FAMOUS GAA songster Rory Gallagher joked his eyesight is so bad that it has seen him accused of being snobby.
His song Jimmy’s Winning Matches was a smash hit with Donegal fans when county manager Jim McGuinness led the footballers to All Ireland glory in 2012.
Rory, the former singer with 90s rock group The Revs, has now taken the extraordinary step of going on social media to defend himself against accusations of snobbishness.
He said: “I swear I’m not a snob. I’ve received my second message in a month, accusing me of being snobby for not walking over to someone in the bar to say hello.
“So, it’s playing on my mind a bit now. If anyone taps me on the shoulder and asks for a quick hello or a selfie, I would like to think that I never say no.
“It’s a nice thing to think that another human actually cares about what you are doing in life.
“However, not many people know I am very short-sighted and I don’t like to wear my glasses on stage for three reasons.
“They steam up, I tried it once and had a panic attack when I saw a few grumpy faces staring back at me, and I’m vain.”
Singer-songwriter Rory Gallagher.
Rory added: “Also after a gig, even though I have changed my T-shirt, you may notice that I am quite sweaty after giving it socks for three hours – so I just can’t wait to get into a cold shower.
“So I never hang around very long after my gigs. Also because I really am drained, I can see a few people baffled when I chat to them and I’m not really making any sense and utterly boring company after a show; my brain is on complete zonked mode.
“So just in case you are wondering why I am not waving to you from stage or coming over to say hello… I can’t see you.
“Another part to this is, at this stage in life, I am actually a bit of a mutt. I love to think of Kilcar in Donegal as my hometown, but I haven’t actually lived there properly since I was 17, almost 30 years ago.
“I went to college in Limerick first in 1997, then on to in Ballyfermot in Dublin. Then, as I was getting settled back in Donegal, we formed The Revs.
“While in The Revs, we spent two spells living in Sydney touring Australia, and in Nottingham touring the UK , not to mention the other 900 gigs from Texas to Tipperary.
“I moved to Lanzarote near the end of 2006 – that’s 20 years ago. In 2018, we moved back to Donegal for a while, then we lived in Scotland for five years, before returning to Lanzarote.
“So, my second point is I might not have seen you in 25 years. Please don’t be giving me online abuse if I walked past you. I am sorry.”