“I like praying. It puts you in a humble state, open to the goodness of people.” It’s a simple line, but it says plenty about Loah as she steps into a big month: the release of her debut album and a homecoming launch in Connolly’s of Leap, the west Cork pub where she had her first date with her husband and later celebrated their wedding.
The singer-songwriter, born Sallay-Matu Garnett, has taken the scenic route to this moment. A performer, presenter, actor and part-time pharmacist, she has spent years building a creative life that never moved in a straight line. That patience is all over Materia Medica, a record shaped over five years and rooted in questions about identity, belonging and adulthood.
A big month for Loah in west Cork
There’s something fitting about Loah launching the album in Leap. West Cork is not just where she lives now with her husband Peter; it’s part of the emotional map of the record. Connolly’s, with its fire, old posters and deep musical memory, stands at the centre of that story.
Loah spoke warmly about community life in rural Ireland, where people know one another and feel responsible for each other. That sense of closeness matters to her. It also sits alongside a life shaped by movement: early childhood in Maynooth, teenage years in Gambia and Sierra Leone, and adult life split between music and pharmacy in Dublin.
Identity, faith and the long road to a debut
Loah has never hidden the fact that the album took time. She has said she needs encouragement and space to make music, and Materia Medica sounds like the work of someone who waited until it felt honest.
- It draws on her background across Ireland and west Africa
- It reflects the uncertainty facing a “frozen generation”
- It carries her interest in healing, faith and human connection
There’s loss in the story too. Her collaborator Eoin French, known as Talos, appears on the album. His death in 2024 still hangs over Connolly’s and over this chapter of Loah’s life.
Still, what stays with you is her clarity. A debut album, a west Cork stage, and a line about prayer that feels like a way of meeting the world. Loah has arrived at this moment slowly, and maybe that’s the point. Image Courtesy: Irish Times
