• Album stream: Interpol – El Pintor

    Set for release on September 9, Interpol are streaming their highly-anticipated fifth studio album, El Pintor. You can stream the album in full over at NPR and buy tickets to see the band play Dublin on February 10 and 11 via Ticketmaster here. Missed it? Watch the band’s recent video for ‘All The Rage Back Home’ below.

  • Electric Picnic reveal Main Stage times

    With only three days left until this year’s (comprehensively sold-out) installment of the annual Stradbally Estate, Co. Laois festival, Main Stage times have been announced for Electric Picnic. Times have also been announced for the Red Bull Music Academy and Casa Bacardi stages. Check them out them out below. Main Stage Friday 10.45pm-12am: Pet Shop Boys 9pm-10.15pm: Foals 7.15pm-8.15pm: Blondie 6pm-6.45pm: The Strypes 5pm-5.30pm: Tvvins Saturday 12.30am-1.45am: Chic 10.35pm-11.50pm: Portishead 8.45pm-9.55pm: Paolo Nutini 7pm-8.05pm: Bombay Bicycle Club 5.30pm-6.25pm: Hozier 3.45pm-4.45pm: Wild Beasts 2pm-3pm: The Stranglers 12.30pm-1.30pm: Trinity Orchestra Sunday 10.15pm-12am: Outkast 8.30pm-9.45pm: Beck 7pm-8pm: Lily Allen 5.25pm-6.25pm: SimpleMinds 3.50pm-4.50pm: Sinead…

  • First acts announced for Samhain Festival 2014

    Having sold out last year, Samhain Festival has announced the first few acts set to play its next outing in a couple of months. Taking the stunning Loughcrew Gardens in Co. Meath on Sunday, October 26, the annual showcase will see the final Irish date on Jon Hopkins’ (pictured) Immunity tour, as well as appearances from John Talabot, the fast-rising Maya Jane Coles, Booka Shade (Live) and Detroit veteran Jimmy Edgar. More acts are to be announced. According to the festival, the new location is “shadowed by Sliabh na Caillíagh, the “Witch’s Mountain”, bordered by 300 year old Yew trees, grown to…

  • Stream: Deafheaven – From The Kettle Onto The Coil

    San Francisco’s leading black metal outfit Deafheaven have released a studio version of their new song ‘From The Kettle Onto The Coil’. The five piece, having just played a well received show at Belfast’s Mandela Hall (review here) have been playing this new song at most of their recent shows. While it sounds familiar to their 2013 breakthrough album Sunbather, it has a few notable deviations, including some chugging guitars and vocals from George Clarke that are less concealed in the mix. ‘From The Kettle Onto The Coil’ can be heard below via SoundCloud. It can be downloaded for free starting…

  • Watch: UNKNWN – BBY

    Bound for Electric Picnic at the end of the month, Champion Sound-signed electronic duo UNKNWN have unveiled their debut music video, for the track ‘BBY’. Directed by Daniel Holmes, it is a nicely edited, suitably phantasmal affair, wonderfully accompanying the track’s hazy, drifting air. ‘BBY’ is taken from the duo’s DEVIL/BBY EP, which you purchase right here. UNKNWN – comprised of producer Chris Hanna and vocalist Gemma Dunleavy – have steadily grown in stature and acclaim over the last few months, something that will come into sharp focus when they play alongside labelmates Ryan Vail, Contour, Ghosts, Talkboy and Replete at the Body & Soul tent at…

  • Stream: Sea Pinks – Dream Happening

    Jangle/neo-surf pop outfit Sea Pinks have just unveiled ‘Dream Happening’, the first track from their aptly-titled upcoming album Dreaming Tracks. The LP will be Sea Pinks’ first release since single ‘An Exploded View‘ was put out last November. The album is to be released through independent Belfast specialist dream/surf/noise-pop label, CF Records on September 29. Stream ‘Dream Happening’ below:

  • Final Electric Picnic Acts announced

    Less than two weeks now to the start of Ireland’s premier music festival, and the festival has revealed the final seventeen acts that will grace the stage at Stradbelly. Several top Irish bands lead the way with Sleep Thieves (above), Tvvins, We Cut Corners and Raglans all set to perform. The other artists that will be playing at the festival are Jenny Lewis,  Krystal Klear,  PHOX,  The Minutes, Vann Music, Booka Brass Band  Spies, The Academic, Orla Gartland, Buffalo Sunn, Daniel James,  Acrobat and Wyvern Lingo. Electric Picnic takes place at Stradbelly Estate, Laois from August 29 to 31. Tickets are sold out.

  • Video premiere: The North Sea – In Love

    The first track to be taken from their as-of-yet unnamed debut album, Dublin alt-rock five-piece The North Sea will release ‘In Love’ on September 26 – and we’ve the first look of the single’s video. Shot by Second Frame and directed by Niall Conroy and Daniel Kennedy, it’s a nicely-lit, monochrome affair, perfectly capture the song’s slick, darkly tangents, reminiscent of the likes of Interpol and Editors. The follow-up to their promising, 2012 self-titled EP, the band’s forthcoming album was recorded live to tape in order to capture their live sound, and was produced by Grammy Award-winning Irish producer David Odlum…

  • Bangor set for Open House Festival Culture Day

    A main fixture of this year’s Open House Festival, the streets of Bangor will be transformed into a bustling hub of happenings and creative activity for Culture Day on Saturday, August 23. Celebrating the wealth of creative talent of the town, buskers, skateboarders, poets, potterers, dancers and dramatists will see every corner of the Co. Down seaside resort come alive with an eruption of sound, movement and colour. Speaking of Culture Day 2014, Open House Festival Director, Kieran Gilmore said, “It’s a well-known fact that Bangor folk are a talented breed. Over the years the town has produced an abundance…

  • Stream: MOLARBEAR – Fierce Brosnan

    Comprised of members of Jackalfeud and the Big Grizzly, Belfast-based five-piece MOLARBEAR have released their debut single, ‘Fierce Brosnan’. The track – clocking in at a rampant two and a half minutes – was recorded and mixed at Bearcat Studios and conjures the likes of Hawk Eyes, early Mastodon and fellow Belfastians Comply or Die. Stream the track via Bandcamp below. Fierce Brosnan by Molarbear