ABSOLUTE LILT, the duo of Lisa Canny and Niamh Hinchy, step into their Heavenly Recordings chapter with P Stands For Paddy, the first track from their forthcoming seven-track Criostal EP.
Built around lilting, one of Ireland’s oldest vocal traditions, the track pushes inherited sound into a modern frame. Two voices move in tight, circling motion, creating something hypnotic, playful, and deeply Irish without treating tradition like museum glass.
The result lands somewhere between folk memory, club-adjacent pulse, and vocal experiment. It is nonsense by design, but not throwaway. The system is vocal first: rhythm, repetition, breath, and syllables carrying the track forward before meaning gets a chance to interfere.
The accompanying video expands that energy into full Irish absurdist theatre. Featuring comedian Mike Rice, Kate Nash as a judge, and presented by Doireann Ní Ghlacáin, it builds around The Fairest Man, a pageant-style concept that flips the gaze with sharp comic intent.
ABSOLUTE LILT, who are also part of the all-female Irish collective BIIRD, explain:
Lilting is nonsense, quite literally. For the music video we wanted to capture the essence of Irish nonsense at its best so we created “The Fairest Man” concept, inspired by Ireland’s love for a kitch & very-country pageant. Think Father Ted in 2026! Our director Olivia Mcloughin knew exactly how to bring the idea to screen and absolutely smashed it! And as for the all star cast, they had us rolling around laughing from the second the filming started. We hope everyone loves it as much as we do!
Video director Olivia McLaughlin adds:
Getting to collaborate with Lisa and Niamh on something funny, sexy, and with a healthy dose of Irish specificity – I said yes immediately. With the Father Ted ‘Lovely Girls Competition’ as our reference, we wanted to completely flip the gaze. There’s a real hilarity and absurdity to how enthusiastically we reward men for being completely average, and we had a lot of fun pulling that apart. I’m grateful to the incredibly talented cast and crew who were up for all of it, every step of the way.
That visual language matters. P Stands For Paddy is not just reviving lilting; it is testing how old vocal forms can move through contemporary video culture, comedy, performance, and collective identity without losing their bite.
With P Stands For Paddy, ABSOLUTE LILT make tradition feel active, strange, funny, and wired for now. Ancient vocal chaos, modern execution. Very Irish, very sharp, zero dust.