• Stream: Gnarkats – Enigma

    March 30, 2018 - By 

    Belfast three-piece Gnarkats recently teamed up with Paul Mahon of the Answer to record a new track, ‘Enigma’. Released this week, the single is a starry-eyed burst of gazey alt-indie with a lyrical undercurrent of feeling isolated in toxic relationships. Speaking of the recording said, “Paul was amazing to work with, he loved the songs and we all got on really well. He put so much effort in to our music, had great suggestions and got the best performances out of us. We are very proud of the two tracks we worked on with him and it was truly a dream come true for [guitarist] Jordan…

  • Premiere: Brash Isaac – If

    March 30, 2018 - By 

    Set for release on April 7 to coincide with Pop Up’s 3 bands, 3 Cities, 3 Singles tour in Derry, ‘If…’ by Belfast-based, Andrew Cameron-fronted Brash Isaac is a delicately-woven yet impassioned single confronting ambivalence and self-realisation. Recorded at SubZero Studios with Michael McCluskey, Cameron said of the track: It’s a slight departure to what we’ve done before and doesn’t rely heavily on a lot of instrumentation or production. We’ve stripped it back to the sound of a four piece band playing their parts together in a room, and we feel that’s how this track works best It’s a song that tackles feelings of dread and anxiety, addressing the…

  • Young Fathers @ The Academy, Dublin

    March 30, 2018 - By 

    To describe Dublin’s Academy as packed would be an understatement. Bodies have been piling in in rapid succession after a slow trickling start. The main floor is shoulder to should with sweating teeming masses barely able to contain their anticipation for the Scottish hip-hop trio Young Fathers‘ arrival. The crowd tonight is beyond hyped up. There’s an intense positivity within all the anticipation that fuel some of the night’s most powerful moments. Thirty minutes after the opening DJ finishes his surprisingly enjoyable set of chipmunk soul and reggae cuts, the house lights dim and stage beams with white light. Three…

  • Stream: MELTS – Skyward

    March 30, 2018 - By 

    A new-fangled Dublin comprising ex-members of Ghost Estates, The Things, The Mighty Stef and The North Sea, MELTS are bassist Colm Giles, drummer Gary Earle, vocalist Eoin Kenny, guitarist Hugh O’Reily and Robbie Brady on organ, synth and theremin. Having recently announced that they’re set to appear at this year’s Castlepalooza, the five-piece have unveiled their debut single, ‘Skyward’. A Motorik-driven burst of nuanced, interlocking psych worship, the track was recorded at the Meadow in Co. Wicklow with Irish Duo the Deaf Brothers, who have worked with the likes of Mmoths, Cloud Castle Lake and Come On Live Long in the past. MELTS will release ‘Skyward’…

  • Making It Rain: A Chat with O Emperor

    March 30, 2018 - By 

    The trajectory of O Emperor is rooted in familiar origins. They did what schoolmates do and formed a band. That band were picked up by Universal shortly after, landing them a #6 in the Irish album charts. They took their time and constructed a studio for the follow-up. here’s a point where the Radioheads & Beatles’ of this world effortlessly toe the line between artistic and commercial success, and its often the dependence and freedom of a studio itself to bring out the alchemy present in the band. Those moments where everything seems to magically synergise at once can’t be replicated…

  • Premiere: Elaine Malone – No Blood

    March 30, 2018 - By 

    Musically recalling some of Tim Buckley’s airy jazz inclinations, and the gently percussive Weltschmerz of Nick Drake, Elaine Malone‘s new single cranks tension between folk music as a vehicle for aural pleasure and folk music as a vessel for crushingly human storytelling. It’s fitting then, that this Good Friday marks the release of the vital ‘No Blood’. That ‘No Blood’ was written & recorded long before Wednesday’s Laganside Court verdict, and the fact its trenchancy of its sentiment is in no danger of fading any time in the near future is a testament to our need to collectively address & confront these issues that pervade every level…

  • Album Premiere: The 202s – From When The Future Was Yet To Hurt Us

    March 29, 2018 - By 

    Dublin’s The 202s will release their new album From When The Future Was Yet To Hurt Us tomorrow March 30 via Difference/Repetition. With a selection of brand new cuts, previously released singles and tracks from their superb 2017 EP, Up In Thin Air, this album feels like the culmination of two years worth of gradual graft from one of Ireland’s finest, most understated acts. Having reformed in 2016 after a lengthy spell away – real life stuff, “since we last made a record, The 202s have made five human beings!” – the trio have been steadily releasing tracks in anticipation of this album and now, as it lands,…

  • Track Record: Jack Rudden (Search Party Animal)

    March 29, 2018 - By 

    In this instalment of Track Record, we hang out with Jack Rudden from Search Party Animal while we he talks us through some of his favourite records, from Slint to Sufjan Stevens. Photos by Zoe Holman. Sufjan Stevens -Age of Adz This is a perfect album. You can disagree if you like, but that will not change the fact that this is a perfect album. I don’t know where to begin with this one really. I could talk about every track on this double LP for hours. There’s just so much to cover. The gorgeous lyrics, the seamless combination of baroque orchestration and synthesizers,…

  • Stream: Spies – Young Dad

    March 28, 2018 - By 

    Following a string of well-received releases via Trout Records since forming back in 2009, Dublin band Spies disappeared off the face of the earth back in 2016. Or so it seemed. Frontman Michael Broderick explains: “We felt in order to write something we were really proud of, we needed to distance ourselves from the outside pressures of being in a band. It’s easy to get distracted by all the things you think you should be doing and overlook that your primary objective should be to write great music”. Having re-emerged today with the inspired ‘Young Dad’ — arguably the five-piece’s strongest single effort to…