Songfacts®:

• This song is a tribute to Aberdaron, a fishing village in Wales where The Trials Of Cato bouzouki player Robin Jones spent time as a child. According to legend it's where the wizard Merlin is buried. The lyric is Welch; here's a translation of the second verse:
  
  When I'm old and respectable
  And my blood running cold
  And my heart not holding together
  As I watch the moon rising
  There'll be hope for me then
  In a cottage which has its door
  Towards the rocks of Aberdaron
  And the wild waves of the sea
• "Aberdaron" was inspired by a poem of the same name by the Welch poet Albert Cynan Evans-Jones (1895-1970). "The flow and transition of the words in these beautiful verses have always reminded me of the tranquility and rugged beauty that attracts thousands to visit this charming area of the Llyn peninsula in North Wales every year," Robin Jones explained. "This has always been a meeting place between spirituality and art, where the famous poet R.S. Thomas was minister from 1967-78. It felt like a real honor for us to be part of that continued tradition with our own song."
• The Trials Of Cato formed in Beirut, where the three original members were teaching English, in 2016. That's when they came up with the melody for this song.
  
  "The arrangement of the piece has developed quite a bit since those early days, with new elements being introduced as we have performed the song live over the past five years," guitarist Tomos Williams said. "'Aberdaron' always comes out as a favorite in our live performances, not only in Wales but also in England, Scotland, Canada and America. I think it's a song that transcends language barriers."
• The group's mandolin player, Polly Bolton, is the only member not from Wales; she's from Yorkshire in England. "I'm not a fluent Welsh speaker, but since I joined the band, the boys have been helping me to learn more and more of this beautiful language," she said. "It was an honor to sing harmony on this track, and although some of the finer poetic nuances were lost on me as an English speaker, I felt that the obvious musicality of the words transcended the language barrier and gave me a real sense of the ancient magic that this poem is meant to convey. I have to say I didn't really get the untranslatable Welsh concept of 'hiraeth' before now – a term which is often described to mean something between longing and nostalgia for a half-forgotten Celtic past – but the experience of filming this track on location in Aberdaron gave me a much better sense of the deep meaning of this term to the Celtic peoples of the British Isles."
• The Trials Of Cato traveled to Aberdaron to shoot the music video. Much of it takes place in St. Hywyn's Church. "We wanted to pay tribute to the unique spiritual significance of this location to the Celtic peoples of Britain," they explained.
• "Aberdaron" is the lead single from the Trials Of Cato album Gog Magog, titled after a mythical giant (Gogmagog) said to roam Cambridgeshire in the UK.