• The Stray Birds @ Black Box, Belfast

    August 25, 2015 - By 

    Perhaps it’s the current trend for all banjo, fiddle and beard-wielding Americana bands, or maybe its promotor Moving On Music’s reputation as a purveyor of musical excellence that’s pulled them in, but whatever the reason it’s a full house in the Black Box for Pennsylvanian bluegrass trio The Stray Birds. Maya de Virtry, Oliver Craven and Charlie Muench played this same room just over a year ago though tonight, judging by the paltry show of hands in response to Craven’s “who was here last time?” survey,  it seems like a new audience is here to catch one of the hottest…

  • Explosive Decoy Humans – Transient

    August 20, 2015 - By 

    Transient is the first EP from unashamedly nerdy tech-metallers Explosive Decoy Humans, dispersed across three continents yet unencumbered by the oceanic expanses. Featuring members of Cyclamen, Subterranean Fishermen, and Dead on Both Shoulders, the qualifications of EDH are without question, and Transient arrives not a moment too soon for this creative contingent. The sonorous, sometimes somnolent croonings of vocalist Lindsay Templeton evoke Orchid-era Mikael Akerfeldt amidst a whirlwind of seething meters. A field recording of a lagoon punctuates the opener’s onslaught, grounding it in an evocative, intimate serenity. True to its name, ‘Chaos’ flits and flutters, its flight enigmatically sating the attention,…

  • Jack MacGowran Remembered @ Samuel Beckett Happy Days Festival

    August 20, 2015 - By 

    Though he died over forty years ago actor Jack MacGowran is still a regular on TV and at international film festivals, having graced such timeless classics such as The Quiet Man, Tom Jones, Doctor Zhivago, Cul-de-Sac and The Exorcist. As a theatre actor MacGowran is best known for his work with Samuel Beckett.  In a revealing talk at Enniskillen’s Southwest College, three people closely connected with MacGowran shed light on his career, his craft and his collaborative relationship with the Nobel Prize-winning writer Beckett. Jack’s daughter, actress Tara MacGowran was joined by Garech Browne, co-founder of Claddagh Records, who had…

  • Reverberation Psych Weekender @ The Grand Social, Dublin

    August 20, 2015 - By 

    With psych music these days now affording its current crop of disciples, a broader platform of sound experimentation to play with, it was in no way surprising to have looked at the diverse line up for last weekend’s Reverberation festival, and licked ones lips with fervent glee. Advertised as Dublin’s inaugural celebration of psych and drone music, The Grand Social played host to all things psychedelic with a dozen bands, various DJ’s and mind playing visuals, as well as cult films, all adding to the vibe of this 13th Floor Elevators’ inspired experience. Cork five piece Elastic Sleep, were tasked…

  • Mistress America

    August 20, 2015 - By 

    With Frances Ha and While We’re Young, Noah Baumbach had made a pretty convincing argument that the most recent act of his reasonably long career is the strongest. Both films tackled ideas of identity, maturity and creativity with a delicate hand and a great deal of profundity and it pleases me to say that his latest effort, his second of 2015, Mistress America sits comfortably alongside the calibre of his previous two efforts. The picture, Baumbach’s second with writer, star and all round charming presence Greta Gerwig, is at its heart a screwball dramedy about growing old, developing a personality and the…

  • The Missing Hancocks @ Samuel Beckett Happy Days Festival

    August 19, 2015 - By 

    It seems odd to have Hancock’s Half Hour at the Happy Days Enniskillen International Beckett Festival, a thirteen-day smorgasbord of all things Samuel Beckett-related. Even a cricket match – a sport Beckett adored – between The Theatrical Cavaliers Cricket Club and the long-wandering Gaities Cricket Club seemed a more logical inclusion in the festival program. Still, comedy has always been a significant feature of the Happy Days festival, with today’s finest stand-up comedians bringing levity to the program. This comedy element reminds us that much of Beckett’s writing is laced with wicked humour, a fact that is often overlooked. So,…

  • 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,…

  • Journey (Sony, PS4)

    August 18, 2015 - By 

    While the debate about home consoles and backwards compatibility rumbles on, the likes of Sony are steadily bringing out remastered, upscaled ports of recent classics. This can only be a good thing if it means that it brings more attention to bona fide masterpieces like Journey, a beautiful piece of design that defies easy-fit categorisation. It is not so much that there are insufficient words to describe this strange and haunting game. Rather, it is more that words will only cause the player to prejudge what they are getting when they download it, and that would be a sad thing because…

  • David Kitt w/ Margie Lewis @ Roisin Dubh, Galway

    August 18, 2015 - By 

    In the past year or so, Irish indie-folk institution David Kitt has made leaps and bounds in a more club-oriented scene with his warm, groove-based approach to house music under his New Jackson alias. Other audiences however will associate him a lot more with something like the folk soundtrack to a rainy summer somewhere in Kerry, triggering the same nostalgia that comes with listening to The Frames Set List or Bell X1’s Music in Mouth. To see Kitt touring extensively around the country this summer in between massive dance settings such as Body and Soul’s Midnight Circus Stage or District…

  • Absolutely Anything

    August 17, 2015 - By 

    On paper, Absolutely Anything sounds like a winning combination: not only does Terry Jones’s sci-fi comedy boast the (unofficial) screen reunion of the surviving Monty Python crew, but it’s also the final film appearance of the late, great Robin Williams – as a talking dog, no less. Despite everything, the film is wholly unremarkable, failing to generate more than a handful of chuckles throughout. Alongside lead Simon Pegg – who has helped pen some of the best British comedies in recent years – the talents of Messrs Cleese, Gilliam, Idle, (writer & director) Jones, Palin and Williams are all but…