• Q+A: Spires That in the Sunset Rise

    September 11, 2015 - By 

    Psych-folk exponents Spires that in the Sunset Rise have been on the road and in various configurations for the better part of fifteen years. Next week, they’ll be hitting Ireland for only their second excursion here in that time, touring new record ‘Beasts in the Garden’. TTA caught up with one half of the duo, Taralie Peterson, and talked albums, labels and touring… You came together musically over ten years ago, after growing up together in Decatur, IL. Can you tell us about growing up together and how that played into your becoming musicians? Growing up in D-town greatly influenced…

  • Premiere: The Shaker Hymn – Trophy Child

    September 8, 2015 - By 

    The term “millennials” has come in for much overuse from quarters that don’t seem to have much exposure to the current millennium, much less its subjects. Enter Cork quartet The Shaker Hymn, with their second album in two years, leading off with an extended rail against the pitfalls and pratfalls of the term. It’s a raucous rocker, armed with fuzz and invested with the psych-pop charm currently permeating the city’s musical cracks, with production from foremost psych exponent Brendan Fennessy (O Emperor), and serves as a taster for self-released album ‘Do You Think You’re Clever?’, due early 2016. Get a listen…

  • Sounds from a Safe Harbour: Five to Watch

    September 2, 2015 - By 

    While Sounds from a Safe Harbour brings many high-profile and international acts to Cork City as part of a wide-ranging ticket, the real gems of the festival lie in the presence on the bill of some of the city and country’s independent bands and artists, once again mostly placed on a “music trail” as a secondary attraction (see also: MTV “hitting” Cork). Never fear, though: TTA’s got you covered with a look of some of the ones to watch. All events listed here are free. Rusangano Family: Friday 18 September @ The Bodega Formerly known by their individual names of…

  • Noise in the Signal: How IASCA’s New Submission System Hurts Independent Music

    August 24, 2015 - By 

    This past week, music rights association IASCA triumphantly announced its deal with online content delivery specialists Yangaroo, to adapt their radio submission system for Ireland. This was sold as a triumph for Irish independent music, as now there will apparently be a more direct path to station heads’ ears via their streamlined system, and apparently, as a result, more scope for radio play. A nice idea, but one that leaves more questions than answers. COSTS: At present, it costs nothing to bung together a .WAV with a press release and a few .JPGs to send off to various D.J.s and…

  • This Morning is a Dream to Me: The Return of Giveamanakick

    August 19, 2015 - By 

    Rare are the musical reunions that can fill a person’s heart up. Evoke feelings of nostalgia? Yes. The warm and fuzzies are the basis of the major labels’ bottom line these days. Tie in with a time and place in a person’s life? Yes. Absolutely. But to truly unwrap those layers of cynicism and break a smile across the face from within? Deep within? Now, there’s a feat. Limerick two-piece Giveamanakick emerged in 2002 and immediately set about wrecking heads with debut long-player is it ok to be loud, jesus?, the maiden label voyage of the city’s flagship independent label,…

  • Chelsea Wolfe – Abyss

    August 19, 2015 - By 

    Treacle-thick tones and monolithic riffing set the tone immediately for Chelsea Wolfe’s latest excursion, Abyss. Long a much-fancied purveyor of doomy, layered heaviness, the record’s title is apt to say the least. ‘Carrion Flowers’ trudges along, industrial tinges emerging here and there in clatterslap percussion as Wolfe’s sultry voice blushes the whole thing with a beautiful fatalism, her range equally as enviable as her depth and strength as an artist. The mechanics of the record maintain consistency throughout, alternating between gentle, damned balladry, and guttural sludge in the likes of ‘Iron Moon’. ‘Dragged Out’s’ looping, keening highnotes invest a detached,…

  • Premiere: Love Addict – Script for a Man EP + ‘Craving a JPEG’ Video

    July 30, 2015 - By 

    Irish emigre Shane Harrington, formerly of Limrock math-punks We Come in Pieces, has been keeping himself busy since heading to New York a few years back. Aside from math band A Year and Change and solo electronic project OST, he’s been brooding on noise side-project Love Addict. It pulls precisely zero punches. Self-recorded and self-performed, it draws on a rich vein of sludge and math-rock angularity. Love Addict is the noise-rock experiment of New York based musician Shane Harrington (OST, A Year And Change, We Come In Pieces). Script For A Man was recorded, mixed and performed by Shane in its…

  • Refused – Freedom

    July 17, 2015 - By 

    Refused are fucking alive. Or so we’re told. One of the most powerful, vital and cathartic hardcore bands of the nineties, the Swedish four-piece created an unmatched legacy by blazing a trail of fearless musical fusion, incandescendent agitprop and a vast palette of cultural influences and reference points, from fine art to the New Romantics, as best encapsulated in seminal album ‘The Shape of Punk to Come’. Then, at the height of their potency and white-hot rage, they disbanded in a storm of shit and failure, and instructed press outlets to delete reviews, promo pics on file, etc. It was…

  • Watch: GODHATESDISCO – Incredible Technology

    July 6, 2015 - By 

    A mechanical, foreboding procession into tremulous reverb and possessed of foreboding, post-punk pace, GODHATESDISCO‘s new single ‘Incredible Technology’ walks a thin line between Krautrock restraint and post-punk alienation. Never will this be better represented than in the accompanying video, just released. A veritable option paralysis of found footage, rhetoric and stock film, all overlaid and bleeding into each other, it perfectly mirrors the song’s descent from signal to drained-out noise, a commentary on the prevalence of tech. GODHATESDISCO releases new LP ‘Great Radio’ on July 24th via Little Gem Records.

  • Premiere: Galants – This is Heaven

    July 6, 2015 - By 

    Recalling heavily the reverb-soaked bombast of the Creation Records roster, GALANTS, the brainchild of Dublin man David Kennedy, have unveiled the first part of a triptych of summer singles in the washed-out tumult of ‘This is Heaven’, a hefty beast of a broadside that sets the tone nicely for their upcoming output. Featuring artwork by Barry White, the new single comes at the start of a spate of Irish dates, including the Workman’s in Dublin on August 2nd, and on the 8th at Cyprus Avenue in Cork, in support of local indie-pop power-trio HAGS. Stream the new single exclusively in the…