• The Thin Air Podcast: Martin Newell (The Cleaners From Venus)

    June 19, 2025 - By 

    Today we’re meeting the jangling man, Martin Newell, a songwriter, poet and author – sometimes referred to as “the godfather of lo-fi music”. In the early 1980s, Martin began recording perfect pop songs under the name The Cleaners From Venus. Releasing albums on tape cassette and spreading through fanzine culture, his early work was later reissued in the 2010s by US label Captured Tracks. Quintessentially English in subject matter and undeniably melodic in production, for many Martin Newell is a missing link in the chain of popular music – a vital outlier and a testament to doing it yourself. You…

  • Monday Mixtape: Big Sleep

    June 16, 2025 - By 

    Ahead of the release of their new single ‘Pick a Cheek’, Dublin-based indie quartet Big Sleep share a playlist of songs that have inspired them, from Big Thief to The Cleaners from Venus. Here’s what the band had to say about their selections – “We put together this playlist on the run for a recording session last year. It contains both songs that we like as a band and as individuals – but some of them were an inspiration for creating our music. So, this selection and its diversity wants to represent our general taste for music but also what…

  • The Thin Air Podcast: Elaine Howley

    June 12, 2025 - By 

    After a brief, half-decade hiatus, we’re delighted to say The Thin Air podcast has returned for Season 3, hosted by Danny Carroll. This season will have a particular focus on the creative practice of self-recording artists, featuring an expanse of deeply personal approaches to the process, and the myriad ways a song – and career- can take shape. In this episode, we meet someone who has long been a TTA favourite, Elaine Howley, a singer and producer originally from Tipperary, and now based in Co. Cork. Danny Carroll went to see Elaine at her home in Dripsey, on a particularly…

  • Track Record: Pebbledash

    May 20, 2025 - By 

      To mark the release of their new single ‘Asha’s Waltz’ today, Cork-based quartet Pebbledash select the records that inspired them from Leonard Cohen to Horsegirl. Photos by Erin Plaice Leonard Cohen – Death of a Ladies’ Man Fionnbharr: As much as we all enjoy the bit of noise, there’s a deep vein of appreciation for the lyricism of artists like Leonard Cohen or Jackson C. Frank amongst all of us in Pebbledash. This is Cohen at his most maximal and, for what the man is known for, perhaps his most unconventional – rarely do we hear him howl how…

  • Shining Light: A Tribute to Conor Biddle

    April 30, 2025 - By 

    All of us at The Thin Air are deeply saddened to hear of the recent passing of lighting designer Conor Biddle. Conor’s work shone brightly across so many stages, lighting up live performances from some of the best acts in the country. We’ve gone through our photography archives to share this tribute to Conor and some of his beautiful work. Our heartfelt condolences go out to his husband Sean, family, friends, and the many colleagues across the music industry who were so lucky to work with him.

  • Cian Ó Cíobháin on 26 Years of An Taobh Tuathail – and 26 Tracks That Shaped It

    April 30, 2025 - By 

    For over a quarter of a century, Cian Ó Cíobháin’s An Taobh Tuathail has been an almighty force in Irish broadcasting and a nightly dispatch from the edges of sound. First aired on 1st May 1999, the show has long operated as RTÉ Raidió na Gaeltachta’s flagship for leftfield and alternative music, delivering everything from ambient drift and avant-pop to underground techno and wayward folk. Presented in Irish but universal in scope, ATT has steadily, and ever increasingly built a reputation as one of the most vital and visionary radio shows on this island – and far beyond it. This…

  • Irish Tracks of the Week – 25th April

    April 25, 2025 - By 

    Dive into the very best Irish music of the week, featuring Junior Brother, AM Shanley, Stratford Rise, Hamer Place, Charlie Hanlon, Maria Somerville and more. Photo by Ellius Grace Junior Brother – Small Violence AM Shanley – AMERICAN VANILLA AMERICAN VANILLA by AM Shanley Stratford Rise – Gunshow Hamer Place – Gerry’s Retired Gerry’s Retired by Hamer Place Charlie Hanlon – Foreshadowing Maria Somerville – Projection Cathal Francis – Snowblind Snowblind by Cathal Francis Dose – After This After This by Dose Cliffords – Dungarvan Bay Offica – Go Mo Laura Duff – Fondness Of You DREAM BOY – Ivory…

  • Irish Tracks of the Week – 18th April

    April 17, 2025 - By 

    Dive into brand new gems from God Knows, M(h)aol, Nerves, VARO featuring Lankum’s Ian Lynch, YARD, RUÁ and Skinner Photo by Yana Babkina God Knows – The Observer Feat. Dreddy M(h)aol – I Miss My Dog Nerves – Dirty Fingers VARO feat Ian Lynch – Sweet Liberty RUÁ – Forbidden Pleasures Skinner – Eisbär (Grauzone Cover) ​ YARD – Slumber

  • Through, Not Around: An Interview with Daniel Bedingfield

    April 17, 2025 - By 

    “For most of my life, I’ve lived with enormous, driven agony. Now, I wake up and I’m okay. Someone dies – I grieve, but I’m still okay. I could lose everything – money, reputation – and I’d still be okay. Something in me has healed, at a core level.” Go on there: forget everything you thought you knew about Daniel Bedingfield. What you thought you knew was only the sudden glint on the surface of something far deeper, freer, and more alive. You probably got the memo: he appeared, seemingly fully formed, back in 2001, an unknown Kiwi-Londoner with a…

  • Monday Mixtape: Ramper

    April 14, 2025 - By 

    Off the back of his sublime debut album, Loner, Donegal alt-folk artist Declan McClafferty aka Ramper talks us through some of his all-time favourite songs – from Kate Bush and the Bothy Band, to Dylan, Villagers and beyond. Photo by Joe Doherty Bob Dylan – Girl From The North Country I think this was the first song that pulled me out of listening to music through the prism of what the guitars were doing. I got a bit obsessed with the simplicity of it – acoustic, vocal, harmonica. Dylan is like a big hole. If you get stuck in there…