Lunch with CMAT this afternoon – performing at the 2025 Primavera Sound Festival and preserved for posterity by RNE Radio 3 in Madrid.
Blending country roots with soul pop and indie energy, CMAT tackles big themes with sharp humour and emotional punch. From reflections on home and economics to fame and womanhood, the songs feel urgent and unfiltered. Tracks like “Euro-Country” and “Take A Sexy Picture Of Me” showcase her soaring vocals and fearless songwriting.
Born Ciara Mary Alice Thompson in Dublin, CMAT has built a reputation for high energy performances and brutally honest lyrics. Her sound reimagines country through a modern pop lens while keeping heart and storytelling at the centre.
CMAT had aspirations to become a professional musician from a young age, and relocated to Manchester, England, to pursue a career in music with her then-boyfriend, performing together as Bad Sea. She has since described their relationship as toxic and isolating, and she stopped pursuing a music career, living a partying lifestyle. She attended an in-person listening session at a London studio with the English electropop singer Charli XCX, who advised CMAT to reimagine her approach.
She broke up with her boyfriend and moved to Dublin to begin self-releasing her music online, and gained considerable attention, as well as radio play from RTÉ Radio 1 and BBC Radio 6 Music. Her debut studio album If My Wife New I’d Be Dead was released in February 2022. Metacritic, which aggregates review scores, gives the album a score of 85 based on 9 reviews, indicating “universal acclaim”. Hot Press magazine wrote that the album was “undoubtedly one of the most thrilling Irish pop debuts of the century”. In a four-star review, DIY wrote, “If My Wife New… feels like a more well-rounded, modern proposition than one solely indebted to the oldest style going could suggest.” The album entered the Irish Albums Chart at number one. In June 2022, she released a single called “Peter Bogdanovich“, which came with a music video which featured her dressing as the late director. On 19 August 2022, “Peter Bogdanovich” charted at number 20 on the Irish Homegrown Top 20. In March 2023, If My Wife New I’d Be Dead won the Choice Music Prize for Irish Album of the Year.
She announced her next studio album, Crazymad, for Me, in June 2023 which was released in October 2023. Like her previous album, this album debuted at number one on the Irish Albums Chart. Her album was later nominated for the Best Album Ivor Novello Award on Thursday 23 May 2024.
The BBC disabled comments in a May 2024 a video on its Instagram page of CMAT’s performance at Radio 1’s Big Weekend festival, following a spate of comments labelled “fat-shaming“.
She announced her third studio album Euro-Country on March 2025, in which she also released the album’s lead single “Running/Planning”. She describes the album as the “type of loss, pain and lack of community that I feel we are suffering from under modern capital isolation” and the “best thing I have ever made”. On 7 May 2025, the album’s second single “Take a Sexy Picture of Me” was released. She performed on the Pyramid stage at the 2025 Glastonbury festival, earning positive reviews. The album’s fourth single, the title track, was released on 22 July. It received media attention and praise for its portrayal of ordinary people’s struggles after the 2008 financial crisis. Like her previous two albums, Euro-Country debuted at number one on the Irish Albums Chartl it debuted at number two in the UK.
She has been noted for her large fanbase among Irish LGBTQ+ people, once telling an NME interviewer “I’m making music for the girls and the gays, and that’s it.”
Thanks Wikipedia.
There you have it – the whole rundown. All that’s left for you to do is; grab lunch – get comfy – press play and get moving.
