• Irish tracks of the week – October 22nd

    October 22, 2021 - By 

    If you can believe it, it’s Friday again, and there’s a fresh round-up of the very best in brand new Irish music to dig into, featuring MuRli, Gemma Dunleavy x2, Junior Brother, windings, The Altered Hours, Melts, New Pagans and more MuRli w/ Gemma Dunleavy – Odyssey windings – Apocryphal Apocryphal by windings Junior Brother – Life’s New Haircut Life’s New Haircut by Junior Brother Group Zero – Everyone’s Already Come Apart Everyone’s Already Come Apart by Group Zero The Altered Hours – Thistle Convertible by The Altered Hours New Pagans – Find Fault With Me MELTS – Maelstrom Leveland…

  • Irish Tracks of the Week – 27th August

    August 27, 2021 - By 

    It’s been another great week for new releases in every corner of the island. Delve into the best of the lot, featuring JYellowL, Ciaran Lavery, Jennifer Moore, Claire Guerin & Eamon Ivri, Leo Miyagee, Emperor of Ice Cream and more.   JYellowL – See Me Finish Ciaran Lavery & Soft Sports – Happiness EP Jennifer Moore – Channels Of Time Channels of Time by Jennifer Moore Claire Guerin & Eamon Ivri – Entropy ​​Entropy by Claire Guerin & Eamon Ivri Emperor of Ice Cream – Weather Vane Weather Vane single by Emperor of Ice Cream Leo Miyagee – Act III…

  • Eimear Reidy and Natalia Beylis – Whose Woods These Are

    July 6, 2021 - By 

    If day trip destinations and social media posts are accepted as a metric, most Irish people view forests as a good thing. But excepting the few lucky enough to live beside one, they are largely a box to tick on the summer to-do list. While beloved for their soul-refreshing qualities, much of the population does not have an everyday relationship with them. This is not surprising, given that government mismanagement has made the arboreal a remote presence. Ireland has the least woodland of any country in Europe, a miserable 11% coverage compared to an European average over 40%. Such disheartening…

  • Irish Tracks of the Week – May 21

    May 21, 2021 - By 

    It’s been another big week for new Irish music, with tracks and albums coming from all over the country from emerging artists and established favourites. Dig into new releases from Maria Kelly, Kojaque, Strange Boy, Elephant, NUXSENSE, VerseChorusVerse, Biig Piig, Toasted Heretic and more. Maria Kelly – eight hours Kojaque – Wickid Tongues Strange Boy – Prayers NUXSENSE – A sacred journey through the golden path A sacred journey through the golden path by NUXSENSE Rory Sweeney X Emby – Two Faces Cherym – Listening To My Head Hex Hue – Aquiver VerseChorusVerse – what if we won what if…

  • Acid Granny announce series of “Radio Paddy” releases

    March 15, 2021 - By 

    Acid Granny, the trolly-toting dealers of improvised electronic punk and abstract audio art, have something new in store for the week of St Patrick’s Day: a fake “Paddy-centric” radio station.  Radio Paddy, which will be released episodically throughout the week, is a frequency scrambling pseudo-celebration of “Irishness” at its most self-referential and insincere. Across three 10-30 minute instalments, the crew stitches together music and spoken segments from a countrywide cast of contributors, flipping Paddywhackery on its head and milking it for all its worth. The result is, in part, a tongue-in-cheek examination of the post-colonial stereotypes perpetuated by things like…

  • Video Premiere: Sean Being – Angel

    November 25, 2020 - By 

    Sean Being has shared a new single, ‘Angel’, with accompanying visuals premiering today (25th November). It marks the Dublin’ artist’s first new music since 2019’s ‘The Brikc’ tape on the reliably excellent wherethetimegoes label. ‘Angel’ pushes his experimental pop style further, with cloudy, euphoric synths, emotive vocal hooks and a crisp, lo-fi electronic rhythm coming together to produce an autumnal anthem, made for late-night walks. The video for the track, directed by Anna Heisterkamp, is appropriately tender, and makes for a beautifully atmospheric accompaniment. The track is set to appear on a new EP from Sean Being, which is set to…

  • Stream: Captain A – Dark Matter Mariner

    August 10, 2020 - By 

    Galway’s Captain A has shared his second new track of the summer, ‘Dark Matter Mariner’. The shadowy instrumental, as eerie and vast as its title suggests, follows July’s ‘Meaning Obscure’, and finds Captain A continuing his ventures away from psych rock and gnarled folk into the world of electronic music. Where 2019’s ‘Dog In The Woods’ was tender and inward-looking, ‘Dark Matter Mariner’ confronts much loftier subject matter, but with a similarly poignant sense of isolation. “It is the soundtrack to the first voyages made by humans into the realms of dark matter and dark energy,” he explains. Drifting, muffled…

  • Video premiere: Sunken Foal – Barley Stick

    March 10, 2020 - By 

    Dublin’s Sunken Foal will release his seventh album, Hexose, on April 24th. One of the most prolific producers in Ireland, the Countersunk label-founder and synthesist supreme – real name Dunk Murphy – follows 2019’s Ribbon Works and Le Doux Nord albums with a new 10-track collection of rich electronics inspired partially by “a lifelong infatuation with confectionery”. Every track on the album is named after some kind of sugar or dessert. Rich, generative melodies and syrupy atmospheres ooze all over the tracklist, while bubbling percussion keeps things energised. Throughout the album, comparisons to Laurie Spiegel, Cluster and Warp’s early bleep…

  • 10 for ’20: Rising Damp

    February 28, 2020 - By 

    In the latest installment of 10 for ’20 – our feature looking at ten Irish acts we’re sure are set to do great things in 2020 and beyond – Eoin Murray profiles genre-warping musician and visual artist Michelle Doyle aka Rising Damp. Photo by Peter O’Hanlon One of the Irish undergrowth’s most febrile live acts, Rising Damp, makes music to be shook to. We first heard her at Banger Cliff, on the Sunday of Open Ear 2019, when she played an appropriately head-scrambling live set of ravey electronic punk and EBM. The Dublin artist’s effect-soaked howls and propulsive rhythms injected…

  • Video Premiere: Gorrister – School Tour

    January 7, 2020 - By 

    Irish experimental label Unbend Leg Out returned in December with its only release of 2019, Gorrister‘s Full Almond.  Comprised of Tongue Bundle and The Barry People’s Warren Pollard and Pob, the album is a typically raucous collection of distorted bass howls, noisy kicks and jarring FX, samples and screams. It’s delightfully frenzied, and not at all for the faint of heart. Below, you can check out the video for album opener, ‘School Tour’, a screeching number that stars the LP as it means to continue. The accompanying visuals are fittingly intense and eerie. Warning: contains flashing images Listen to/buy Gorrister’s Full Almond through…