• The Thin Air’s Top 100 Irish Tracks of 2018 (#100-51)

    December 22, 2018 - By 

    Christ on a rickety sleigh, was this tough. But truth be told – it’s rarely easy. As we scramble to bang heads and attempt to assimilate, order and re-order the absolute deluge of excellence that has met our ears over the previous twelve months, it’s instantly clear that there will be some notable omissions. It’s equal parts unavoidable and unfortunate, but more significantly, it’s glowing testament to what we’re dealing with in every pocket of this island. Of course, we can’t – nor wish to – conclusively say this is “the best year for Irish music in recent memory” (the…

  • The Thin Air’s Top 100 Irish Tracks of 2018 (#50-1)

    December 22, 2018 - By 

    Christ on a rickety sleigh, was this tough. But truth be told – it’s rarely easy. As we scramble to bang heads and attempt to assimilate, order and re-order the absolute deluge of excellence that has met our ears over the previous twelve months, it’s instantly clear that there will be some notable omissions. It’s equal parts unavoidable and unfortunate, but more significantly, it’s glowing testament to what we’re dealing with in every pocket of this island. Of course, we can’t – nor wish to – conclusively say this is “the best year for Irish music in recent memory” (the…

  • Album Stream: Foolish Mortal – Foolish Mortal

    December 14, 2018 - By 

    Luminously captured in its eponymous, sixteen-track LP, Laurie Shaw’s new side-project, Foolish Mortal, is a blitzing, fuzzed-out traipse through the inner and outer recesses of Shaw’s musical mind. Conjuring everyone from White Fence and Black Lips, to The Wipers and our Lord and Saviour, Ty Segall, it’s a heady, genre-mangling feat of garage rock mastery from the prolific Cork-based Wirral artist. Out now via the brilliant Sunshine Cult Records, you can stream the album in full below. While you’re at it, pop along to Plugd in Cork on Saturday, December 22 to catch Foolish Mortal alongside Mikron and Perish.

  • Premiere: Anto and the Echoes – Hollywood Baby

    December 13, 2018 - By 

    Belfast-based Fermanagh six-piece Anto and the Echoes are a band that have long prided themselves on their live show. It’s something that shines through and then some in the video for their new single, ‘Hollywood Baby’. Running parallel with the track’s rock-pop bombast (good luck finding a catchier chorus this side of Christmas) Declan Ó Grianna’s video – which features the band and some of their fans in the thick of it at the National Club on Queen Street in Belfast – puts cutting loose firmly centre-stage. Have a first look below. Photo by Rebecca Dougan

  • Bob Dylan and Neil Young To Play Kilkenny

    December 13, 2018 - By 

    Having recently announced a show together at London’s Hyde Park, it’s been announced that Bob Dylan and Neil Young will play Kilkenny next summer. Billed as their only appearance in Ireland, the icons will play the 27,800-capacity Nowlan Park stadium on Sunday, July 14. Tickets – which are priced from €76 – go on sale this Monday at 9am.

  • Oh Sees Set For Irish Shows

    December 13, 2018 - By 

    San Francisco garage rock masters Oh Sees will return to play Ireland next year. The ever-prolific, John Dwyer-fronted band will play Belfast’s Limelight 1 on Monday, May 20 and Dublin’s Button Factory on May 21. Tickets – which are priced £22 and €25 respectively – go on sale this Friday at 9am. Revisit the band’s twenty-first album, Smote Reverser, below.

  • Stream: Eoin Dolan – Quiet Christmas

    December 11, 2018 - By 

    Four months on from releasing easily one of the Irish EPs of the year – the superb, sci-fi-tinged four-tracker Superior Fiction – Galway singer-songwriter Eoin Dolan is back with one of modern music’s big aberrations: a legitimately great Christmas single. Marrying sleigh bells and heady surf melodies with killer indie-pop lo-fidelity, it’s almost certainly the only festive single from an Irish artist that you should bother checking out this year.

  • Premiere: Cal Folger Day – Apples + Reprise

    December 11, 2018 - By 

    Including ‘Homez-a-Place‘ and ‘Song From a Party‘, Dublin-based New Yorker Cal Folger Day has released a steady stream of sonically mottled and consistently compelling EPs and singles over the years. Her latest project is The Woods and Grandma, a verbatim pop-about Lady Gregory, which was recorded live in Dublin at Ailfionn by Christopher Barry and mixed/mastered in LA by Hans Zimmer engineer Forest Christenson. Set for broadcast on RTÉ Lyric FM on Sunday (December 16) between 6-7pm, the show – which scooped the Little Gem award at the 2017 Dublin Fringe Festival – will go on a two-week East Coast US tour with…

  • Stream: Gnarkats – Take Me Away

    December 10, 2018 - By 

    Gnarkats’ knack for blending burrowing, star-shaped melodies with low-end riffs saw them emerge as one of Ireland’s best alt-indie bands this year. Citing the likes of Fidlar, St. Vincent and fellow Belfast-based band, And So I Watch You From Afar, as key influences, Jordan Evans, Stuart Robinson and Louis Nelson are back with their final song of the year, ‘Take Me Away’. A re-recording of an old fan favourite, the single – which comes accompanied with a wonderfully DIY video, which you can watch below – was recorded and mixed by Stuart Robinson from the band.

  • Win Tickets to The Murder Capital in Belfast and Dublin

    December 10, 2018 - By 

    We’ve a pair of tickets to give away to two Murder Capital shows this week: Wednesday (December 12th) at Voodoo in Belfast and Dublin’s Workman’s Club on Friday. To enter, simply e-mail info@thethinair.net with the following question and indicate which show you would like to attend: What is the name of the Murder Capital’s frontman?