Featuring support from A Bad Cavalier and the Wonder Villains, Belfast-based quartet Ed Zealous bowed out in fine fashion at their sold-out farewell show at Belfast’s Voodoo on Saturday night. Our photographer Joe Laverty was there to capture the band’s (decidedly sweaty and cathartic) swansong.
Following up on the sprawling ‘Molly’ – our Irish track of 2014 – one of our 15 picks for 2015, experimental indie rock act Princess – based around the creative pair of Aoife Frances & Liam Mesbur – have just unveiled their latest single, ‘Black Window’. Weighing in at little under three minutes , the song is significantly more concise than the duo previous work, recalling prime ’90s indie rock with hooks to match. It’s one of their shining moments to date, covering more ground in their perpetually evolving blend of shoegaze, krautrock & noise, as heard on the pair of singles…
Kanye, we’re gon’ let you finish but Beck is easily one of the most innovative, exciting and singular artists of our generation. We love you, Kanye, we really do, but Mr. Hansen has consistently churned out some of the most downright exceptional sounds – party-starting jams, neo-psychedelic throwdowns and brooding odes – over twelve studio albums, three EPs, forty singles, fourteen soundtracks and thirty-nine genre-spanning collaborations. He’s good, Kanye – he’s very good – and to prove it, if you’ve got the time in your very busy schedule, here’s a playlist comprised of Beck’s 20 best songs. It took us ages…
No Monster Club is a cacophonous creature that can’t be categorized. Styled by Dublin’s own Bobby Aherne, this musical act is a creation born of many genres, many trials, many errors, and many years in production, with latest release People Are Weird proving no exception to this theme. In fact, this eighth album represents a lot of Aherne’s transformation as an artist these past eight years. Dipping his hands and his listeners’ ears into various pots of sound across the set, Aherne flees from being pinned to one classification, weaving an opus which draws on the influence of past artists…
Redbeard’s latest showcase took place at Belfast’s The Bar With No Name (AKA Auntie Annie’s – RIP, etc.) at the weekend. Headlined by fast-rising Derry band Making Monsters, the show also featured blinding sets from Molar Bear, Axecatcher and MAW. A connoisseur of all things heavy and local, our photographer Liam Kielt was down to capture the action.
Viet Cong really know how to make an entrance. The first moments of their self titled debut LP contain those drums; they’re almost tribal with intensity but they’ve been distorted and muffled to the stage where they achieve this kind of industrial vibe, evoking the likes of the Manic Street Preachers’ ‘Intense Humming of Evil’ and Nine Inch Nails’ ‘Mr. Self Destruct’. It’s this kind of deeply unsettling atmosphere that the likes of Einstürzende Neubauten just revelled in and gives the band a clear mission statement: for these Canadians, it’s still the mid 80s, and Joy Division, Echo and The…
In the latest installment of Cork Heads, Brid O’Donovan chats to Cathy O’ Donoghue, owner of Turquoise Flamingo, a vintage clothing and accessories online store and blog. She also co-runs Oh Me, Oh My DIY creative workshops in secret locations. The Things you do as a Child. Arts and crafts with my mum I suppose. We lived out in the country and we had no neighbours. I have one sister who didn’t come along until I was five so she wasn’t fun until I was eight or nine. I was a bit of a tomboy but I was girly too.…