• Young Fathers – Dead

    February 27, 2014 - By 

    Calling your album Dead doesn’t exactly promise a party, and to that end Young Fathers deliver few surprises. Take them at face value as hip-hop however and your expectations are much likelier to be challenged (unless perhaps your hip-hop collection is already coming down with acts boasting lineage from Liberia, Nigeria and Scotland). It might be difficult to imagine cold what such a combination might sound like, but once you’ve heard it, generally it adds up. The beats are the most obvious link to Africa – ironic though that may be since chief producer ‘G’ Hastings is the Scottish element…

  • Guided By Voices – Motivational Jumpsuit

    February 26, 2014 - By 

    Another year, another Guided By Voices record. You should know the score by now: 20 tracks, few of which break the two minute mark, filled with song fragments, little moments of beauty, and the occasional full-fledged composition. In this regard, the new GBV album is little different from its predecessors, surfing on the comfortable wave they’ve been on since they arrived re-invigorated from the wilderness with the release of Let’s Go Eat The Factory in January 2012. None of which is to say that it’s in any way a bad record. On the contrary, it’s an album that rarely has…

  • St. Vincent @ The Olympia

    February 24, 2014 - By 

    The Olympia Theatre quickly fills up as Slow Skies take to the stage as tonight’s warm-up for the impending spectacle of St Vincent. Possibly to make the latter’s immaculate stage set up possible, the former are down to headcount of three, and squeezed to the front of the stage. With the reduced set up, all the pressure is on the delicately soaring voice of Karen Sheridan (below) to carry them into the attention of the waiting crowd. After a slightly nervous start, she settles into the new surroundings and by the time they swell into on the shore (the lead…

  • The 1975 @ Ulster Hall, Belfast

    February 21, 2014 - By 

    “Do you like cabbage and bacon?” and “Will you go to my formal with me?” are just a sample of the rather odd questions posed to Matthew Healy and Adam Hann from The 1975, by a giggle of teenage girls. The Thin Air was at a local radio station to see a private acoustic set prior to their headline slot in the Ulster Hall. We were the oldest people there. While the band played quite beautiful acoustic versions of their singles ‘Sex’ and ‘Chocolate’, their fans snapped photos excitedly, making us slightly sad that their full attention wasn’t focused on what…

  • VA – Kompakt Pop Ambient 2014

    February 20, 2014 - By 

    Kompakt, surely Germany’s most pragmatic electronic label, have it pretty damn good. Not only do they operate from one of the most historically rich techno hubs in Europe, but as an independent and well-respected label they have become part of that same cultural relevance. The label has been lovingly grown from its record shop roots in the early 90’s and their propensity for sparse, subtly textured electronica has dominated their output up to the present day. Their latest compilation is the fourteenth installment of their Pop Ambient series and from the beginning seems to efficiently comply with the label’s sonic modus…

  • Gardens & Villa – Dunes

    February 19, 2014 - By 

    When surrounded by the cold on all sides, it’s important to find appropriate mood music; something to either blast away the cold with promises of Summer just on the horizon or to revel in the abject misery and desolation of the whole season. With Dunes, recorded in the near arctic US Midwest, California-based Gardens and Villa are trying to explore the season. Whether or not they’re successful is a very different story. Dunes operates on two primary settings: new wave/post punk- inflected electro boogies and slower tempo melancholic nuggets of ethereal emotion. Throughout the whole record the influences are apparent.…

  • Her

    February 18, 2014 - By 

    Her opens with a close-up of its star, Joaquin Phoenix, speaking directly into the camera, but he is not addressing the audience. Nor is he speaking to another character on the other side of the camera. Instead he is talking to a machine. Her imagines a world only one step removed from the one we live in today, where the only conversations people have are with their phones or their computers, of a lonely, cellular existence where every human interaction is managed through a digital medium. The film takes place in a near-future Los Angeles and follows Theodore Twombly (Phoenix),…

  • Bombay Bicycle Club – So Long, See You Tomorrow

    February 14, 2014 - By 

    Bombay Bicycle Club are an admirably prolific outfit, with So Long, See You Tomorrow completing  the band’s meteoric journey up the British charts; their fourth album since 2009 going straight in at number one. The album is certainly their most experimental to date and features everything from a very Bollywood-style intro on ‘Feel’ to synth and electro tracks scattered throughout the album. If Bombay fans of old were expecting an album rooted in more of an acoustic feel they will be very disappointed or will have to adapt quickly, but, then again, adapting to a change in tack from this…

  • I Break Horses – Chiaroscuro

    February 11, 2014 - By 

    Chiaroscuro, an Italian juxtaposition of the words light and dark, has historically been a dramatic and influential style of presentation, particularly in the classical art world; it is also the theme upon which I Break Horses’ second album is based. Having seen success with their first release Hearts which netted them touring slots with Sigur Rós and M83, the excitement had been building in the minds of many prior to this release – they were a new band that many critics couldn’t help but fall for. The new record is a series of anxious, techno-infused pieces, with a strong bent…

  • Foals @ The Olympia

    February 10, 2014 - By 

    Last time Foals played Dublin’s Olympia Theatre, eccentric frontman Yannick Philippakis took a wobbling stroll around the outer rim of the second floor balcony, pulling hip-swinging moves through the encore as he clung on with one hand. We can only assume the Olympia’s insurance company wasn’t in attendance: had they been, tonight might well have been subject to a safety veto. Foals, clearly, don’t do anything by halves. Emerging into a theatre borderline steaming from the storm outside, they firmly boot things into gear with a ‘Total Life Forever’, ‘Miami’ and ‘My Number’ trifecta, the singles launching a sing-along that…