• Monday Mixtape: Cathy Pellow (Sargent House)

    March 23, 2015 - By 

    We’re very pleased to present this week’s Monday Mixtape, featuring none other than Sargent House founder and owner Cathy Pellow. A true champion of independent music and some of the very best artists around, Pellow’s mixtape features several unreleased tracks from the likes of R. Ariel, Mutoid Man, And So I Watch You From Afar and No Spill Blood, as well as released material from acts including Helms Alee and Wovenhand. And So I Watch You From Afar – Wasps (from Heirs, out on May 4) Blis. – Floating Somewhere High and Above (from Starting Fires In My Parents House) Empty Houses –…

  • Rave New World (20/3)

    March 20, 2015 - By 

    With Antoin Lindsay temporarily AWOL (he’s moving country, ok? Enough with those crazy thoughts about being on the run from loan sharks, etc.) Aidan Hanratty delivers this week’s Rave New World on his most capable lonesome. Electronic music is a thing, and a very good thing. Embrace it like a long-lost brother, you cold, inconsiderate swine. Only joking – you’re lovely. GIGS Mud: Bodytonic present Blawan & Sunil Sharpe at The Twisted Pepper Friday, March 20 Last year Sunil Sharpe went b2b with Ben UFO. Rather than Ben going harder, Sunil went deeper, showing the breadth of this local hero’s ability.…

  • Classic Album: Pink Floyd – Obscured by Clouds

    March 20, 2015 - By 

    In the wake of the solar eclipse that has captured people’s imaginations, and clogged up their social media feeds, Steven Rainey takes a bit of artistic licence and delves back into Pink Floyd’s history to rediscover an album that finds them revelling in the darkness caused by the blotting out of the sun.Technically, Obscured by Clouds is a soundtrack album for the French film La Vallee, a reasonably obscure oddity that finds a woman going on a voyage of self-discovery in New Guinea. I haven’t seen it, and I’m betting you haven’t either (and if you have, fair play to you –…

  • Terry Pratchett (1948-2015)

    March 16, 2015 - By 

    “It is often said that before one dies your life flashes before your eyes. This is in fact true. It is called living.” – Sir Terry Pratchett Terry Pratchett’s last book, a paperback copy, sits on my shelf, pristine and unread since receiving it for Christmas and I find myself both cherishing and dreading the opportunity for one final visit to the most significant of the worlds he created, The Discworld. I can honestly say that I had no idea how important the writer of these books was to me until I read he’d died. Sitting in my workplace looking…

  • Label Mixtape: Touch & Go

    March 18, 2015 - By 

    Originally founded as a fanzine in 1979 by Tesco Vee and Dave Stimson before becoming a record label in 1981, Touch & Go was originally a platform for the Chicago hardcore punk scene, before Vee handed the reins over to Corey and Lisa Rusk in 1983, with Corey Rusk still being at the helm today. The label would go on to become synonymous with the 1980s noise rock scene, as well as 1990s math-rock, before expanding into all things alternative in later years. The label is also well known for its DIY ethic, offering artists 50-50 deals after production and…

  • Monday Mixtape: Ricki O’Rawe (Not Squares)

    March 16, 2015 - By 

    With their forthcoming second album, Bolts, set for release next month, Belfast-based trio Not Squares are steadily re-affirming their reputation as one of the country’s very best live acts. Ahead of launching the album at Galway’s Róisín Dubh on April 9, Ricki O’Rawe (pictured in the bold white-rimmed shades, above) from the band shares his favourite songs as of late – including Tyondai Braxton, Luke Abbott, Arca and Polmo Polpo – in a playlist aptly-titled Pissed and Passed Out. Take it away, Ricki. “This mix is made up of sounds that I have been digging recently. The music spans time and space but coheres…

  • Rave New World (13/3)

    March 13, 2015 - By 

    If there’s two men on this isle more readily equipped than Antoin Lindsay and Aidan Hanratty to tastefully distill the towering pantheon of electronic music as it manifests itself at this precise moment of time, in this particular corner of the world, we haven’t met them. Nor do we wish to. Here’s this week’s Rave New World. Don’t chew glowsticks. GIGS Twitch Presents: Paul Woolford and Midland at Mandela Hall, Belfast Saturday, March 14 Two heavyweights of house and techno make their way to Twitch this Saturday for a pretty unmissable back-to-back session. Paul Woolford has played Twitch a few times before…

  • Festival Mixtape: Body & Soul 2015

    March 12, 2015 - By 

    Set to return to Ballinlough Castle, Clonmellon in Co. Meath during the Summer solstice weekend of June 19-21, Body & Soul 2015 is set to be one of the highlights of the Irish summer festival calender yet again. Just yesterday, the festival announced its first wave of confirm acts – and what a tidy list it was. Ahead of further line-up announcements, stream our sixteen-track playlist featuring some of the very best acts already confirmed to play the festival – including Goat (pictured), Dan Deacon, Natalie Press, Clark, Meltybrains?, SOHN, Nightmares on Wax, Savages and Austra – below.

  • Label Mixtape #003: 4AD

    March 10, 2015 - By 

    A label based on aesthetic principles, 4AD has spent over 30 years being everything you think it is not. Initially founded by Ivo Watts Russell in 1980 as a vehicle to release music by bands at the centre of the nascent goth scene, the label quickly established a style and format that would lead to it becoming one of the most iconic record labels of the 80s.With records clad in immaculate Vaughn Oliver sleeves, the label originally specialised in floaty, gothic ambience, before encompassing world music, dance music, and – perhaps most significantly – the cutting edge of the US…

  • Rave New World (6/3)

    March 6, 2015 - By 

    Rave New World: Antoin Lindsay and Aidan Hanratty return with this week’s unarguably indispensable guide to the very best electronic/dance tracks, mixes, releases and gigs taking across the country this weekend. GIGS Gary’s Gang presents: DJ Fett Burger at The Sweeney Mongrel, Dublin Friday, March 6 Tonight sees the arrival of DJ Fett Burger in Dublin. Fett Burger’s the owner of the constantly fantastic Sex Tags Mania label from Norway alongside his brother DJ Sotofett (who I covered on here last week). It’d be foolish to tell you what to expect but it’ll probably have some balearic and disco in there with…