Verified source report
‘Addiction is proof there is a devil. Recovery is proof there is a God’: Irish rockers Bleech 9:3 on struggle, sobriety and their stunning debut
After two friends sponsored each other in Alcoholics Anonymous, they started making music. As they gear up for a summer of 40 festivals, the band tell their harrowing yet uplifting story On stage in a Camden pub, Barry Quinlan, frontman of Irish rockers Bleech 9:3, shares the intensity of Joy Division’s Ian Curtis. He hunches and jerks around the mic stand and his eyes bore a hole in the back wall as jubilant teenagers expand and contract in a circle pit. The gig in mid-May has the same I-was-there energy as early Arctic Monkeys or Fontaines DC shows; with major labels signing Bleech 9:3 on both sides of the Atlantic, dozens of festival dates this summer and a wildly impressive, impassioned five-song debut EP, the band will soon be playing much bigger rooms than this. But when I meet Barry and his three bandmates earlier on that day, there’s none of that twitchy energy. Bleech 9:3 bring
What happened
According to The Guardian’s source item, ‘Addiction is proof there is a devil. Recovery is proof there is a God’: Irish rockers Bleech 9:3 on struggle, sobriety and their stunning debut, After two friends sponsored each other in Alcoholics Anonymous, they started making music. As they gear up for a summer of 40 festivals, the band tell their harrowing yet uplifting story On stage in a Camden pub, Barry Quinlan, frontman of Irish rockers Bleech 9:3, shares the intensity of Joy Division’s Ian Curtis. He hunches and jerks around the mic stand and his eyes bore a hole in the back wall as jubilant teenagers expand and contract in a circle pit. The gig in mid-May has the same I-was-there energy as early Arctic Monkeys or Fontaines DC shows; with major labels signing Bleech 9:3 on both sides of the Atlantic, dozens of festival dates this summer and a wildly impressive, impassioned five-song debut EP, the band will soon be playing much bigger rooms than this. But when I meet Barry and his three bandmates earlier on that day, there’s none of that twitchy energy. Bleech 9:3 bring
Context
The development sits in VINI’s Culture file for readers following arts, entertainment, fashion, film, music, celebrity, and the business of culture. The original report is linked so readers can check the source account, follow later updates, and compare new coverage against the first published record. The source item is dated 2026-06-17T09:41:47+00:00.
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Source
Primary source: ‘Addiction is proof there is a devil. Recovery is proof there is a God’: Irish rockers Bleech 9:3 on struggle, sobriety and their stunning debut via The Guardian. VINI cites and links the source; it does not reproduce the publisher’s full article text without rights clearance.
This source-cited VINI report links to the original publisher record. VINI does not republish third-party article bodies without rights clearance. 1 source listed.
Source links
- ‘Addiction is proof there is a devil. Recovery is proof there is a God’: Irish rockers Bleech 9:3 on struggle, sobriety and their stunning debutThe Guardian - 2026-06-17T09:41:47+00:00
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