The day before we speak, Lyra was on a flight listening to a song when she began to well up. The song was one of the Cork singer-songwriter’s own. She had written it about her ex and it was bringing back a welter of painful memories of the relationship.

“It was young love,” she tells me. “He was the first person I felt like that about, and I was kind of obsessed with him. When it ended, it was really tough. I wouldn’t wish it on anyone, I hated it.”

The end, which came a few years ago, was somewhat protracted.

“We broke up initially and then there was the chats for ages, a will-we, won’t-we kind of vibe. It was the saddest time of my life. Even when I tried to write about it, I was just hysterical.

“I think I am such an emotional, fall-hard-in-love kind of girl. It’s not that it’s totally raw now, but listening to it I was just taken back to how raw it was at the time. A lot of it was because he ended it. And not in a very nice way.”

Was it by text?

“A phone call. I don’t think I deserved that. I don’t think that people realise that in the context of a break-up, things that they say or do could have lasting effects on the other person’s confidence. If you want to end it, you can end it, but you can do it in a nicer way.”

However, it’s clear that the emotional ups and downs of the last few years have provided rich inspiration for her music.

While the song she listened to on her journey home (which she says won’t be released to the public) raked over the coals of heartbreak, her most recent single, ‘Lose My Mind’, is an instant dancefloor banger and evidence she has moved on.

“I wrote it from the perspective of a girl who just goes out for herself, just to have fun, and nobody can dampen her mood or bring her down,” she says.

“And that’s what I kind of wanted for myself because after a break-up you go out looking for validation in other people and you’re thinking: ‘Oh God, will I ever find someone again?’

“I’d always been this polite girl that says yes to everything and I was kind of meek in relationships. I was such a safe Sally, and I thought I wanted to be a bad-ass bitch and if guys want to buy me drinks across the bar, nobody’s going to stop me this time.” 

And so, she confirms, there have been nights out that ended at 8am. She may have stood on a chair and danced to her own song when it came on in a club – but we won’t go there (“God, I’m cringing thinking about it!”).

If anything, Lyra has gone from strength to strength. Her stunning, electronic-pop and smokey, passionate vocals – which recall the icy passion of Florence Welch and the shimmering low range of Toni Braxton – continue to amass fans online. Her videos on YouTube have hundreds of thousands of views, and she made her debut in the top three of the Irish charts earlier this year.

She has worked with producer Rupert Christie – who has worked with U2 and Coldplay – and ‘Falling’, another song that chronicled her heartbreak, was featured on Grey’s Anatomy.

While lockdown, and the hiatus for live music, could have shattered her momentum, the twentysomething found other ways to keep herself in the cultural mix.

She appeared a number of times on The Late Late Show – once performing a stunning version of ‘Zombie’ by The Cranberries – and she’s been a witty presence on the judging panel of Virgin Media’s new music talent show, The Big Deal, alongside Deirdre O’Kane, Jedward and Aston Merrygold.

“At the start of the pandemic I was so excited because I was going to go out on tour. And then Covid hit. It was devastating for everyone obviously, but for performers, it was very tough.”

It had come at just the wrong point in her career, she points out.

“I was scared that I’d missed the boat. I’d built up all this momentum and had built myself up and I was worried that by the time things got going again that people would have forgotten about me.

“Once we started coming out [of lockdown], I was just so relieved by the reaction, getting invited to do things that maybe wouldn’t have happened if we hadn’t been in lockdown.”

Such as her role on The Big Deal. After a nervous start, she decided to give herself free rein – she told one contestant that his performance made her feel like her “ovaries are melting”. There’s a touch of Adele, by way of Bandon, about her.

She also struck up a friendship with fellow judge Boy George; the pair may work together in the future and she is mad about the Boy.

“It’s surreal speaking to him because he’s obviously an icon of music and just culture generally. He’s such a cheeky chappie, we have such a laugh whether the cameras are on us or not. I listened to his music growing up, but I hadn’t been aware of things he’d done outside of music and things from his early life,” she says.

He also offered her advice: “He said being out there with what I wear and so on, that I should keep doing that.”

Viewing figures for The Big Deal kicked off well, but slumped after the first few episodes, and it was moved from its Saturday slot to Sunday night. Does she have any theory about why it doesn't seem to have clicked with viewers?

“We’re in an era where people don’t really watch live TV in the same way. Everyone is watching Apple TV, Netflix and Amazon Prime. The amount that everyone put into The Big Deal with the crew and the staging and the costumes, it’s unfortunate it didn’t get that massive explosion of publicity.” 

Growing up in Bandon, Lyra – christened Laura – was “always the kid who was a bit out there. I’d be going into school with plastic clip-on earrings and the high heel shoes that you’d get in the pound shop.”

Her parents are now retired; her father was a biochemist and her mother ran a restaurant for 25 years. “I waited tables for years and years. I’ve served more hot breakfasts than you’ve had hot breakfasts,” she says.

As a child she did ballet lessons and Irish dancing but never went to drama school. She was very influenced by her mother’s taste in music – in particular Enya, Fleetwood Mac’s Stevie Nicks, and Michael Jackson, whose ‘Earth Song’ she would perform in talent competitions.

In her late teens she wrote a song called ‘Emerald’, which drew attention from BBC Music and a number of record companies.

“I recorded it on my friend’s PC and we put it on SoundCloud. It was a very rough demo but people started emailing me about it and a few of the big record labels got in touch.”

The song was used in the Teen Wolf series in America and in a number of reality TV shows – including Made in Chelsea and TOWIE – as well as in a Guinness ad, which helped bring in some money. Lyra was hesitant to sign for a major label, however.

“The labels were telling me things like ‘you need to dye your hair darker and be really white skinned’, that whole Corrs vibe, and they wanted my songs to be more ‘poppy’.

“They were also talking to me about the way I sing and asking me to pronounce my ‘th’ and sing lines in the songs again. I really wasn’t enjoying it.

“I didn’t know what I wanted to be at that point and I didn’t want to sign up to something I was going to be moulded into.”

Record companies can sometimes keep artists on their books without releasing new material – George Michael’s career was famously put on hold for five years in the 1990s while a dispute with his label was resolved – and Lyra was wary of the same thing happening to her. “I just did not want that to happen,” she says.

At that point, her grandmother, with whom she is very close, became ill and Lyra took time out to care for her.

“My mum was telling me it was fine but my sister told me it’s not really fine. And so I moved home for about a year to look after her and put everything on pause. After that I began to really knuckle down with writing and put together loads of songs, which I narrowed down to around four.”

She met Ben Mortimer, the co-president of Polydor Records, which counts ABBA, The Rolling Stones and Lana Del Rey among their acts.

“I very much had the style and voice already established. [Representatives from the label] had seen gigs and they knew what they were getting and were happy with it. I had the feeling they understood me.

“After [getting the deal], my budgets went up and I didn’t have to get a mate to do my make-up for free. I also got to work with a stylist but it was very give and take, a collaboration.”

During this period she moved to London, but didn’t like the lifestyle.

“It just didn’t give me that off-button, where I felt like I could just get some headspace and be creative. It was a lonely place and even on a Sunday if I wasn’t doing something, I’d feel guilty.”

She moved to Brighton, where she had friends.

“I just love the vibe in Brighton and it’s easy for my family to visit. I’m back and forth like a Yo-Yo to Ireland, though.”

She was also able to move on in her personal life, and heal the wounds of the relationship break-up.

“I think, in a way, he did me a massive favour. You only realise after it happens that maybe [breaking up] was the best thing. I did date a bit afterward but mainly it was just going out with my girlfriends.

“I am the kind of person that when I’m in a relationship, it can easily become a kind of cocoon, where it’s just work and the relationship, so I gave the time to my friends. And that’s where ‘Lose My Mind’ came from, as well as a few other fun songs which I think people are going to hear and be like, ‘she’s changed her tune’.” 

Pop music is a brutal business. For Lyra only excellence is enough; she has to become a star to have made it at all. Does that add a lot of pressure?

“There is pressure but I feel that I have so much more to give. Time is of the essence in this industry and so many are trying to make it that if you slip up once, someone will take your place. It’s as cut-throat as that.

“I get nervous about timing, that people will think, ‘I’m done with her now, I’m going to move on to the next thing’. Artists are disposable and there’s always someone with better songs, better looking, better dance moves coming up behind you and all you can really do is make sure that you are the best version of yourself.”

Do people understand that stress?

“In the creative world people would understand it, but I’ve been in the company of people who will say, ‘yeah, but you’re doing what you love, so why are you complaining?’ I’m thinking, ‘yeah, I do love it but it can be stressful and I want to do it for the rest of my life’.

“And just because it’s what I love doesn’t mean everything in my world is unicorns and clouds. It’s a hard path to the top and there’s only one person who can get me there and that’s me. And that’s pressure.”

However, when it comes together, the emotional payoff is huge, she adds, and the return of live shows has given her a boost.

And while her shows are a broad, inclusive church, she doesn’t want politicians at her gigs – there will be ‘Wanted’ posters for them, she jokes, after the way they have abandoned performing artists in lockdown – but she lives for the energy of the fans.

“I did a show in Kilmainham which was the first one after lockdown and I was so nervous. I hadn’t been in public for ages, and I was thinking what if I can’t sing, what if I don’t know how to talk to the audience. And then when I went on, people started singing along with ‘Falling’.

“I can’t explain it, it was just like everything coming together. I just felt hopeful for the future. And when I came off stage I just started bawling crying.”

This time around, though, they were tears of happiness. 

‘Lose My Mind’, the new single from Lyra, is out now. Lyra plays Dublin Castle with Picture This and Ryan Sheridan on New Year’s Eve – tickets from usual outlets.

Dates for the diary: Three breakout acts of 2021

Malaki

This 21-year-old from Dublin, whose real name is Hugh Mulligan, has been behind some of the most interesting new Irish music of the last few years.

He performed an incredible version of Van Morrison’s ‘Someone Like You’ on the Late Late during the first lockdown and released a track called ‘Fair Play’, with Lucy Williams (daughter of economist David McWilliams) on vocals, that racked up over a million streams online. He also appeared on an RTÉ series about mental health, I’m Fine, this past summer and his new EP, DFTTYM, deals with his own battle with depression.

He had to get a job in a hospital during the pandemic, but since things have opened up he’s announced a nationwide tour and will play the Róisín Dubh in Galway on December 3 and The Academy in Dublin on December 9.

Shane Codd

This talented 24-year-old DJ and producer shot to fame in January when his track ‘Get Out Of My Head’ reached the Top 5 in Ireland and the Top 10 in the UK. By then the single had already gone viral – as more than six million people have watched it on YouTube, with millions more streaming it on SoundCloud and iTunes (where it was an Irish No 1).

Codd had caught the eye of executives at Polydor Records, who signed him. Heavily influenced by 1990s and early-2000s feel-good house, the Cavan man’s first break came when he became a finalist at the 2018 Breakout Producer competition held by fellow Irish DJ Mark McCabe.

He’s playing The Academy Green Room in Dublin on December 8 and Limelight 2 in Belfast on December 9.

Lea Harte

Stranded at home in lockdown, this 20-year-old from Kildare decided to bite the bullet. She used the piano that her grandparents had given her to hone her songwriting and performing skills and she set up pages on TikTok and Instagram which promoted her music.

The tactic paid handsome dividends. She quickly amassed a large following through the social media platforms and her single, ‘Older’, went on to reach the Top 10 in the charts here. Her manager Brian Whitehead (who also manages Picture This), also found her through TikTok.

She plays the Green Room at the Academy in Dublin on December 10-11 and at Malahide Castle with Picture This on June 18, 2022.