• Parquet Courts at The Helix, Dublin

    June 14, 2022 - By 

    As the stage crew carry out the last of their tasks, the countdown to Parquet Courts’ arrival draws imminently closer. The stage of Dublin’s Helix is bathed in a low red hue, which gives off more of a dance club aesthetic to proceedings, as opposed to the fact it is about to host one of Brooklyn’s foremost indie bands. With the crowd beginning to gather, the club vibe is emphasised even further as the sounds of Todd Terje’s take on M’s ‘Pop Muzik’, and a remix of Timmy Thomas’ 1970s’ song ‘Why Can’t We Live Together’, pulsate from the PA.…

  • Arborist at First Presbyterian Church, Belfast

    May 2, 2022 - By 

    On any day, Belfast First Presbyterian Church offers a quite spectacular setting for a concert. It’s even more so the case when the event organiser, namely Arthur Magee, decides to use the Cathedral Quarter Arts Festival to honor the memory of former parishioner Thomas McCabe, who opposed the formation of the Belfast Slave Ship Company in 1786. In lieu of the usual opening band, the audience was offered an excerpt of the forthcoming play Sugar! by actor/writer Cillian Lenaghan. In his play, Lenaghan imagines Thomas McCabe’s visit to his church on the day after he prevented the formation of the…

  • Mitski at Vicar Street, Dublin

    April 27, 2022 - By 

    A large white wooden door hangs in the centre of the stage. Five musicians dressed in black step into position. Mitski begins to sing a capella, her haunting vocals emanating from the wings while her band members take the stage. She appears dressed in long, white flowing garments. Immediately, the crowd are in awe. Beginning with ‘Love Me More’ and ‘Should Have Been Me,’ she circles the stage, frantically, as if searching for a lost lover. Airy organs float above a wall of sound, as a tight rhythm section cuts through layers of keys and synths. She races in a…

  • Pillow Queens – Leave The Light On

    April 11, 2022 - By 

    Pillow Queens’ sophomore album Leave the Light On smooths the cracks of their debut to unveil a near-perfect follow-up. Where In Waiting documented the rough transition from adolescence into adulthood through fleeting tales of young love and triumphs, Leave the Light On  pushes forward into something more settled. Through elegiac verses and changing perspectives, Pillow Queens construct a metaphorical space that inspects the cracks in its white picket fence. These anthems shine light on the marginalised and lonely as they navigate the mundane and everyday; it’s an album that yearns for the peace of domesticity, in a country that continuously…

  • Lighght – Seodra

    April 8, 2022 - By 

    As Lighght, Cork producer Eamon Ivri has repeatedly flipped the script in  becoming one of the island’s most mercurial producers. Marking his return to L.A. imprint Doom Trip, the six-track Seodra is a blitzing trip featuring some of his most lethal (in both senses of the word) club material. And talk about a timely return. Where last year’s Holy Endings offered sublime ambient reprieve in supremely fucked-up times, these six deftly-produced volleys all but proffer hectic times with a rake of good heads. While the searing arps of ‘Rib’ strike a museful tone, peaks including ‘Tactile Love’ and ‘Hang Tight’…

  • And So I Watch You From Afar – Jettison

    April 7, 2022 - By 

    After five albums, And So I Watch You From Afar take something of a left turn with their first ‘multimedia album’ Jettison. Produced with accompanying visuals, their usual crushing riffs and frenzied guitar workouts are replaced, at least initially, by gentle chords resembling The Cinematic Orchestra’s ‘To Build a Home’. Strings and spoken word passages from Emma Ruth Rundle and Clutch’s Neil Fallon float in and out, adding new dimensions to the beloved Belfast-based band’s sound The tension racks up though as the album continues, each movement seamlessly progressing into the next as one long continuous piece, at times recalling…

  • HousePlants at Cyprus Avenue, Cork

    April 5, 2022 - By 

    The brainchild of electronic music wunderkind Daithí and Irish rock veteran Paul Noonan of Bell X1, HousePlants formed during lockdown and, through back and forth emails and messages, quickly started knocking out tunes. Their debut album Dry Goods is full of songs I couldn’t wait to see live while being churned around in a sweaty crowd at 2am at some backwoods music festival. So I was somewhat surprised by the relaxed atmosphere in Cyprus Avenue just before the main act took to the stage. Did the good people of Cork not know that there was dancing to be had tonight?…

  • CMAT at Cyprus Avenue, Cork

    March 11, 2022 - By 

    Ireland has a strange, almost Lynchian relationship with country music. There are the Daniel O’Donnell/Nathan Carter/Garth Brooks die-hards, of course. This cohort is usually composed of people who grew up on westerns of the ’60s and ’70s, and came of age to the bizarre strings of the “Country and Irish” genre of music proliferated by the showband era. But interestingly there’s also a large chunk of millennials who were impacted (quite tragically) by Garth Brooks’ sold-out Croke Park concerts in the ’90s, and subsequently found themselves in some strange time-warp where youth clubs were teaching line dancing and the price…

  • NewDad – Banshee

    March 8, 2022 - By 

    Young Galway quartet NewDad hit the ground running with the release of their debut EP Waves in early 2021. Its fresh take on hypnotic dream pop and shoegaze sounds captured the hearts and minds of listeners and critics alike. On their follow-up, Banshee, NewDad have kept that momentum going, accelerating toward a dazzling future. Recorded in Belfast and mixed by John Cogleton (Lana Del Rey, Phoebe Bridgers), Banshee sees NewDad dig deeper into their sound, resurfacing with a handful of tracks that see them at their most daring, intense and captivating. Opener ‘Say It’, arguably the band’s most radio-friendly track…

  • Big Thief at the National Stadium, Dublin

    March 1, 2022 - By 

    Carrying five albums in just seven years under their belt, Big Thief weigh in at the endearingly well-worn National Boxing Stadium with the towel very much not-thrown. Following warm-up act KMRU’s opening platform of ambient environmental sounds the stage set-up is minimal. Additional instrumentation of fiddle, jaw harp, and piano featured on Big Thief’s latest album are nowhere to be seen tonight. This is a group with full confidence in the intimacy and connectedness of its core membership. Adrianne Lenker and guitarist Buck Meek are at opposite ends of the stage. James Krivchenia’s drums are positioned centrally and he is…