• EP Stream: Porphyry – Ursa Minor​/​Coming Home

    July 19, 2017 - By 

    A quiet gem comes in the form of Derry songwriter Daryl Coyle’s new EP Ursa Minor​/​Coming Home.  Under the Porphyry monicker, Coyle produces a brand of psych-folk that brings to mind the likes of Midlake and Villagers but that, when least expected, veers into unexpected territory. With vocal inflections that could, at a push, summon Maynard James Keenan (Tool, A Perfect Circle), and with ambitious instrumental reaches into the more colourful expanses of prog, ambient and psych, this EP is subtly surprising and earnestly bold. Have a listen won’t you? Ursa Minor/Coming Home by Porphyry  

  • Pussy Riot Announce Dublin and Belfast Shows

    July 19, 2017 - By 

    Five years on from their highly-reported performance at Moscow’s Cathedral of Christ the Savior, Russian feminist protest punk rock group Pussy Riot have announced they will play shows in Ireland later this year. Riot Days – which accompanies band member Maria Alyokhina’s written memoir of the same name – is a show directed by Russian theatre director Yury Muravitsky that traces the story of the band’s notorious guerilla protest and what followed in the aftermath. Marrying punk, electronica, theatre, documentary footage and protest, the show will stop off at Dublin’s Button Factory on Thursday, November 23 and Belfast’s Mandela Hall…

  • Lineup Announced For Dublin Quays Festival

    July 19, 2017 - By 

    With its aim of “providing a programme of events that catches the imagination of the public, while also giving artists and emerging talent a platform to engage with along the river” Dublin Quays Festival has announced its lineup for its inaugural outing across August 17-20. Taking place in The Workmans Club, The Sound House, The Liquor Rooms, The Grand Social, The Wiley Fox, Sin E and Bagots Hutton, the free, four-day music, art and spoken word festival will host the following in the aforementioned Liffey-bordering venues: Old Hannah, Cat Dowling, Birds Of Olympus, Maria Kelly, Fiction Peaks, Kelly-Anne Byrne, Super…

  • Watch: Pillow Queens – Rats

    July 17, 2017 - By 

    Having self-released the debut EP, Calm Girls, back in December, Dublin pop-punk band Pillow Queens have been growing in momentum over the last few months. Coinciding with their first UK tour, the four-piece have unveiled the DIY video to their new single, ‘Rats’. According to the band, the video “takes place on the set of a radical left queer educational programme for children. Despite being severely underfunded and under-rehearsed the show goes on, their aim being to enlighten the youth of Ireland to the wonderful world of leftist politics. Hosted by Snotsey-May Darcy and co-hosted by resident artist Síle O’Surelook…

  • Video Premiere: CATALAN! – OKA

    July 17, 2017 - By 

    His debut solo release outside of his work with alt-punk three-piece Axis Of, ‘OKA’ by Ewen Friers AKA CATALAN! is a track that, whilst certainly redolent of the subtly anthemic and nicely bombastic alt-punk of the aforementioned North Coast outfit, explores new, socially-conscious territory. Set for release this Friday (July 21), the opening gambit is a strong, bobbing effort that tussles with indigenous history and social media, hoping to “highlight the value of living in a reality where the human mind can be invigorated and bring positive change”. Inspired by Big Country, Why?, Crass, Les Savy Fav and The Knife, it’s a first release stemming…

  • EP Stream: Jon Dots – Impossibly

    July 17, 2017 - By 

    Jon Dots is the solo music-making moniker of Dublin-based writer and musician Darragh McCabe. Also drummer with one of the city’s most compelling alt-punk bands, three-piece Alien She, McCabe has honed brilliantly imaginative, texture-warping brand of indie-pop in the form of his debut EP Impossibly. A four-track release, it marries exquisite, harmony-laden instrumentation and occasional bursts of orchestration with delicately-worded tales that hit home via McCabe’s clear knack for composition in the vein of the likes of Ed Harcourt, Rufus Wainright, Dirty Projectors, Tune-Yards and early Of Montreal. Impossibly EP by Jon Dots

  • Video Premiere: Tuath – Youth

    July 14, 2017 - By 

    Being just about the best thing in Ireland that we could call trip-hop, experimental Donegal psychers Tuath have a new single, and we’re delighted to show it for the first time. Casting an oneiric glimpse back to the years we’ve tossed away, the video is much like Tuath as a band: a ragtag affair that would have you believe everything they do is for kicks, but that belies a feeling that goes much deeper – listen and you’ll hear. ‘Youth’ is the title track from their forthcoming EP of the same name, due for release on August 15, and it echoes everything on the outer fringes from shoegaze, prog,…

  • Stream: EHCO – Raise It Up feat. Jessica Lord

    July 13, 2017 - By 

    Wicklow-based producer Eoin Whitfield has shared the first track from his new project, EHCO.  ‘Raise It Up’, a collaboration with vocalist Jessica Lord, is a crisp and bright electronic number that brings much of the same melodic nuance to the fore as Whitfield’s former band and sorely missed TTA favourites Enemies did. Given his production expertise and knack for a harmonic flourish, we’re very keen to hear plenty more from this project which, when brought to a live setting, will feature a six-piece live band.

  • EP Premiere: KILNN – KILNN

    July 12, 2017 - By 

    A release “stitched together from several late night experiments”, the self-titled debut EP from KILNN presents three bursts of darkly ambient techno that evokes the likes of Surgeon, Paula Temple and LFO at their most tenacious. Here, the pair – comprised of Rían Trench of Solar Bears and Chris Con of BUDU – have blurred the lines between dank warehouse all-nighters and back-alley futurism via a slew of atomizing beats and some brilliantly foggy ambience. With the promise of some “wild improvised hardware sets in the near future – have a first listen to the EP (which is self-released and will be…

  • Video Premiere: Bodies – I’m Waiting

    July 11, 2017 - By 

    The solo project of Dublin’s David Anthony McGeown AKA Bodies was last on our radar back in November with his debut single ‘Nightmoves’ – an opening gambit we premiered and thought was “right up there with the most curious and captivating debut singles from an Irish artist this year”. New single ‘I’m Waiting’ is taken from a forthcoming EP and finds navigate ambitious and rather spirited alt-pop territory. Better still, the track – recorded at Clique in Straffan, Co. Kildare – is very nicely brought to life via a video written by McGeown and created by Shaun Ryan and Jeff Doyle of…