Alan Maguire captures English electronic duo Fuck Buttons deliver a stellar performance at the opening marquee show of this year’s Cathedral Quarter Arts Festival.
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As part of this year’s The Cathedral Quarter Arts Festival, we’re very happy to present a special celebration of boundlessly influential U.S. three-piece Hüsker Dü at Voodoo Belfast on Monday, May 5. As well as hosting a one-off screening of Every Everything: The Life, Times and Music of Grant Hart, Hüsker Dü drummer, songwriter and visionary, Belfast-based punk and rock n’ roll bands, No Matter, The Groundlings (headliners) and alt-rock three-piece, Abandcalledboy will play three sets balanced between original material and their very own takes on classic Hüsker Dü material. In Every Everything, The Life, Times and Music of Grant Hart,…
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Now in its fifteenth year, hands down Belfast’s most exciting, diverse and inspiring festival of music, culture and arts, Cathedral Quarter Arts Festival returns from May 1-11. Boasting a programme featuring everyone from De La Soul and Tinariwen to Simon Amstell, Shonen Knife and Yuck, it is quite possibly the annual festival’s strongest roster to date. At the risk of scaling a mount of hyperbole, we reckon there is quite literally something for everybody at this year’s festival. Whether you look to the words and ideas of the likes of Bernard McLaverty or Mark Ellen, the comedy of Katherine Ryan or Howard Read et al, genre-defining artists such as The Handsome Family, The Selecter and Fuck Buttons or…
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Set to take place from May 1 to May 11, the programme for this year’s Cathedral Quarter Arts Festival has been announced. As with every other installment of the annual Belfast festival, variety and eclecticism is at the heart of this year’s line-up. From Wilko Johnson and the Mercy Lounge, De La Soul, Channel 4 news anchor Jon Snow, The Handsome Family, Simon Amstell, Shonen Knife and everything in between, there is a hugely impressive roster running the gamut from music and comedy to spoken word, theatre, visual art and more. We’re also getting involved in this year’s programme, hosting a…
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With the likes of The Selecter, Tinariwen and Shonen Knife already announced, several new acts have been confirmed for this year’s Cathedral Quarter Arts Festival. Arguably topping the lot is American groundbreaking hip-hop trio De La Soul (above), who join Ginger Baker’s Jazz Confusion, DBC Pierre, Wilko Johnson, Rubberbandits, Fuck Buttons, Wild Beasts, Jimi Goodwin and The Third Policeman. Now in its fifteenth year, Cathedral Quarter Arts Festival 2014 will run from May 1 to May 11. Go to the official CQAF website for ticket info.
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There’s a crucial moment during this evening’s multimedia shenanigans when an entire cinema auditorium chuckles in unison at the sight of a LEGO David Bowie explaining the inspiration behind his new persona “Cobbler Bob”. At this point the audience have fully plugged into BUG, Adam Buxton’s deliberately random selection box of music videos, skits and winding anecdotes about earache. And that’s part of the joy of BUG: the not knowing what glittery video or deranged cartoon is going to pop out of the indie rock super collider next. Essentially, what we have is an assortment of music promos glued together…
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The last time that British Sea Power visited Belfast, in February 2011, something felt different. The band, by this point a seasoned touring outfit with several joyously received Belfast gigs to their credit, were playing the Spring & Airbrake for the second time, but attendance was down, the atmosphere was flat and the setlist dragged, stuffed full of songs from the lacklustre album they were promoting at the time, Valhalla Dancehall. Just as their previous record, the Mercury-nominated Do You Like Rock Music?, seemed set to propel them skyward, Elbow-style, it looked like the Brighton band were already on a…
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One of the things that marks Belfast’s Cathedral Quarter Arts Festival out as a bit different is the inclusion of the Artist In Residence. Every year a locally based musician is chosen for this coveted title, a badge saying this person is a cut above the rest and a badge that is proudly displayed throughout the festival, the artist in question playing several showcases as well as supporting international acts playing during the festival. Joining previous success stories of Rachel Austin, Aaron Shanley and Glastonbury performer Isobel Anderson is this year’s choice, cellist-singer-songwriter Alana Henderson. It’s no surprise then that…
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As much renown for his towering intellect and vocabulary as he is for his increasingly ambitious literary work, 51-year-old writer and journalist Will Self is, equally, widely recognised as “that clever guy from Question Time and/or Shooting Stars“. Ahead of his talk at this year’s Cathedral Quarter Arts Festival, Brian Coney happily risks becoming fully aware of his own intellectual impotency in discussing Self’s beloved London, the oft-misunderstood approach ‘psychogeography’ and the author’s latest, arguably most accomplished novel, the Man Booker Prize-nominated Umbrella. You have, of course, recently published Umbrella. At the risk if being too general, what type of…
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Having gone from strength to strength over the last decade and a bit, Cathedral Quarter Arts Festival has all but cemented its reputation as the most versatile and wholly immersive arts festival in Northern Ireland, if not the whole island of Ireland. As it prepares once more to dominate Belfast night-life and enthrall thousands across ten days of lovingly-selected, boundlessly exciting music, art, comedy and everything in between, Brian Coney sits down with CQAF organiser from day one, Sean Kelly, to discuss what’s in store and how the country’s most loved annual arts festival came to be. ______ Hi Sean.…