• A Brief History of Post-Rock

    August 14, 2014 - By 

    Of the countless genre names that describe modern music, post-rock is probably the vaguest of those widely used. Open to generalisation, uncertainty and blind exaggeration, it has no commonly accepted definition and many acts including Tortoise and Mogwai have distanced themselves from the term. That said, much like postmodernism or the avant-garde, there remains a general consensus about the development and essential traits central to this most ambiguous of labels, currently used to describe the likes of This Will Destroy You, Mono and our very own Adebisi Shank, And So I Watch You From Afar, etc. Brian Coney attempts to trace…

  • Festival Mixtape: Hard Working Class Heroes 2014

    August 14, 2014 - By 

    Yesterday, 100+ acts were announced to playing Hard Working Class Heroes, hands down the country’s finest annual showcase of emerging, independent, homegrown talent. Spanning dozens of genres, the festival – taking place across Dublin from October 2-4 – is set to be a downright unmissable three-day event. Check out our twenty-track, decidedly eclectic Festival Mixtape for HWCH below via Spotify.

  • Bangor set for Open House Festival Culture Day

    August 13, 2014 - By 

    A main fixture of this year’s Open House Festival, the streets of Bangor will be transformed into a bustling hub of happenings and creative activity for Culture Day on Saturday, August 23. Celebrating the wealth of creative talent of the town, buskers, skateboarders, poets, potterers, dancers and dramatists will see every corner of the Co. Down seaside resort come alive with an eruption of sound, movement and colour. Speaking of Culture Day 2014, Open House Festival Director, Kieran Gilmore said, “It’s a well-known fact that Bangor folk are a talented breed. Over the years the town has produced an abundance…

  • “We Are…” by Diarmuid Kennedy

    August 13, 2014 - By 

    Whether you’ve encountered him or not – and chances are many of you have – self-professed “unprofessional photographer” Diarmuid Kennedy has been a veritable fly-on-the-wall of Belfast music over the last couple of years. A masterfully discreet operator, he is often one of a small handful at people to brave line-ups of all-but anonymous debutantes and furtive young musicians; his photography – just like his work capturing bigger, more established local bills – providing a priceless insight into an ever-evolving, somewhat maligned but, for the most part, consistently impressive music scene. Sitting outside the Pavilion Bar on Ormeau Road – a venue in which the photographer has shot innumerable up-and-coming bands…

  • Stream: MOLARBEAR – Fierce Brosnan

    August 13, 2014 - By 

    Comprised of members of Jackalfeud and the Big Grizzly, Belfast-based five-piece MOLARBEAR have released their debut single, ‘Fierce Brosnan’. The track – clocking in at a rampant two and a half minutes – was recorded and mixed at Bearcat Studios and conjures the likes of Hawk Eyes, early Mastodon and fellow Belfastians Comply or Die. Stream the track via Bandcamp below. Fierce Brosnan by Molarbear

  • Hard Working Class Heroes line-up announced

    August 13, 2014 - By 

    With over 500 bands having applied, the line-up for this year’s Hard Working Class Heroes festival has been announced. Having showcased some of the country’s finest breakthrough talent over the years – everyone from Hozier to Villagers – the line-up for this year is as follows: A Lazarus Soul / Acrobat / Affleck / Arborist / Atriums / Benihana / Benny smiles / Brian Casey / Buffalo Sunn / Buffalo Woman / Carriages / Carried By Waves / Cfit / Ciaran Lavery / Cloud Castle Lake / Clu / Codai / Color // Sound / Columbia Mills / Conor Walsh…

  • Festival Mixtape: Belsonic 2014

    August 13, 2014 - By 

    An annual fixture at Belfast’s Custom House Square, this year’s Belsonic – running from Friday, August 15 to Friday, August 22 this year – boasts some extremely big hitters. Whether you look to the likes of Nile Rodger’s Chic, Biffy Clyro or Queens of the Stone Age, globetrotting, genre-defining stadium-fillers are very much the order – with some select up-and-coming support acts thrown in for good measure. Check out the full line-up and buy tickets here. Stream our Festival Mixtape for Belsonic 2014 – featuring all fourteen confirmed acts – below.

  • Album stream: SlowPlaceLikeHome – Romola

    August 12, 2014 - By 

    Ahead of headlining the next installment of our gig/club night No Tomorrow, self-proclaimed “cosmic forest-dweller”/Donegal electronic artist Keith Mannion AKA SlowPlaceLikeHome has released his new album, Romola. And it’s very, very good. With our full-length verdict to come later in the week, the ten-track album was written, performed, recorded, mixed and produced by Mannion in Donegal’s Knather Woods. Go here to read our recent interview with Mannion, here for the Facebook event page for the No Tomorrow show (at Belfast’s Voodoo on Saturday, November 6 – also featuring Somadrone and Documenta DJS) and stream Romola via Bandcamp below. Romola by SlowPlaceLikeHome

  • Jabberwocky Festival cancelled

    August 12, 2014 - By 

    All Tomorrow’s Parties have announced that Jabberwocky festival, set to take place this weekend, has been cancelled. Neutral Milk Hotel (above) James Blake, Darkside, Caribou and more were set to perform at the two-day London event. In a post on their Facebook page, ATP founder Barry Hogan wrote “It is with deep sadness we regret to inform everyone that as of today Tuesday 12th August 2014, ATP is being forced into cancelling this weekend’s Jabberwocky festival. Refunds will be available to all customers at the point of purchase. We have put everything into promoting Jabberwocky, and despite healthy ticket sales;…

  • Stendhal Festival of Art 2014

    August 10, 2014 - By 

    Make no bones about it: the Glasgowbury-shaped hole in the Northern Irish summer festival calendar is indeed a sizable one. But as is equally apparent to those of us in eager search of its successor, it’s all very much a case of one door closes, another door opens. Teetering right on the precipice of ascending to the enviable rank of Northern Ireland’s singular unmissable two-day music and arts festival, Stendhal Festival of Art, with its glorious rural expanse and wonderfully kaleidoscopic eclecticism, is set to do just that this weekend. Here’s how things went down. Held on the barley-bordered fields of Ballymully Farm…