Memorabilia Showcase: Philip Chevron’s Suit & Kilt

Philip Ryan professionally known as Philip Chevron was an Irish singer-songwriter and guitarist. Hes best known as the lead guitarist for the celtic punk band The Pogues. He was also the frontman for the 1970’s punk rock band The Radiators From Space, Chevron was regarded as one of the most influential figures in Irish punk music.

Philip was not only just the lead guitarist for the Pogues he was also a sophisticated songwriter, producer, musical director and interpreter.  

Chevron was apart of one of the most iconic christmas songs ‘Fairytale of NewYork’ it’s on repeat every christmas and has been in the top 20 charts every year since 2005! He also wrote “Thousands are sailing” the classic

The Irish Rock ‘N’ Roll Museum experience was delighted to receive a donation of Philip’s famous pinstripe Kilt suit. It was donated by Steven Averil, or Steve Rapid, the singer of Radiators from Space. Steve is also a very accomplished designer, who has designed many influential rock artwork. One of his first pieces was U2’s album “Boy”, and his agency AMP Visuals have worked with Nine Inch Nails, Depeche Mode, Hothouse Flowers, The Dubliners to name a few. Steve kindly donated Philip’s famous pinstripe suit to our museum on the behalf of Philip’s family and it’s one of our more popular pieces due to it’s striking appearance.

Where did Philip wear this suit?

One of the most frequent questions we get into the Museum after tours from visitors is “Where did Philip wear this kilt?”

Philp wore this suit at many gigs, one particular instance we can pinpoint is March 2011 in New York, when the Pogues played Terminal 5 over a number of nights. Below is a fan video of Philip and the Pogues rocking out. He wore this suit quite frequently in his later career and we’ll be collecting as many videos as we can. If you have any videos or memories of Philip and a gig he played with this suit we’d love to hear from you!