• More Acts Set for Longitude

    May 20, 2015 - By 

    With just under two months to go to go until the festival, several new acts have been confirmed to play Longitude 2015. Set to take place at Dublin’s Marlay Park across the weekend of Friday, July 17 to Sunday, July 19, the following acts are amongst the latest additions: Le Galaxie / Carl Craig / Cashmere Cat / Leon Bridges / Josef Salvat/ Haelos / All Tvvins / Brame / EMBRZ / Frank B / Jeremy Underground / Wife / Shane Linehan / Hubie Davison / Niall D’Arcy / John Daly / Faune / 4Wrd Grad / Contour / Lee…

  • Watch: Fierce Mild – Equal People

    May 19, 2015 - By 

    Far from sitting on the proverbial Marriage Equality fence, Dublin lo-fi trio Fierce Mild play a ridiculously endearing brand of lo-fi punk, inflected with little flourishes of danceable beats and a general sense of celebration. “Celebration of what,” you ask? “Equality, in all its forms” we reply. Watch the video for their single ‘Equal People’, taken from their debut EP, Yes N Yes N Yes, below.  

  • New Additions to Forbidden Fruit Line-Up

    May 14, 2015 - By 

    Shaping up to be one of the festivals of the Irish summer, Forbidden Fruit have announced a handful of next acts to its 2015 bill. Joining the likes of Wu Tang Clan, Nicolas Jaar and Jamie XX to the line-up – taking place at Dublin’s Royal Hospital Kilmainham from May 29-31 – are East India Youth, Kowton, Lorenzo Senni, Tei Shi and U.S. electronic maestro Will Wiesenfield AKA Baths (pictured). Check out the full line-up below and go here to buy tickets to the festival.

  • Stream: Sorcha Richardson – Petrol Station

    May 14, 2015 - By 

    Having first caught our attention back in October, 2013 with the delicate, confessional folk of her wonderfully understated EP, Last Train, New York-based Dublin songstress Sorcha Richardson has just released a new track, ‘Petrol Station’. A simmering, nocturnal slice of electro-pop which sees Richardson’s lyrical gymnastic take centre-stage, the track was recorded by Gian Stone. Stream it below.

  • Inaugural Hollow Sounds Festival Announced

    May 14, 2015 - By 

    Jape, Slow Skies, I Have A Tribe, Elephant and The Man Whom are amongst the acts set to play the inaugural Hollow Sounds festival at the scenic Ballykeeffe Ampitheatre in Co. Kilkenny this Summer. Set to take place across the weekend of July 3-4, the festival – presented by KPB and Homebeat – promises to bring together a line-up of forward-thinking Irish music and classic cinema to the Kilkenny countryside venue. On the Friday, Happenings will be making their Kilkenny debut by screening The Goonies (we’re sold!). Sounds like a really cool and intimate event in the making. Snap up tickets for the festival – which go on…

  • Album stream: Rory Nellis – Ready For You Now

    May 12, 2015 - By 

    Having successfully completed a Pledge campaign to ensure its release, Belfast singer-songwriter Rory Nellis has released his long-awaited debut solo album, Ready For You Now. Last month we said Nellis’ music “betrays an increasingly tangible sense of conviction and candor. Where no lyric or phrase feels throwaway, no chord progression or melodic flourish seems kneejerk or unconsidered. This almost meditative attention to detail is something that has often set his music apart from many of his peers, something that’s more than evident on his forthcoming debut album, Ready For You Now.” A few weeks later, those words ring louder than…

  • Stream: Cry Monster Cry – Atlas

    May 11, 2015 - By 

    Having received quite the response for their album, Rhythm of Dawn, Dublin alt-pop brother duo Richie and James Martin AKA Cry Monster Cry have an uncanny knack for melding superb vocals harmonies with simple yet burrowing and quite brilliant alt-pop melodies. The second track to be taken from their aforementioned debut album, ‘Atlas’ is a song almost definitely written for the radio. Combining two-part harmonies with a bewitching mishmash of organs, piano, drums and mandolins, the single was recorded and produced in Dublin by Keith Lawless and mixed by Guy Massey, who has worked with the likes of Ed Sheeran, Manic Street Preachers and some dude called Paul McCartney. Cry Monster Cry…

  • Watch: Malojian – Bathtub Blues

    May 11, 2015 - By 

    The follow-up to the sublime ‘Communion Girls’, released back in February, Stevie Scullion AKA Malojian has unveiled the video for jaunty new single, ‘Bathtub Blues’. A brilliantly breezy effort, the video for the track features Scullion and his music-making cohorts Joe McGurgan and Mike Mormecha performing the track in a bathroom. We see what they did there. Malojian launch their new album, Southlands, at Belfast’s No Alibis on May 29 and 30. Buy tickets here and watch the video for ‘Bathtub Blues’ – directed by Tommy Keery – below.

  • Stream: Young Wonder – Sweet Dreaming (Tusks Remix)

    May 7, 2015 - By 

    With the launch of their debut album, Birth, taking place at London’s Electrowerkz tonight (May 7), Cork electro-pop duo Young Wonder are an Irish act very much on the up. Having released a stream of the original a couple of weeks ago, the pair have now unveiled a wonderfully understated remix of ‘Sweet Dreaming’ by London’s Tusks, a re-working that really drives home the track’s darkly, earworming melodic flourishes. Where the original is a dusky, beguiling effort, Tusks’ remix is a much more nocturnal affair; something for soundtracking that solitary headspace back home after a night out. Win tickets to the duo’s…

  • EP Stream: Keian – Lia

    May 7, 2015 - By 

    Far beyond bustling venues of the capital and endless streams of self-congratulatory press releases, Ireland is home to some decidedly more furtive, sub-rosa artists. Conjuring the intimate post-rock solipsism of Hood and Blue Aeroplanes with the wispy, inward-working bedroom electronica of World’s End Girlfriend, Lia by Dublin-based Irish-Iranian songwriter and producer Keian Roohipour AKA Keian falls under the aforementioned bracket, proving an initially unassuming yet very promising triptych of considered alt-pop. At the root of the material is an experimental knack that transcends sub-genre which, along with the music’s altogether charming lo-fidelity, coalesces to deliver something that proves encouraging for future material. Keian’s debut release, Lia was recorded, produced…