• Inbound: Little Hours

    With their first headlining gig and EP launch to take place this Thursday (November 27) at Dublin’s Sugar Club, Joe Madsen chats with folk duo Ryan McCloskey and John Doherty AKA Little Hours about the rollercoaster ride of a year they’ve been having since their formation back in February. Photos by Isabel Thomas. How long have you guys known each other and how long have you been playing together? Ryan: “For about five or six years.  We’ve played with a lot of different cover bands over the past few years, but the original thing came into formation at the start of this…

  • Mark Kozelek – Sings Christmas Carols

    “I just don’t understand Christmas I guess” laments Mark Kozelek in a spoken word section of the opener ‘Christmas Time Is Here’, and while he is reading lines originally spoken by Charlie Brown it sets the tone for the entire record. The former Red House Painters‘ singer Kozelek attempts to understand the holiday season on Sings Christmas Carols by exploring the emotional depth of these Christmas songs and escaping from his depression and melancholy. Mark Kozelek is no stranger to cover albums, having released a downtempo covers album of AC/DC songs entitled What’s Next to the Moon and Tiny Cities, an…

  • Watch: Elastic Sleep – Slip

    Cork dream-pop quintet Elastic Sleep have just unveiled the video for new single, ‘Slip’, following their debut EP, Leave You, which came out in April; and with fellow shoegazers The Altered Hours also hailing from the county, it seems to be fast-becoming a minor hotbed for all things psychedelic. ‘Slip’ – released through Big Tea Records as the second of their Winter Trio of singles – is available now from iTunes and Bandcamp for just £1. Watch the video below:

  • Listen: Speed of Snakes – Speed of Snakes

    Not content to be in only one of the best bands in Ireland, Dublin-based electronic duo Speed of Snakes – comprising of Vinny from the now-deceased (still-warm) Adebisi Shank and Rupert from BATS – have unveiled an eponymous new track from their upcoming debut album of the same name. Having long been collaborating, with signs of a more extensive live & recorded output in 2015, their last release was hypnotic groover ‘Backbone of Night‘. Check out ‘Speed of Snakes’:

  • Watch: Axis Of – Wetsuit

    North coast erstwhile punk trio Axis Of have unveiled the video for ‘Wetsuit’ – the first single off their second album, The Mid Brae Inn – which sees them take off in a decidedly more indie, pop-rock direction, a huge departure from the band’s early brand of frantic hardcore; although, in saying that, they’ve been known to have an ear for a hook since the sludge-pop of ‘Lifehammer‘ from their debut LP, 2012’s Finding St. Kilda. The Mid Brae Inn gets its launch through Smalltown America on New Year’s Eve at Belfast’s Empire Music Hall, with ‘Wetsuit’ available from November 26 from Independent Music, with the b-side being…

  • Classic Album: The Raincoats – The Raincoats

    1979 was the peak year for post-punk. Picking up the torch from the already stale and fast dying punk scene, adopting its spirit but injecting it with a new sense of invention, artistry and a range of eclectic influences in place of punk’s self inflicted limitations, there were genre defining debuts from Joy Division and Gang Of Four, as well as classic follow ups from the likes of Wire and Public Image Ltd among many others. The Fall even released not only their first but also their second album that year, featuring two almost entirely different lineups, immediately starting as…

  • Arca – Xen

    Understandably Arca’s debut album Xen has been eagerly anticipated in electronic circles and beyond. A couple of strong EPs in Stretch 1 and Stretch 2, his astounding &&&&& mixtape, productions for FKA Twigs and some guy called Kanye West as well as forthcoming productions on the next Bjork album – the London-based Venezuelan producer is hot property. Xen is supposedly an androgynous alter-ego of Arca whose “mere existence is kind of repulsive and attractive at once” he told The Fader and it’s this idea of these two opposites co-existing that makes Xen so endearing. The hip-hop focus of Arca’s previous…