On May 11, Arab Strap’s Aidan Moffat and fellow Scot, singer and guitarist RM Hubbert will release a collaborative album, Here Lies The Boy, via Rock Action. The release will precede live dates from the pair, who have announced a date at Dublin’s Grand Social on July 24. Special guest on the night is Glasgow singer-songwriter Siobhan Wilson. Tickets cost €18.50 and go on sale on Friday at 10am.
This time last year, we spoke to organisers of Our Back Yard, one of the country’s most inspired small, homegrown festivals. Ahead of returning to Gilford on June 30 with acts including Hunkpapa, Petty Youth and Beauty Sleep, we catch up with organisers to discuss the past, present and bright future of the festival. Hi guys. Featuring the likes of Bonnevilles and Emerald Armada, reports from last year’s Our Back Yard were very positive. How was it compared to previous years? Our Back Yard 2017 was a watershed event for us. Whereas previous years had a distinctly lo-fi, amateurish vibe,…
It’s been announced that New Jersey DIY punk trio Screaming Females will play Dublin’s Grand Social on September 6. The Maria Patternoster-fronted band announced their seventh studio album, All At Once, earlier this year. Set for release via Don Giovanni records, it will be follow-up to 2015’s Rose Mountain. Tickets for the Dublin show are priced €15 and go on sale on Friday at 10am.
As we well know, Record Store Day takes place this Saturday, April 21st, and in celebration, Bangor’s leading the annual day of wax in the North with a series of events on High Street. Unfortunately for Belfasters, the closure of Belfast mainstays, Head & Sick Records has left them with no local outlets. Thankfully, Bangor’s Bending Sound Records is just a quick train ride away, and will open from 9am-5pm to help. Across the road, the MG car showroom hosts another record fair from 9am-3pm, from which point Flea Market Soul takes over just two doors down, offering up that rare treat: vinyl-only DJs, through the evening on…
Dublin’s Michael Orange AKA Feather Beds‘ 2017 album Blooming was a record we described as “a addictive, warm listen. Perfect to accompany blustery autumn walks as the evenings draw in, or to course through the room as you unwind by a fireplace.” Now, over half a year later and as we enter into the summer months with torrents of water under the bridge since, it feels apt to reflect on an album that, while understated, remains a rich, valuable and enticing listen that reveals its intricacy more with each play through. With the sharing of a new video for LP track ‘Headache Dreams’,…
Filled to brim with squelching alien textures and off kilter grooves, Unknown Mortal Orchestra’s Sex & Food is an intriguing and at times disquieting listen. Largely preoccupied with themes of isolation and disconnection, it seems fitting that the majority of the album was conceived and recorded far from the outfit’s New Zealand home in a dizzying array of far flung locales ranging from typhoon drenched Hanoi to an earthquake devastated Mexico City. The disorientating effect of this strange release evokes the free floating ennui of having been on the road too long, feeling washed out and jet lagged in a suddenly unfamiliar…
Set to return across the June Bank Holiday weekend of June 4-5, Forbidden Fruit Festival have revealed that 20 Irish acts will play its Bulmers Live Stage. Including Æ MAK, Fehdah and Lilla Vargen, the full line-up is below. Tickets for Forbidden Fruit Festival 2018 are available to buy here.
North Dublin gets a lot of bad press. We hear so many tales of ludicrous individuals and gangs that it’s easy to make the assumption that the North of the city is a place lacking in substance. Presented by DCU and Other Voices, ANAM is the start of an annual showcase of what culture lies bubbling beneath the surface of the city, but its importance is felt most by the local residents of the North side. Starting off the night are Discovery Gospel Choir (below), a harmonically powerful, multi-cultural group that shake off the traditional Irish awkwardness by asking everyone…
Daniel Avery has been DJing for 14 years. In such a relatively short space of time, few others have managed to traverse the techno spectrum quite in the same was he has. While his 2013 debut LP Drone Logic was widely regarded as one of Britain’s greatest ever techno offerings, his studious back catalogue has seen him expertly morph the genre with flashes of acid house, psychedelia and trance to name but a few stylistic ventures. Whether Avery’s trademark energy and intensity has been splashed across his original productions, or cast over in remixes Factory Floor’s, Django Django’s or Munk’s material, the recurring theme…
Officially launched at Belfast’s Love & Death last night, ‘Seafaring Man’ is the new single by Belfast-based Scots-Canadian singer-songwriter Peter Sumadh AKA The Mad Dalton. Taken from his forthcoming debut album, Open Season – which will be released in June following a successful pledge campaign – it’s another full-bodied slice of wistful Americana that, rather than getting ensnared in the images and memories of the past, aims two eyes firmly on the horizon. Open Season is launched at Belfast’s Black Box on June 14. Have a first listen (and look at Chris Molloy’s video) below.