• Premiere: Hazing – Nervous Signals (Soil Creep remix)

    March 21, 2016 - By 

    Released back in February, Joy Void by Dutch/Irish artist Hazing is a debut EP that demands your our attention from the get go. Evoking the likes of Wild Nothing and Ariel Pink over its four tracks, there is a somnambulist glow woven throughout the release, conjuring late-night city traipses, head down, hands in pockets, driven forth by wayward thoughts of belonging and connection in a sleeping urban jungle.Two months after it dropped, Dublin producer Aidan Wall AKA Soil Creep has re-imagined lead single ‘Nervous Signals’ in superb fashion. Excavating beats and bleeps from the track’s placid fabric, it re-frames the track in such a…

  • Stream: Brame and Hamo – Kebab Dreams EP

    March 15, 2016 - By 

    Brame and Hamo are a duo originally from Sligo who, over the course of the past year, following a relocation to Berlin have been going from strength to strength with their blend of house and hip-hop which is resolutely loyal to the genres’ links to Jazz and soul. With their seamless meshing of these styles the pair impressed labels such as Dirt Crew and Detroit Swindle’s Heist Recordings and have since put out EPs on both labels, garnering them plenty of play in label sharer’s DJ sets and an ever growing respect both in their new base and back home.…

  • More Acts Set for Sea Sessions

    March 14, 2016 - By 

    Bundoran, Co. Donegal surf and music festival Sea Sessions have announced the second wave (ahem) of acts set to play its ninth outing from June 24-June 26. With the likes of Primal Scream, Bad Manners and Ciaran Lavery already revealed, Gavin James, Ham Sandwich, King Kong Company, Raglans, Daithi, Exmagician (pictured), Miles Graham, Picture This, T.P.M., Fang Club, New Valley Wolves, Crow Black Chicken, Karma Parking, Third Smoke and Wolves of Youth join the bill. Tickets for this year’s festival start at €99.90. Go here to buy yours. Check out the current Sea Sessions line-up below.

  • Belfast Film Festival 2016

    March 10, 2016 - By 

    Comprised of more than 133 films and events from 30 countries around the world, the programme for this year’s 16th Belfast Film Festival is their biggest to date. Set to return from April 14-23 in various venues across the city, an incredible range of premieres, guests, documentaries, shorts, discussions, music, film installations fall under categories including New Cinema, Documentary Panorama, Altered States, Talking Film, TV, NI Independents and Twisted Cornea. Launching with Deniz Gamze’s Mustang on Thursday, April 14 at the Moviehouse, the sheer medley and diversity of this year’s programme is nothing short of a thing of beauty. But don’t take our word for it: you…

  • Cinema 16 For ’16: Hitchcock/Truffaut

    March 7, 2016 - By 

    An alternative guide to this year’s cinematic offerings, we trawl through the dilapidated rows of seats in the back alley ‘art’ cinemas and crumbling picture palaces so you don’t have to. Rescuing gummy Venus de Milos from sticky crevices and fishing midget gems out of cold cups of tea. Diaries at the ready cinephiles. Hitchcock. You barely need to say anything else. In fact, you don’t need to say anything at all, you could just scribble Hitch’s nine stroke signature line drawing – a caricature of the director in profile. No director has cast such a long shadow over the…

  • Watch: Moon City Boys – City

    March 1, 2016 - By 

    Stockholm four-piece Moon City Boys recently released their new track, ‘City’, a song which, for those of us outside of Sweden who haven’t had the pleasure of seeing them live yet, served as only the fifth piece of officially released music to come from the band. Having formed in 2011 but conscientiously taking their time before putting out a lengthy release, the group have released two 7″s to date, the Rockets/Stranger in 2014 and Let My Love Dance/Washing Machine in August 2015. Each of the songs on those releases showcased a group with clear influences taken from the likes of Jefferson Airplane (‘Washing Machine’) and The…

  • Ciara O’Neill – The Ebony Trail

    March 1, 2016 - By 

    The modern folk music scene is all too often seen as the playground of minimal imagination. In recent years it has divided opinion more than most and rightfully so, suffering as it does from sub-par input with lazy, introspective lyrics and generic instrumentation. Such is the dilution of the genre, it takes something special to stand out and demand attention. Ciara O’Neill’s album, The Ebony Trail is a largely sparkling piece of work with inventive themes, ideas and directions yet it is also an album which occasionally fails to match its own high standards. Ciara takes a worn out trope and twists it into something…

  • Rave New World (19/02)

    February 19, 2016 - By 

    Antoin Lindsay and Aidan Hanratty return for their latest look at the very best electronic gigs, tracks, mixes and releases of the week. Gigs Room 19: Byob Party For The People at Jigsaw, Dublin Friday 19 February 2016 This byob “gaff party” of sorts is a fundraiser for the Syrian crisis, specifically for the Dublin Calais Refugee Solidarity Group. Held in an intimate venue on Mountjoy Square, it should be a lot of fun. AH Jackmaster & Fatima Yamaha at District 8, Dublin Saturday 20 February 2016 Jackmaster is a regular visitor to these shores, and he’s a perennial party boy.…