• James Yorkston – The Route to the Harmonium

    March 28, 2019 - By 

    It’s been five long years since Scottish folk singer James Yorkston’s last solo album – 2014’s The Cellardyke Recording and Wassailing Society – though he’s certainly not been resting on his laurels in that time. As well as turning novelist and podcaster (spinning esoteric tunes on ‘46-30’), he’s put out two highly acclaimed albums in quick succession with his new trio, Yorkston/Thorne/Khan – a sort of folk-fusion collaboration with his regular double bass player Jon Thorne and Indian sarangi player Suhail Khan (a third album is already recorded and ready for release early next year). All the while, though, he’s…

  • The Redneck Manifesto – The How

    December 11, 2018 - By 

    The Redneck Manifesto may not be a household name, but their influence on modern Irish music cannot be understated. Their initial run of releases in the early 2000s, falling somewhere in that uncategorisable gap between post-rock and math-rock, helped to pave the way for the abnormally large influx of instrumental guitar bands on this island. Bands like Adebisi Shank and Enemies bore their influence and long sang their praises, while across the Irish sea, even now-global superstars Foals reportedly worshipped heavily at the TRM alter in their early days, even inspiring frontman Yannis Philippakis’ choice of Travis Bean guitar. Resolutely DIY…

  • Woven Skull – Woven Skull

    December 3, 2018 - By 

    The latest Woven Skull record may be self-titled, but it’s a long way off being their debut. One glance at their Bandcamp page shows just how impressively prolific they’ve been over the past decade, with all manner of singles, EPs, albums and collaborations of improvisational drone-folk creeping out of their Leitrim base. And that’s not to mention the various solo and side projects the group – original trio Natalia Beylis, Aonghus McEvoy and Willie Stewart, along with more recent addition Ailbhe Nic Oireachtaigh of Cian Nugent & The Cosmos – manage to keep on the go as well. If giving…

  • Thom Yorke – Suspiria (Music for the Luca Guadagnino Film)

    November 15, 2018 - By 

    With the increasingly long gaps between Radiohead albums in their latter years, three of the band’s members so far have managed to put this downtime to good use exploring their own projects on the side. And for a band so heavily focused on sounds and texture, it’s no surprise that all three of them have found themselves drawn to soundtrack work in one way or another – most notably Jonny Greenwood, whose string of collaborations with Paul Thomas Anderson this year earned him an Oscar nomination for Phantom Thread. Drummer Philip Selway too, having reinvented himself as a hushed folk…

  • Ty Segall – Fudge Sandwich

    November 8, 2018 - By 

    Garage rock institution Ty Segall has always been insanely prolific, but in 2018 he’s taken things to extremes. So far he’s put out expansive double album Freedom’s Goblin, a long awaited second collaboration with White Fence and a second record from side project GØGGS. Now we can add to that an album of covers in Fudge Sandwich, but news has also surfaced of an ultra-limited cassette called Orange Rainbow distributed at a recent art exhibition, and a new side project with wife Denée called The C.I.A. with an album due out in December. Exhausting stuff, but back to Fudge Sandwich for…

  • Documenta – Lady With The Ring

    October 31, 2018 - By 

    It’s a chilling story, that of a woman prematurely buried, presumed dead until awoken by a grave robber attempting to amputate her finger to make off with her valuable ring. Often attributed to early 18th century Lurgan woman Margorie McCall, her grave, pictured on the cover of this EP, does indeed state “lived once, buried twice” – though the existence of countless versions of this tale all over Europe, attributed to various different women from anywhere as early as the 14th century, does sow doubt on its veracity. Nonetheless it remains an infamous piece of local folklore, and Belfast’s finest…

  • Lisa O’Neill – Heard a Long Gone Song

    October 27, 2018 - By 

    Given Lisa O’Neill’s rising star in recent years, it’s surprising she hasn’t been snapped up by a bigger label sooner, with previous work being either self released or issued through The Frames’ Plateau Records. Having toured extensively over the last few years with the likes of Glen Hansard, James Yorkston and The Divine Comedy though, it seems pretty natural that at last the Cavan songwriter should follow fellow Irish folk luminaries Lankum onto the eminent Rough Trade label, or more accurately, Rough Trade’s brand new folk imprint River Lea, for album four. Where previous records, particularly 2013’s Same Cloth or…

  • Sea Pinks – Rockpool Blue

    October 9, 2018 - By 

    With the difficulty of making a proper living from music these days, it’s not uncommon to see the release schedules of bands on the more DIY end of the spectrum slow right down as they’re increasingly forced to balance music with work commitments and other general life admin. And yet, with the release of their seventh album a mere eight years on from their debut, Belfast’s Sea Pinks may surely by now have overtaken even Dublin’s No Monster Club for the title of Ireland’s most prolific band, and while one could be forgiven for assuming a case of quantity over…

  • Exploded View – Obey

    October 3, 2018 - By 

    Exploded View are a band on a steady ascent. Formed a few years ago in Mexico City by Welsh-born, Berlin-based Anika in order to perform songs from her 2010 solo covers album on a tour of the country, the new group’s natural chemistry lead to 2016’s eponymous debut, an album of stellar original material influenced by “Can, dub and political revolution” on the ever reliable Sacred Bones label.  Coming seemingly from  out of nowhere, the album flew a little under the radar at first, but last year’s EP Summer Came Early, with its unusually catchy, breezy title track – albeit…

  • Something Positive, Something Sincere: An Interview with Wooden Shjips

    September 6, 2018 - By 

    Ahead of shows at Belfast Empire Music Hall (Sept 17th) and Dublin’s Whelan’s (Sept 18th) Ripley Johnson of San Francisco psych alchemists Wooden Shjips talks to Cathal McBride about songwriting process, positivity and playing to “up for it” Irish audiences. It’s been a full five years since the last Wooden Shjips record. What made 2018 the right time for a return? Well, it was 2017 that we reconvened to make the record. Hard to say why, really. For me, I just got the urge to work with the guys again so proposed a simple plan for making it. The plan was…