• Choice Cuts: The Best Tracks of… June

    July 1, 2014 - By 

    June saw the release of a plethora of hard hitting hip-hop and rainy day jazz music, and perhaps more suitably, a wealth of breezy summer jams to dig your teeth into. Below are ten of the month’s best (sifted from a great many more,) culminating in the top three. J Mascis – Every Morning (Sub Pop) No one can deny the impact J Mascis had on rock and punk music in the 80s and 90s, and its nice to see the Dinosaur Jr veteran continuing to release great music. His new track ‘Every Morning’ is a fairly stripped down acoustic…

  • Watch: Nyt Bloomer – Old Toys

    June 30, 2014 - By 

    A new video for the track ‘Old Toys’ has been unveiled by the Donegal-born producer Conor McNamee, aka Nyt Bloomer. The video appropriately sees an assortment of nostalgia-inducing 80s and 90s children’s toys animated into life, backed by Nyt Bloomer’s sample-heavy instrumental. Ninja Turtles meet Action Man, and there’s even a Street Shark involved. And can you spot the brief homage to And So I Watch You From Afar? The promising young producer releases his debut Old Toys tape in Belfast’s Menagerie, on Friday July 4, alongside Welfare and Colpey. Watch the video for ‘Old Toys’ below.  

  • Stream: Grimes – Go

    June 27, 2014 - By 

    The otherworldly summer sounds of Claire Boucher’s 2012 breakthrough Visions under her moniker GRIMES have largely been eschewed on this new single, unveiled in the UK by Zane Lowe of BBC Radio 1. Entitled ‘Go’, the track was originally penned by Boucher for Rihanna, who then turned it away. The song features a much punchier beat and a more dubstep inspired sound than anything the musician has touched before, opening with chilling harpsichord and Boucher’s luscious vocals, before twisting into a darker and heavier territory. The track also features Blood Diamonds, who has collaborated with the Montreal songstress in the past.…

  • Stream: Courageous Endeavors – Prototype

    June 25, 2014 - By 

    Jazz is great. Isn’t jazz great? The genre seems to be enjoying a resurgence, fronted by Toronto trio BADBADNOTGOOD, who recently dropped a rather sublime record as well as collaborations with the likes of Danny Brown and Earl Sweatshirt. The newest release in this new wave of modern jazz comes from a quartet called Courageous Endeavours. Hailing from Minneapolis, their debut album, Prototype, is an enthralling and vital addition to the rejuvenated movement; it’s brilliant, and absolutely worth listening to. In particular, check out ‘Habits Of Entitlement’ and ‘Second Hand.’ You can listen to Prototype below, and watch the music video for…

  • Stream: Shabazz Palaces – #CAKE

    June 23, 2014 - By 

    A second single has been revealed from next month’s Lese Majesty, the much-anticipated new release from hip-hop experimentalists SHABAZZ PALACES. It’s as avant garde and genre-bending as we have come to expect from the Seattle based duo. It’s called ‘#CAKE,’ and follows the previously released single ‘They Come In Gold.’ The beat slowly pierces through the twitchy instrumental, which is a layered and jazzy affair. Unpredictable, eccentric and undeniably unique, Shabazz Palaces seem on par to match their lauded 2011 debut album Black Up. Listen to ‘#CAKE’ below. Lese Majesty comes out July 29th on Sub Pop.

  • Listen: Bent Knee – Being Human

    June 21, 2014 - By 

    ‘Being Human’ is the name of the newest single from Boston-based art rockers BENT KNEE, taken off of their forthcoming album Shiny Eyed Babies. The young band take the phrase ‘shifting dynamics’ to new extremes, constantly twisting and contorting their sound in new ways, and this new teaser is no different. The track begins delicate and ethereal, before shifting into something much more bombastic. The rhythmic and melodic explorations on the track are completely fresh, creating moody atmospheres trumped by theatrical breakdowns. The album, due July 15, can’t come soon enough. Listen to ‘Being Human’ below. Shiny Eyed Babies by Bent Knee

  • Choice Cuts: The Best Tracks of May

    June 10, 2014 - By 

    In the latest installment of Choice Cuts – a feature looking at the very best tracks released in the month previous – Belfast-based writer and voracious sound enthusiast Aaron Hamilton takes us a on an eight-track, cross-genre journey, culminating in his top three tracks of the month. Ben Khan – Youth [Blessed Vice] London producer Ben Khan’s recent EP 1992 sees him furthering his warm funk-pop sounds into even catchier and addictive territory with ‘Youth’. Thick synth pads and squealing guitars moan underneath a stomping beat that will definitely see an abundance of replays in summer 2014.   Little Big League…

  • Swans – To Be Kind

    May 21, 2014 - By 

    In 2012 something quite extraordinary happened. After reforming his band Swans following a hiatus of over thirteen years, Michael Gira and his select group of musicians released their masterpiece: The Seer. Hailed as their finest work by many, it was a colossal piece of music spanning over two hours, an extended exploration of the unknowable obscurities and mind-numbing repetitions that had become synonymous with the Swans name. But it was much more than that – it was an evolutionary step into uncharted territory for the band, and for contemporary rock music as a whole. In an age where the synthesiser…

  • Choice Cuts: The Best Tracks of… April

    May 6, 2014 - By 

    April has certainly been a busy news month – in sports, we had lifetime bans and huge fines for court-side racism, as well as banana throwing (and eating); in entertainment we had Jeremy Clarkson, mostly just being Jeremy Clarkson; in politics we had a series of PR meltdowns for UKIP, many of them revolving around racism as well. Indeed, intolerance and prejudice has been widespread this month. There was no sparing the music world, either, with both Sky Ferreira and Avril Lavigne being branded racists for their respective music videos. It would be easy to be bogged down by all…

  • Inbound/exclusive stream: Nyt Bloomer

    May 1, 2014 - By 

    Hailing from Donegal, Conor McNamee AKA Nyt Bloomer is one of the more interesting voices in Ireland’s thriving electronic music scene. I met with him at his April 24 show at the Menagerie with Shammen Delly and Colpey to speak about the inception of Nyt Bloomer, his record label You Can’t Break It Records, and his infatuation with sampling. Ahead of the vinyl release, Old Toys is available for streaming exclusively on The Thin Air, and the cassette can be bought in Belfast’s Sick Records. Hi Conor. Lets start with a little background – where did Nyt Bloomer come from? I…