• Preview: Robocobra Quartet & Meltybrains? @ Black Box, Belfast

    May 6, 2019 - By 

    Two of the island’s most unclassifiable and artistically uncompromising – not to mention finest live acts – are set to play a double-headliner at Belfast’s Black Box on Friday, May 17 in what looks to be a contender for Irish Gig Of The Year. Proudly co-presented by Moving On Music and yours truly, it’s the first hometown headline show of the year for Robocobra Quartet, and the first Northern show in years for experimental  Meltybrains?. Perpetually a band of contradictions, we’ve long been one of Robocobra Quartet’s most ardent voices of praise. Their string of EPs and NI Music Prize-nominated pair of LPs – 2016 debut Music For All Occasions and Plays…

  • Naoise Roo Set To Return With Night of Music, Art, Theatre & Spoken Word

    April 12, 2019 - By 

    Long one of our favourite songwriters & artists on the island, Naoise Roo has been on an extended hiatus for the last couple of years. Thankfully, she’s just announced her return EP, Sick Girlfriend, and is set to hold her first show in a number of years at Dublin’s Project Arts Centre on May 4. The show will serve as a preview of the EP, with Sick Girlfriend‘s four tracks centred around themes of depression, the negative aspects of the music industry, and the stereotypes that burden women experiencing mental illness. Roo will be joined by producer/bassist Daniel Fox of Girl Band, as well as drummer Rian Trench, guitarist Karl Tobin and…

  • Tower Records: Record Store Day 2019

    April 4, 2019 - By 

    As with every year in recent memory, Dublin’s Tower Records is marking this year’s Record Store Day on Saturday, April 13 in style. This year, the store – Ireland’s largest independent record shop – is marking the occasion with a week-long celebration, with countless records, old and new, being sold with a massive price reduction. You can check out what’s on the cards this year right here. Majorly reduced, first-rate wax aside, the store will also host exclusive in-stores from three Irish acts across the week: All Tvvins launch their new album, Just To Exist, on April 12th at 1pm…

  • Dublin Is Sound

    April 3, 2019 - By 

    On Saturday, April 13th – Record Store Day 2019 – Dublin’s The Grand Social will play host the inaugural Dublin Is Sound. Co-hosted by Nialler9 and Seven Quarters, the +14s daytime gig will present a genre-spanning bill of four of country’s best acts: Pillow Queens, Squarehead (pictured), God Knows from Rusangano Family and Tebi Rex. Advance ticket buyers will receive a limited edition 12″ vinyl record on the day featuring tracks from the acts. The vinyl is pressed in the city by Dublin Vinyl with specially-designed artwork by Dublin based designer Ruan Van Vliet in response to the music. Doors…

  • A4 Sounds presents: Silverbacks & Extravision

    April 2, 2019 - By 

    Since 2009, Dublin hub A4 has went above and beyond in their mission to transform the means by which cultural works are produced, accessed, and understood in Ireland. Their latest initiative – a new bi-monthly gig night – is one that we’re fully behind. Curated by Matt Hedigan, an artist and member of Hands Up Who Wants To Die, No Spill Blood and Elk, the next installment of the series unites two of our very favourite fast-rising bands from Dublin on Friday, April 5th: Silverbacks and Extravision  It’s BYOB and runs from 8-11pm. Go here for the gig’s Facebook event page and check…

  • Girls Rock Dublin Announce 2019 Camp

    April 3, 2019 - By 

    Following the success of the past two years, Girls Rock Dublin has announced the return of its summer camp for 12-17 year olds. Set to take place over the last week of June, from 25th-29th, the camp has taken great care in ensuring more inclusivity than ever before. There are spaces for 20 (cis & trans) girls and gender non-binary folks, with half of this number designated as scholarships to applicants from Direct Provision and low-income households. Over the five days, twenty applicants will form a band, learn an instrument, write a song & perform onstage by the end, with no previous…

  • A One-Off Event Will Explore the Weird & Wonderful Work of Irish Video Director Bob Gallagher

    March 20, 2019 - By 

    If you’re in any way au fait with the likes of Girl Band, Villagers, SOAK, Pillow Queens, Saint Sister and Myles Manley, you’ll be at least familiar with the name Bob Gallagher. Over the last few years, the director and cinematographer has emerged as a force to be reckoned with in the world of Irish video direction On April 18, Dublin’s Button Factory will play host to Under My Garage. It’s an evening of discussion, music and live visuals that will explore Gallagher’s work by inviting attendees on a “journey through his subconscious, transforming the Button Factory into the set of a…

  • Preview: Brian Irvine Ensemble @ Brilliant Corners Jazz Festival

    March 5, 2019 - By 

    It was at last year’s Brilliant Corners when the Brian Irvine Ensemble ended their 6-year hiatus, and for good reason. Irvine cuts a singular figure not just in Northern Irish music, but worldwide, as one who embodies the spirit of the perpetually open-minded Brilliant Corners and all that jazz music encompasses, by pushing ever forward, with only a slight glance at anything that preceded.  The ensemble comprises around a dozen in number, drawn from varying backgrounds of contemporary classical, jazz & improvised music in Europe & Russia. As with many of artists comprising the Brilliant Corners 2019 lineup, their performances give themselves entirely over to neither formless improvisation…

  • Preview: Izumi Kimura @ The Black Box Green Room, Sunday March 3

    March 1, 2019 - By 

    Brilliant Corners, as we’ve said before, is “the finest patchwork of jazz & sonic digression that Belfast has to offer”, and, in its seventh year, has pulled out all the stops to make this another memorable piece of scheduling. It officially kicks off tomorrow with Ulster Youth Jazz Orchestra & The Comet Is Coming – the latter of which is sold out – and we’ll be highlighting some of the events on offer throughout its run from March 2-9. Firstly, we have contemporary pianist Izumi Kimura, who plays an afternoon show this Sunday in the intimate Black Box Green Room. Her liminal craft is one of nuance, subtlety and precipitous…

  • Brilliant Corners Announce 2019 Programme

    January 30, 2019 - By 

    Now in its seventh year, the tastemakers at Moving On Music have announced the programme for their annual highlight – and the country’s finest jazz festival – Brilliant Corners. The festival will take over various venues in Belfast across March 2-9, with a kickoff solo piano concert from Craig Taborn at SARC’s Sonic Lab on Saturday, February 16. As expected, it’s a wonderfully diverse patchwork of jazz and first-rate sonic digression in the spirit of MOM’s booking the year round. It’s appropriate then, that the two first-night offerings on March 2 are the Ulster Youth Jazz Orchestra Shabaka Hutchings’ unmissable apocalyptic synth-jazz project The Comet Is Coming, supported by…