s been the birthplace of a mind-blowing list of musical gems: The Cranberries’ Everyone Else Is Doing It, So Why Can’t We?; REM’s Reveal; Shania Twain’s Up!; the score for Mission Impossible, played in the vast expanse of Studio 2 by an 80-piece orchestra. But more importantly, Windmill Lane Studios is Dublin’s own home to decades-old musical lore. With so many greats arriving here over the years, what tales does it have to tell?
Stories of greatness born in Dublin 4
For starters, there’s Gaga. In 2010, she was the biggest popstar on the planet, stopping off in Dublin on her world tour to perform a sold-out gig at the O2. While lesser mortals might require a bubble bath and a soothing tea before taking to the stage, Gaga spent the hours before her concert just across the river from the O2, at Windmill Lane. Her purpose? Recording some of the tracks for her 2011 album Born This Way, including the iconic lead single of the same name. The song has become a modern-day staple on commercial radio and an anthem for LGBTQ rights, all brought into existence in a soundproofed booth in Ringsend.
And then there’s U2. As any true fan will know, their first album Boy has quite a rough-and-ready sound, which apparently was no accident. The album’s producer got the band to record the drums out by the reception desk, where the echoey hallway gave the drums an interesting “clattery” tone. The only drawback was that they needed to stop and repeat every time the phone at reception rang, proving that even the gods of rock n’ roll can get interrupted by practicalities sometimes.
At last, some growing recognition
In recent years, Windmill Lane Studios has opened its doors to the public and is growing in popularity with locals and tourists curious to learn more about Ireland’s role in legendary modern-day music. So the next time you’re humming a tune by one of your favourite pop divas or rock mega groups, try googling it to see if perhaps it came into existence just down by the river in Dublin 4.
