• Video Premiere: Arthur Itis – I Wish I Was Here

    March 3, 2022 - By 

    The word ‘shapeshifter’ loiters never too far from Cork experimentalist Arthur Itis, aka Arthur Pawsey, having cultivated a prismatic pop alter ego via a singular blend of electronics, psychedelia, looping & glitched-out Sun Araw-esque rhythms, and the avant-garde. Having released a truly accomplished LP in 2021 with Occam’s Razor (Art For Blind), he returns today with ‘I Wish I Was Here’ the first track from his forthcoming, altogether more minimalist, home-recorded new mini-album Longhand. Coloured with tape warbles, hiss, inbuilt reverb and a more traditional kind of homespun aesthetic, the tape method’s limited parameters enable Pawsey to strip back layers of the usual…

  • Watch: Deaf Joe – Shadow Work

    February 23, 2022 - By 

    Over the last few years, Joe Harney aka Deaf Joe has emerged as one of the country’s most consistent and singular songwriting voices. Spanning dream-pop, electronic, indie and far beyond, his deftly-woven craft on albums including 2019’s Love Stories has been nigh on polychromatic and remarkably refined. On 9th March, Harney releases his highly-anticipated fifth studio album, Kalachuchi, via Donegal’s Bluestack Records. Recorded in Scotland, Denmark, and Ireland over three years, it’s a release that, if lead single ‘Shadow Work (Come Help Me Sleep)’ is anything to go by, is set to reveal the full, prismatic majesty of Harney’s talents. Check…

  • Clara Tracey Pays Tribute to Irish Stain Glass Icon Harry Clarke in New Video

    February 22, 2022 - By 

    Pizza Pizza Records’ latest signing and experimental pop auteur Clara Tracey today releases the video for her wonderful latest single ‘Harry Clarke’. The lushly-arranged Daniel Fox production puts the Fermanagh-born, Belfast-based Tracey’s layered, technically superlative vocal range at front and centre, offers fragments of the subtly subversive, highly influential Irish stain glass artist & illustrator Harry Clarke. Initially inspired by window ‘The Eve of Saint Agnes’, Clara tells us more about the song’s inception: “Stained glass windows often bring to mind biblical scenes and churches, they don’t tend to be associated with dark eroticism. While Harry Clarke did receive most of his commissions from…

  • Kurt Vile to Play Belfast and Dublin

    February 15, 2022 - By 

    Kurt Vile & The Violators will play a brace of Irish shows in the summer. Following the release of his highly-anticipated new album, (watch my moves), on 15th April, Vile and his band will stop off for shows at Belfast’s Limelight 1 and Dublin’s Vicar Street on 30th and 31st August respectively. Tickets – which go on general sale this Friday, 18th February at 10am – are €35 for Dublin and TBA for Belfast. Check out Vile’s sublime, seven-minute new single ‘Like Exploding Stones’ below.

  • Massive Attack Set For Dublin Return

    February 15, 2022 - By 

    Massive Attack are coming back to Dublin. The Bristol trip-hop legends will play an outdoor show at Royal Hospital Kilmainham on August 28th. It marks the band’s first show in the city since 2019, when they performed as part of their Mezzannine XX1 tour. Tickets for this summer’s show cost €59.50 and go on sale this Friday, 18th at 10am.

  • Watch: Pillow Queens – Hearts & Minds

    February 10, 2022 - By 

    On 1st April, Dublin quartet Pillow Queens will release Leave The Light On, the highly-anticipated, ten-track follow-up to the band’s 2020 debut LP In Waiting. Capturing what lead singer Pamela Connolly describes as “the reoccurrence of teenage insecurities occasioned by the band’s rise to prominence and the imposter syndrome she experienced as a result,” it’s another sublimely crafted effort from the indie-rock foursome. Underpinned by the subtle exploratory textures of a band in rapid evolution, across four minutes, the song soars and earworms in equal measure. “Hearts & Minds’ is about experiencing the feeling of being a teenager again,” says Connolly. “The insecurities…

  • Watch: Junior Brother – No Country For Young Men

    February 9, 2022 - By 

    Ronan Kealy’s evolution as an artist has been a rare delight to behold. The Co. Kerry singer-songwriter known as Junior Brother has all but single-handedly upended the (granted, somewhat kneejerk) conception of experimental folk on these shores. It’s a trajectory, the power of which shines searingly through new single ‘No Country For Young Men’. The follow-up to last October’s inspired ‘Life’s New Haircut’, it’s a masterfully mesmeric effort that explores the culture shock – and straight-up experiential doom – of Kealy’s relocation to the capital. “I wrote this song in response to the tangible feeling of dread and anxiety I…

  • Naoise Roo Set To Perform Debut LP Lilith in Dublin

    February 2, 2022 - By 

    Naoise Roo is set for a special, one-off performance next month. Currently based in Belfast, the Dublin artist will perform her acclaimed debut album, Lilith – hands down one of our favourite Irish albums of 2015 no less – at the recently-launched Workman’s Cellar in Dublin on Thursday, 10th March. As well as performing the album in its entirety, accompanied by a full band for the first time since the album’s original tour, she will be supported by fellow Belfast-based songwriters Aoife Wolf and Clara Tracey on the night. Ahead of what’s expected to be a seismic year of new music and…

  • Open Ear To Return in Summer

    January 31, 2022 - By 

    A few stout in the Jolly Roger? Praise be: Open Ear is returning this summer. The country’s leading electronic/experimental festival will once again take over Sherkin Island off Cork across June 3-5th. Line-up and tickets will be revealed soon. Never been? Check out Eoin Murray’s review of the festival’s unforgettable 2019 outing here.

  • Tyler, The Creator, Megan Thee Stallion & More for Longitude

    January 31, 2022 - By 

    Longitude has revealed the first acts set to perform this summer. When it returns to Marlay Park in Dublin across July 1st-3rd, the festival will host headliners Tyler, The Creator, Dave, Megan Thee Stallion, A$AP Rocky, Doja Cat and The Kid Laroi among others. Check out the full first line-up announcement below. Priced at €99.50 for day passes and €239.50 for the weekend, tickets for Longitude 2022 go on sale this Friday, 4th February at 9am.