• Women’s Work 2017

    April 15, 2017 - By 

    With its inaugural outing last year proving a resounding success, Belfast’s Oh Yeah Music Centre will host this year’s Women’s Work Festival across May 24-29. A unique festival for the city celebrating women in music, the purpose of Women’s Work is to raise the visibility of women who are generally in the minority in music, by hosting a range of activities that are open to all genders and include showcases, gigs, special events, panels, talks, and exhibitions. This year’s programme includes over 50 acts, creatives and DJs across 6 dedicated days, with additional content across the whole month of May. Up to 30…

  • Record Store Day 2017: Irish Round-Up

    April 15, 2017 - By 

    Doubled up as its tenth annual outing, Record Store Day takes place this Saturday, Saturday 22. As ever, record stores the length and breadth of the country will be marking the occasion in different ways. Here’s our run-down of where to be this Saturday, from 8am right up until the end of the after-party. Dublin Spindizzy Records As some new standalone titles, Spindizzy on South Great George’s Street will stock up to three-quarters of this year’s RSD titles in limited quantities. Opening at 8am especially for the day (with access from the Drury St. entrance) the store will also host Spindizzy and friends…

  • The Sad Gals Club Launch

    April 15, 2017 - By 

    A brand new regular event featuring female DJs spinning the best chill, downtempo music from the realms of electronic music, indie rock and much more, the first ever Sad Gals Club will take place at Gulpd Cafe in Triskel Arts Centre, Cork on Sunday, April 16. Running from 4pm-8pm the club – hosted by the most excellent Kelly Doherty – will welcome Lisa O’Flynn and Aisling O’Riordan of Southern Hospitality Board, Dublin Digital Radio and more. We can’t think of a better way to spend Easter Sunday afternoon. Get on down from 4pm.

  • Preview: An Act of War – TANK at the MAC

    April 14, 2017 - By 

    In 1965, an American scientist lived with a dolphin for ten weeks to try and teach him to speak English as part of a NASA-funded research project into human-animal communication. Condemned as an elaborate circus trick, these lessons remain a controversial episode in the space race between the two Cold War superpowers. The critically-acclaimed, Fringe First award-winning TANK rips this history apart to explore the difficulties of bridging cultural divides, the politics behind the stories we tell and what happens when you inject a dolphin with LSD. Ahead of its two-night residency at Belfast’s the MAC across April 20-21, Brian Coney talks…

  • Album Premiere: Percolator – Sestra

    April 13, 2017 - By 

    Last month we had the honour of premiering ‘Crab Supernova’ by new-fangled Dublin maestros Percolator, a band we said “conjured a thick miasma of ‘gazey Kosmiche textures and Motorik groove” over their debut single’s four off minutes. Today we’re very pleased to go one further with this first listen of the band’s exceptional full-length debut album, Sestra. Set for official release tomorrow, the eight-track release is a masterclass in filtering the band’s through their own brand of at times woozy, at others brilliantly breakneck hybrid of Krautrock locked patterns and submerged psych-pop. This is confident, carefully-crafted music, betraying a real respect of the…

  • Watch: Le Galaxie – Pleasure

    April 12, 2017 - By 

    Le Galaxie have always been good for a music video that capture the heart and soul of their craft. Following on the heels of ‘Le Club’ and ‘Love System’ from last year, the Michael Pope-fronted quartet’s latest single, ‘Pleasure’ (featuring the tones of Fight Likes Apes’ certifiably deadly MayKay) now comes with its own rather colourful visual accompaniment. Combining light and kinesis, darkness and subtle dance, paint and confetti, the video – which you can watch below – was directed by Sam Hooper. ‘Pleasure’ is out on April 21 via Reckless Records.

  • Stream: Ciaran Lavery – New Partner (Bonnie Prince Billy Cover)

    April 12, 2017 - By 

    With Record Store Day 2017 next Saturday fast approaching, Aghagallon artist Ciaran Lavery is primed to to release his own contribution in the form of A King at Night, an EP featuring covers of Bonnie “Prince” Billy songs. The lead single from that, ‘New Partner’ – which featured on BPB AKA Will Oldham’s 1995 album as Palace Music, Viva Last Blues – makes for an exquisite, wonderfully reflective rendition, where swooning streaks of string, lush harmonies and Lavery’s impeccable vocal delivery marry in very impressive fashion.

  • Another Love Story Reveal Initial Line-Up

    April 12, 2017 - By 

    Easily our favourite small Irish summer festival, Another Love Story returns to the sublime Killyon Manor in Co. Meath from Friday August 18 to Sunday, August 20. With more acts set to unveiled, organisers Happenings and Homebeat have revealed their initial line-up of live acts and DJs including Katie Kim, Overhead The Albatross, JFDR, This Is How We Fly, I Am The Cosmos, Bantum, ELLLL (pictured), The Another Love Story Soundsystem, Bodytonic DJS, The Thin Air DJs, a very special guest and much more. Here’s the initial line-up in full: Due to unprecedented early demand, the festival is current on its last tier of…

  • Stream: Pat Dam Smyth – Juliette

    April 12, 2017 - By 

    Ask a selection of the country’s most well-regarded and successful singer-songwriters who their own favourite Irish songsmith is and there’s a very strong chance that Pat Dam Smyth will crop up. An artist whose candour, lyricism and musicianship leaves affectation and hubris at the door, his long-awaited new single ‘Juliette’ is a masterfully mournful cut, concisely relaying the tale of a woman attempting to escape an abusive relationship. Cut from the same cloth of Nick Cave and John Grant, the full-band effort also conjures Dark Side-era Pink Floyd in its braying brass and portentous, swaggering pop élan. The first single to be taken from…