• Track Record: Toby Kaar

    July 14, 2016 - By 

    In the latest installment of Track Record, Cork producer Toby Kaar talks us through some of his all-time favourite records, featuring Kanye West, Warieka Hill Sounds and Fleetwood Mac. Various Artists – No Oil Crisis This is a really funny record. A New Thing album in response to the Gulf Oil crisis. I’ve never understood that kind of contrived connection between music and current events. Like the time they sent Rahzel out on a boat to beatbox about melting icecaps. Anyway, I got this in a second-hand record shop in Bristol. The album is a great cross-section of the kind of…

  • Dig Early: An Interview with Sligo’s Art For Blind Records

    July 14, 2016 - By 

    For over a decade, Art for Blind Records has been a home for underground, DIY and subversive music and zines of many stripes, both as a label functioning from wherever its composite parts are at a given time, and a series of stalls and shops that have followed them. As the duo prepare to release the debut EP from Cork noisemaker ELLLL and just off the release of the Altered Hours’ first 12″, Mike McGrath-Bryan speaks to Dany and Edel from Art for Blind about the label, its place(s), the people around it, and the future. Art for Blind doesn’t…

  • Interview: King Kong Company

    July 18, 2016 - By 

    Not merely one of the country’s most singular, genre-warping acts, Waterford six-piece King Kong Company are right up there with the very best live propositions around. Having just released their emphatic self-titled debut album, Brian Coney talks to the band about working with The Prodigy producer Neil McLellan on the release, capturing their live energy in the studio, their diverse range of influences and what the future holds in store. Hi guys. You’ve been getting some great reviews for your new, self-titled album. It was originally set to be released last year. Was perfectionism (or at least only wanting to release something you were…

  • The Pressure is Off: An Interview with Joe Mount of Metronomy

    July 13, 2016 - By 

    Metronomy are just one of those bands. On average the group have released a full record every two to three years, each one to more acclaim and appreciation than the last. From their wonky, wild sophomore record Nights Out to the refined pop reflections of Love Letters they’ve been a group whose steady rise through the ranks has looked almost easy. So easy in fact that it’s hard to imagine that it’s been a whole decade since the release of their outrageous debut Pip Paine (Pay the £5000 You Owe). ‘I suppose I’m part of the furniture,’ muses Joe Mount.…

  • Picture This: Your National Visual Arts Guide – Environment

    July 12, 2016 - By 

    The concept of environments, and environmental impact, resonates across the broad content and diverse mediums featured in this edition of The Thin Air’s Picture This. While this theme is present in the traditional sense of the impact we as a human race have had on the environment, it is more keenly felt in the reverse and the impact an environment can have on us – the subject and the audience. The four shows highlight how it can alter the cultures and traditions of its inhabitants, help formulate ideologies and craft viewpoints. In a broader sense we also see the impact…

  • Feel Good Lost’s 5th Birthday

    July 12, 2016 - By 

    The working name for Cork director, editor, designer, cameraman, alternative DJ, live visual artist and media designer Brendan Canty, Feel Good Lost just celebrated their 5th birthday party in the panoramic Mitchelstown Caves. This year featured candlelit performances from the enigmatic JFDR (Iceland) and an immense and explorative performance from Cork act Talos. As well as taking photos of the event, Blair Alexander Massie had the pleasure of chatting with Brendan about the milestone. After 5 longs years of emails, flights, videos, EP and LP’s and now a show in a cave. What’s the most rewarding part about what you…

  • Festival Mixtape: Longitude 2016

    July 12, 2016 - By 

    Set to return to Dublin’s Marlay Park this weekend, the three-day line-up for this year’s Longitude is easily one of the strongest of the Irish summer festival calendar. Headlined by Kendrick Lamar, Major Lazer and The National – as well as featuring the likes of Jamie xx, Father John Misty (pictured), Run The Jewels, Laura Mvula, Courtney Barnett, Vic Mensa and Kurt Vile & The Violators – organisers have struck a keen balance with both genre and the ratio between homegrown artists and much bigger acts. Ahead of what’s set to be yet another memorable weekend for the MCD-run festival, stream our 30…

  • Front of House: Bettine McMahon & Graham Sharpe of KnockanStockan

    July 12, 2016 - By 

    Very few Irish music festivals are imbued with the sheer independent spirit and passion for homegrown sounds that continues to set Co. Wicklow’s KnockanStockan Festival apart. Set to return to Blessington Lakes this weekend with a host of the country’s very finest artists in tow (full line-up below), Mike McGrath Bryan chats to Bettine McMahon and Graham Sharpe, festival director and music director of KnockanStockan, about their humble beginnings, the festival’s annual schedule, only booking Irish acts and what the future holds. Photos by Moira Reilly. Hi guys. Give us some insight to the beginnings and roots of Knockanstockan. Bettine:…

  • Who You Gonna Call? The Outraged, Most Likely

    July 10, 2016 - By 

    In Robert Wise’s 1971 movie adaptation of Michael Crichton’s novel The Andromeda Strain, one of the four protagonists is a woman. And in the movie, there’s nothing significant or outrageous about this. She is, simply, biologically, a woman. But more importantly, she’s a character. She does stuff, she has feelings, ideas. And when a younger male cast member handles the film’s sole action sequence, it’s not because it’s a job that only a man could do, it’s because he’s younger and more physically fit. In the current era of re-boots, The Andromeda Strain is crying out for a remake, with the 1971-stylings of the film…

  • Monday Mixtape: Joe Greene (Documenta)

    July 11, 2016 - By 

    This week’s eclectic Monday Mixtape comes courtesy of Joe Greene, who has been at the helm of some of the most cosmically enveloping music ever to come out of Belfast, courtesy of  psych/drone-pop seven-piece Documenta. They’re to release an extended version of the David Holmes-produced ‘Love As A Ghost’ (artwork above, single below) originally from their excellent 2015 album, Drone Pop #1, through Touch Sensitive Records. Documenta play Mister Tom’s Lounge at Lavery’s, Belfast on July 22 to coincide with the single’s release. Now, over to Joe. “In no particular order here are a few of my favourite things.” Big Star – For You I first heard Big Star when I was a teenager way…