BIO
Spook-folk Sweetheart Greta O’Leary is a songwriter and musician whose pervasive yet spacious sound cuts through the thickest of skins. Poignant, heartbreaking, and occasionally absurd, O’Leary seizes us with her dynamic voice, bending the folk-genre to another plane. Think Angel Olsen meets Vashti Bunyan.
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“Acoustic, with a free-thinking aesthetic and a refusal to conform”- Muzic.net
“A real fragility” - Nz Musician Magazine
“O’Leary’s voice is reminiscent of a hāngī pit, imbued with earthy, smokey tones” - UTR
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Coming of age during a few nomadic years hitching the globe, Greta’s lifelong love of music was ignited through the folk scenes of Australia and beyond, a contrast to her childhood home of blues and rock and roll. O’Leary began publicly releasing in early 2022, her first single ‘Outnumbered’ charted on independent radio stations such as BFM, RDU, Radio One and Radio Control, and gained 140,000 views for its self directed music video.
"Writing and feeling is truly all that has ever made sense to me”. Currently being mentored by producer/musician Tom Healy (Tiny Ruins, Marlon Williams), receiving NZ on Air development funding and previous mentorships from the inimitable Liz Stokes (The Beths), Frances Dickenson (Establish Music) and Aston Rd, it is clear this is a fact.
Releasing her debut EP Treasure Horse in 2022, Greta and her live band took the collection on a 7 date national tour. “In true Greta spirit it is ridiculous, optimistic, bleak and celebratory.”
At times crushingly fragile, then surging and frenzied, Treasure Horse is hypnotic, relentless and poised in a world of O’Leary’s’ own. Produced by a duo team of Toby Lloyd and Charlotte Yates, it’s a wry journey through the depths of self, bleak longing and an earnest celebration of life.
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"Ploughing through a valley bathed in golden light, spurred by urgency.” - Under The Radar
“An insanely atmospheric and wonderfully crafted debut” - Ratworld Magazine
“A sonically rich record” - Under the Radar
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Bursting through the seams of traditional songwriting with a sound that is truly hers, O’Leary soothes and disrupts us with stories of grief, love, and belonging, wrapped in nostalgic and archetypal imagery. Quickly establishing herself as a rising force in the local music scene, Greta was recently the recipient of APRA’s Aotearoa Artist Mentoring programme, and is currently working with mentor Tom Healy on her newest body of work.
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“Intimate storytelling and confessional prose are complimented by cinematic arrangements” - UTR
“Wonderfully deep in nature” Muzic.net
“At times it feels naïve and wistful yet at others it is a voice which has lived and suffered” - Muzic.net
“O’Leary’s vocal delivery is incredibly unique, I genuinely can’t think of any other performer to relate it to“ -Ratworld Magazine
“This does not sound like anyone else I have heard recently” Muzic.net