Review: Buí release new single The Sun Shines Down on Me

Buí’s modern indie take on cult Lo-Fi artist Daniel Johnston’s ‘The Sun Shines Down on Me’ offers a completely different experience to the original track, building on Johnston’s genius song writing.

Buí is a musical project based on the music of singer songwriter Josh Healy. Based in Belfast, the group have been together since 2017, releasing six singles, two EPs and one full length album in that time.

Buí’s catalogue of music is some of the most exciting music to come out of NI in recent years, ranging from a Midwest emo type sound to Folk inspired songs sung in Irish. The closest comparison to the band that could be made in terms of sound would be American Indie Rock band Grandaddy. Both Buí and Grandaddy’s earlier tracks go for a Lo-Fi quality, eventually branching off into featuring 8-Bit sounding analogue synths taking up the main melody of the song as opposed to the usual guitar heavy Indie Rock melodies.

With their last single ‘Something Else to Talk About/People Don’t Think’ releasing in 2019 under Analogue Catalogue Records to great success, with over 100,000 listens on Spotify, fans of the band had been eagerly waiting for a new release throughout the COVID-19 pandemic.

On Saturday, January 22, 2022 Buí followed the single up with a cover of American singer songwriter, Daniel Johnston’s ‘The Sun Shines Down on Me’. Johnston, who famously recorded and handed out his music on cassette tapes, propelled to cult status when Nirvana’s Kurt Cobain was pictured wearing a T-Shirt with his cassette’s album cover on it. The original song, released in 1982 on one these casettes, is a very rough recording of Johnston playing piano and singing, which is the norm for his music. Buí’s take on the song gives it a new lease of life, opting for folky guitar over Johnston’s Lo-Fi piano sound. A subtle synth comes in halfway through and adds to the overall texture of the song, as well as making it sound more in line with Buí’s usual style of song writing. The contrast between the voice of Johnston compared to Buí’s vocalist Josh Feely gives the song a different feel, with Feely’s voice being a lot less harsh, letting the song sound a lot more uplifting than the original.

Overall, it’s a great single to return with for Buí, and should be exciting fans in terms of how their new original tracks will sound in the future.

With Buí announcing new show dates for the first time since the pandemic started, they’re definitely a band to keep an eye out for.