• BØRNS – Blue Madonna

    January 18, 2018 - By 

    Returning with his highly anticipated sophomore effort Blue Madonna, Michigan born Garrett Børns captures the momentum from his debut Dopamine and transforms it into a catalyst for experimentation. Gone is the typical homogeneous album setup, replaced instead with kicks and flares from a medley of instruments that spring up from the spaces that break up the noise.  Where Dopamine reclined into a suave sofa of plush electro-pop beats, Blue Madonna erratically paces across a floor of glossy, facet tiles. Opening with the relatively reserved ’God Save Our Young Blood’, BØRNS‘ pace and tone matches that of his collaborator, one Lana Del…

  • Kelela – Take Me Apart

    October 9, 2017 - By 

    Sexual freedom, power, and intelligence have long been attributes that women have been denied, unless they expect and accept a heinous label to come with the package. If a woman is sexually confident, she is only granted said trait within social realms at the risk of being labelled: wh*re. This is an even more troubling reality if such a person identifies as queer. If she’s powerful? She is labelled as controlling. Intelligent? Arrogant. Long has the patriarchy overshadowed and demeaned women and non-binary individuals, categorising them in order to maintain dominance. Kelela challenges all of this on her debut LP Take Me Apart, an alluring piece of…

  • The Pains of Being Pure At Heart – The Echo of Pleasure

    September 1, 2017 - By 

    On their fourth full length release, The Echo of Pleasure, The Pains of Being Pure At Heart have taken a sharp stab at the all consuming 80s aesthetic that has engulfed the world over recent months. It wraps itself around the guts of frontman Kip Burman’s thoughts as he patiently waits to become a father, exploring ideas of love, longing and the human experience. Waiting to become a father is a peculiar state of limbo to be in. While you count down the days, you are already living in the altered existence that comes with having a child. On this…

  • Nadine Shah – Holiday Destination

    August 29, 2017 - By 

    The past few years have seen a sizeable shift in the workings of politics and global affairs. The media is becoming more and more ‘bias’ from each side, and everyday people are forced to have some sort of stance on every event that occurs worldwide. This somewhat sudden worldwide-moral responsibility has been placed acceptingly on the shoulders of most, but for some, they refuse to acknowledge these horrific events due the fact that they are not affected directly. This peculiar bubble of self importance is targeted directly on Nadine Shah’s third record Holiday Destination as she projects her political beliefs…

  • Caroline Says – 50,000,000 Elvis Fans Can’t be Wrong

    August 7, 2017 - By 

    Growing up in Alabama, Caroline Sallee (aka Caroline Says) wasn’t within reaching distance of the formidable west coast. After college, she became a waitress in Yellowstone as an exercise in solitude and isolation, saving up to complete a journey of transfiguration along the aforementioned path. She returned to Alabama to record 50,000,000 Elvis Fans Can’t be Wrong in her parents basement, a debut album that captures the melancholic loneliness of such a journey within its nine tracks, just shy of 30 minutes. The thoughts that Caroline Says convey in this initial release are all felt in a passing manner. It’s…

  • Alt-J @ Trinity College, Dublin

    July 13, 2017 - By 

    Alt-J return to Ireland having released their latest venture RELAXER, a somewhat submerged album in it’s approach and avoidance of the charts. Despite not having mass appeal, Alt-J continue to draw a young and devoted audience, most of which can be seen at Trinity College tonight. They begin their set with lead single from relaxer, ‘3WW’, and ‘Something good’ from debut An Awesome Wave, a reserved introduction if such a thing exists. There appears to be no hesitation from the crowd in joining the perpetually swaying atmosphere created by the onstage personas however, as the typical ‘warm up period’ for…

  • Lorde – Melodrama

    June 27, 2017 - By 

    Success came to Lorde after her debut album Pure Heroine injected what every youthful spirit needed: A glorious, romanticised, cathartic portrayal of the mundane life that most face at a certain time in their life. At the age of 16 she sang about the superb bland details of life such as taking buses with “the knees pulled in” and “dreams of clean teeth” underneath a blanket of tender beats and adolescence; and from that moment the world was hooked. Lorde makes her sophomore return with Melodrama, literally. The album comes as a thematically packed release, dealing with the ever-expanding house…

  • Lost Avenue – Best Friends

    April 20, 2017 - By 

    Derry based punk trio Lost Avenue recently unveiled their new EP Best Friends, the latest in a series of small releases that punch well above everything they’ve done before. Something about the release threatens to get lost within itself, however, thrashing violently towards an uncertain conclusion. When listening to Best Friends, it’s hard not to get the impression that the band are aiming for something that is certainly achievable, but they’ve overcooked it, using sharp conversions and sudden alterations to an unnecessarily degree. This is likely due to some combination of self-doubt and the need to appear unique in an industry where…

  • Sorority Noise – You’re Not As ___ As You Think

    March 20, 2017 - By 

    Like it or not, emo music has been revived. Acts like Julien Baker, American Football and Modern Baseball have gained enough scope to evolve and define what emo music is and what it aims to achieve, and while defining what is classed as emo music is an entirely different kettle of fish, it’s fair to say that associating it with long black fringes and pubescent frustrations is something of the past. On You’re not as ____as you think, their third album , Sorority Noise dive into the depths of depression and death and the ways of coping with them, firmly planting…

  • Julien Baker – Sprained Ankle

    March 17, 2017 - By 

    Julien Baker’s debut album Sprained Ankle lures us in with a curiously intimate complexion; it almost feels too intimate to be listened to casually, as if we’re flicking through the most private parts of Baker’s life, gazing in empathetic awe without even introducing ourselves. It’s a one way conversation with stark, personal subject matters such as relationship anxiety, depression, religion and death, and all we can do is listen. Sprained Ankle was originally released in 2015, but is now being reissued on Matador. It’s hard to comprehend that the album is a year and a half old given that nothing…