• April Verch Band @ The Old Courthouse, Antrim

    May 15, 2017 - By 

    Antrim’s The Old Courthouse was a fitting venue for the April Verch Band, which brought its vibrant, fiddle-based Americana to a building that dates to 1776. Fitting because, in a way, fiddler and step dancer Verch was bringing the music home. In the seventeen hundreds over a hundred thousand Irish left home to begin a new life in North America, bringing with them their fiddle music, songs and dance traditions, and these roots — amongst others — were evident during a captivating ninety-minute show. Of course, along with the Ulster-Scotts/Irish came the Scottish, French and Polish — amongst multiple nationalities…

  • The Divine Comedy w/ Lisa O’Neill @ CQAF, Belfast

    May 8, 2017 - By 

    It’s a while since Neil Hannon has toured with a full band version of The Divine Comedy, having toured last album Bang Goes The Knighthood solo back in 2010 (including a date in this same faux-starlit CQAF marquee) and having made most appearances since – such as his Mandela Hall performance upon winning 2015’s Oh Yeah Legend Award – with a stripped back trio of acoustic guitar, piano and accordion. The days of endless major label money having long since dried up, a return to the era of bringing along a full orchestra seems unlikely, but the promise of a…

  • Lady Macbeth

    May 4, 2017 - By 

    Like a tightly wound corset ready to explode, Lady Macbeth is masterfully controlled period piece with a rebellious, cruel heart. Based on Nikolai Leslov’s Lady Macbeth of the Mtsensk, which imagined Shakespeare’s play from the perspective of the Scottish king’s much-maligned wife and cheerleader, the film applies its own interpretative reorientation to 19th-century England’s landed gentry, a social world the English imagination clings to in dusty, wistful, National Heritage nostalgic, a cosy image of class harmony imminently worthy of subversion (the film has been called an ‘anti-Downton Abbey‘). Lady Macbeth is a bold and confident debut work from screenwriter Alice Birch…

  • Playlist: TTA is 4

    May 2, 2017 - By 

    Today is our 4th birthday and to celebrate we have compiled a playlist of 40 of our favourite Irish tracks from the years we have been operational featuring Adebisi Shank, Sleep Thieves, Oh Boland, Girls Names, No Monster Club, Documenta, Bantum, Katie Kim and many more. Music and culture has exploded over the last four years here and we’ve been proud to cover that throughout. We’ll be relaunching The Thin Air magazine and website later in the year but in the meantime we’d like to thank our contributors, everyone who has supported us, picked up the magazine, clicked on the website,…

  • AAA: Therapy? acoustic tour

    May 4, 2017 - By 

    In this installment of AAA, we go behind the scenes with Therapy? on their acoustic tour taking in the Empire in Belfast and the Roisin Dubh in Galway. Photos by Liam Kielt and Sean McCormack. The Empire, Belfast by Liam Kielt Roisin Dubh, Galway by Sean McCormack

  • Daithí – Holiday Home EP

    April 28, 2017 - By 

    Daithí teased listeners as far back as last year with the first scintillating, electro-pop banger from his latest endeavour, Holiday Home. The snappy five-track release lands today and, just as that first single, ‘Falling For You feat. Sinead White’ suggested, it shows Daithí continuing his progression in maturity as a producer, providing a collection that exudes confidence. The Galway/Clare-based producer continues to craft fascinating, atmospheric tracks that cross- weave traditional Irish cultural elements with modern-day electronica. He’s managed to ramp up the sophistication on this one, continuing to transcend boundaries by inventively fusing together electronic, folk and synth elements. With…

  • Watch: Vernon Jane – Fuck Me

    April 27, 2017 - By 

    Holy moly! Don’t you dare sit down, gang, this is important. Dublin Jazz-Punk (or, psyjance as they like to call it) collective Vernon Jane are here to kick the living daylights out you and your loved ones and teach you a lesson while they’re at it. Following on from the 2016 EP The Inner Workings of a Damaged Nobody, the group have returned with a vengeance with new single ‘Fuck Me’. The abrasive, merciless track finds the band channelling influences from the brutally hard-rockin’ camps and those of frenzied jazz. Band leader and vocalist Emily Jane bellows lyrics that demand attention and which grapple…

  • Stream: Elaine Mai – The Colour of the Night

    April 25, 2017 - By 

    Elaine Mai will release her new EP The Colour of the Night on 19 May. Following ‘Enniscrone’ from October 2016 and a recent remix of Liza Flumes ‘Sheets’, the Dublin based producer and vocalist has now revealed the title track of the forthcoming release. Much in the same vein as ‘Enniscrone’, which also features on the EP, ‘The Colour of the Night’ is an atmospheric electronic number with a solid backbone carrying it to its peak. Mai’s ability to capture sincere emotion in simple, warm melodies is on full display here with the words of loss and of nostalgia being carried by chiming synths…

  • Stream: Participant – Next Year

    April 25, 2017 - By 

    Taken from his Sampler EP, Dublin’s Stephen Tiernan AKA Participant has unveiled ‘Next Year’. The EP, which was released exclusively on cassette in March, features five singles on Side A and a collection of samples and field recordings on Side B. A delicate slice of atmospheric folk, Tiernan’s acoustic guitar and tempered vocals are gradually joined by additional textures, keys and faint strings, giving the track a neo-classical edge with hints of Ólafur Arnalds creeping through. With candid lyrics confronting themes of complacency, self-worth and commitment, Tiernan said of the track: “‘Next Year’ is a song that for me deals with the idea of…