Just over a year on from the release of the stellar Dreaming Tracks, Belfast threesome Sea Pinks have re-emerged with new single, ‘Depth of Field’. Yet another masterfully sanguine slice of melancholia from the Neil Brogan-fronted band, the track – relating ambivalence and doubt in ways they mastered many moons ago – is the first taste of what to expect from their forthcoming new album, Soft Days, which is set for release in January via CF Records.
An all but medicinal annual distraction from the January blues, Belfast’s Out To Lunch have revealed the first wave of acts to grace their eleventh outing at the start of next year. Including Conor O’Brien’s Villagers at the Mac, a book reading from Isy Suttie at the Black Box, an adaptation of Steinbeck classic Of Mice and Men, comedy from Sarah Kendall and shows from the likes of Beardyman, East India Youth, Jim ‘The King’ Brown and Aoife O’Donovan, this year’s bill is already shaping up very nicely indeed. Check out the full Early Bird line-up and secure tickets here.
Released via London’s Kinnego records, Belfast producer Connor Dougan AKA Defcon has woven some real magic on his new, three-track EP, Reach Out. According to his Bandcamp page, Dougan has “taken the lesser-travelled route of low-key experimentation and refinement, and has arrived at something unique, informed by leftfield hiphop and crate-digging, but also modern dub trickery and bass weight.” Check out our review of the EP in the October issue of our magazine online here. Reach Out by Defcon
From Wolf Alice, Slaves and Jamie XX to Ghostpoet, Aphex Twin and our very own SOAK, the 2015 Mercury prize shortlist is a typically diverse affair once more this year. With this year’s prize held in association with BBC Music, the winner will be announced on Friday, November 20. Our money’s on Jamie XX but, of course, we’d be delighted to see SOAK take it. In the meantime, check out our Mercury Music Prize 2015 playlist below.
Forming from the ashes of Yes Cadets, ‘Dreamer to the Dawn’ by Belfast five-piece Pleasure Beach bears the urgent hallmarks of the likes of overlords Arcade Fire, The National and The War on Drugs. The follow-up to their very well-received debut single ‘Go’ (which we featured here) the band’s new single is a streamlined slice of zealous electro-pop. If Springsteen snuck into Beach House’s studio circa the recording of Teen Dream and magic came to pass, this would surely resemble the result. ‘Dreamer to The Dawn’ is taken from the band’s debut EP of the same name, which will be released via…
Dublin duo Anna Doran and Conan Wynne AKA Contour have always kept us on our toes here at TTA, steadily releasing material that constantly seems to be growing more and more inimitable and suggestive of big things in the pipeline. Lifted from their Champion Sound-released EP Blessed With Weird Things, the pair’s Paul Mahon-directed video for new single ‘Paradise Lost’ is an ambitious, experimental audiovisual milestone on their journey to date.
Already an essential proposition across November 7 and 8, the inaugural Metropolis festival in Dublin will boast another, self-proclaimed “unrivalled” element: Arcadia Spectacular. The first in what’s set to be a series of art installation announcements for the festival at the grounds of the RDS, the Arcadia experience unifies every element of art into a vivid sensory matrix taking in sculpture, architecture, theatre, circus, robotics, engineerings, lightning, music and cutting edge technology. Their interactive stage, titled The Afterburner is one of eight stages and spaces to be explored at Metropolis. Check out the current line-up for the music side of things…
A prophetic tale-teller and uncannily perceptive pop talisman, Dublin’s Paddy Hanna is, for us, something of a sub-genre unto himself. A key exponent of Paddyhannaism, week by week, his talents become yet more apparent, not least during a string of dates across the country recently that have coalesced as some kind of Good Word of Irish music and testament to a burgeoning appreciation of an artist who emanates an air of resolution. Taken from the forthcoming two-track EP of the same name – set for release on December 4 – ‘Underprotected’ is another superb statement of intent, coursing and balanced with feverish fragility and…
Currently over in the States playing some shows for CMJ, Dublin quartet Cloud Castle Lake have long been one of the country’s more idiosyncratic and consistently innovatory acts. Having teamed up with Dublin-based collective This Greedy Pig, the band have unveiled the video for ‘Genuflect’, a seven-minute capturing the latest – nigh on beatific – stage of the band’s forever forward-thinking evolution. Tapping into something profound across its sleep and release, the track fuses Mingus-esque brass with totemic percussion, effects-soaked guitar, lead-like bass work and Daniel McAuley’s ever impressive, range-defying vocal acrobatics. If you’re in NYC, don’t miss them at Routh Trade on Saturday…
Having played Dublin’s Workman’s Club last month, baroque pop prince and Dutch producer/multi-instrumentalist Jacco Gardner chats to Brian Coney about his new album, Hypnophobia, the imprint of cinema on his music and the luxury of recording completely on his own terms. Hi Jacco. You released the wonderful Hypnophobia (the “excessive fear of deep sleep” I’ve just learned) back in May. Before touching on the recording and songwriting, what’s the significance being the title of the release? When I saw the word for the first time I immediately felt some connection. For me it’s a way of describing the unknown territory…