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.
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…
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.
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?
Conor O’Brien’s Villagers are the latest act announced to headline Iveagh Gardens next summer. Supported by Aldous Harding, the band – who released one of the Irish albums of 2018, The Art of Pretending to Swim, in September – will play the Dublin show on Friday, July 12. Tickets go on sale on Thursday, December 13 at 9am.
Forbidden Fruit have revealed their first names for 2019. The annual festival – which returns to Royal Hospital Kilmainham in Dublin across the Bank Holiday weekend of June 1-3 – will welcome Skepta, Danny Brown, Mura Masa, Elbow, First Aid Kit, Jon Hopkins, Paul Kalkbrenner, Maribou State, Mall Grab, Daniel Avery, Polo & Pan, Homeshake, Ross from Friends and Saint Sister. More acts are to be announced. Day and weekend tickets go on sale at 9am on Thursday.
To celebrate our collective itchy feet awaiting the onset of socially acceptable daytime drinking, half-arsed cracker pulling and hastily-concocted post-pub sandwiches, here’s our annual Semi-Alternative Christmas Playlist – featuring everyone from Yo La Tengo, Big Star and Mazzy Star to The Fall, Mark Kozelek and Deerhoof.
Janelle Monáe will play the Summer Series in Dublin on July 3, 2019. Monáe – who released one of the albums of 2018, Dirty Computer, back in April – is the latest act to be announced for the annual Trinty College gig series. New Order and Paul Weller have also recently been announced to play. Tickets for the show cost €54.65 and go on sale on Friday, December 14.
“What the fuck is up Dublin?” screams Luka Palm, as he takes to the stage of The Academy an hour later than expected. The young Dublin rapper carries himself with a boyish swagger, as he marches up and down the stage, with cartoonish intro music blaring in the background. There is certainly a buzz in the air as the show begins, but with that comes an air of uncertainty. Palm has been doing the round on the Irish and UK circuit with his SoftBoy label-mates over the last year, but has not released much music. The audience are unfamiliar with…
Back in January, we featured Kerry experimental folk artist Ronan Kealy AKA Junior Brother as one of our ones to watch in 2018. From making his mark at Electric Picnic, Metropolis, Other Voices and elsewhere, to being lined up for a spin on Cillian Murphy’s BBC 6Music show on December 23, he has made good on the promise and then some Sealing the deal on a very busy year – one that was spun into motion via last year’s ‘Hungover at Mass‘ – is the serene and singular ‘The Back of Her’. It’s a wistful and unravelling heart-stung paean that distils the essence of Kealy’s craft to…