British Sea Power live at Cyprus Avenue in Cork. Photos by Silvio Severino
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Unique in its setting of the Trabolgan Holiday Village in Cork to offset the unpredicatable Spring weather, It Takes a Village festival runs from April 13-15, and has announced its latest set of bill updates. The Good Room-curated festival offers an ATP-esque alternative in the form of 150 self-catering houses and apartments, as well as 35 fully-serviced campervan sites, not to mention the host of nostalgia-invoking activities Trabolgan has to offer. Today’s line up update includes The Gloaming frontman Martin Hayes, alongside one of Ireland’s most respected traditional guitarists Steve Cooney. One of the Irish voices of his generation, Blindboy Boatclub brings his podcast live on Sunday. Landless…
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In many eyes the country’s best band, Cork’s The Altered Hours have just announced details of a forthcoming new EP, On My Tongue, and an accompanying European tour. The follow-up to their stellar 2016 full-length In Heat Not Sorry, the five-piece will release the four-track On My Tongue via Art For Blind Records and Penske Recordings early next year. A typically first-rate effort from the band, lead single ‘Open Wide’ premiered over on Clash. To coincide with the release, the band will also embark on a nine-date European tour across February-April, which incorporates shows on March 29th at Dublin’s DBD Venue, Letterkenny’s Regional Cultural Centre on 30th. Yours truly will…
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Cork, ever Ireland’s unexpected cornerstone of hazy psych, can boast another addition to the canon in the The Sunshine Factory‘s new single ‘Seer’, which we’re delighted to premiere here. This comes alongside the announcement of their debut EP proper, Cruelest Animal, the title track of which was released last year following a string of extremely promising demos and homemade recordings. Towering out of the speaker like some meta-diegetic music recorded live from a cave to soundtrack a climactic David Lynch scene – probably one of Evil Coop walking cooly away from a major explosion – ‘Seer”s measured, primal urgency, gives way to an incredible synth motif – think Vangelis’ Blade Runner Blues – before settling into a mess of rusty, screeching guitars.…
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Cork, ever Ireland’s unexpected cornerstone of hazy psych, can boast another fine release, with The Sunshine Factory having just announced their debut EP proper, Cruelest Animal, the title track of which was released last year following a string of extremely promising demos and homemade recordings. Firmly establishing their neo-psychedelic chops with slots alongside the likes of KXP, The Orange Kyte, and tour support to psychedelic legends The Telescopes on their most recent Irish jaunt. It comes out on November 30th, accompanied by a hometown launch, through their own independent label, Sunshine Cult Records, and was recorded with Chris Somers at One Chance Out Studios. While Cruelest Animal was recorded a year ago, it seems that a healthy gestation…
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While the threat of Nuclear war, and the fear of immediate death via a trigger happy world leader, has been trust to the fore of public consciousness in recent months, the threat and danger of chemical warfare via secondary means – the manufacture, storage and disposal of weapons – has been a real and constant concern for over a century. In America the issue over where to store nuclear waste has remail unresolved since the Manhattan project began, with initial efforts of dumping barrels into the waters around New Jersey so unbelievable in the context of modern knowledge that it borders…
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Having released a string of stellar singles over the last two years, Dublin & Cork-based experimental, orchestral, psychedelic garage rock project The Bonk have released their debut LP, The Bonk Seems To Be A Verb, and we’re delighted to premiere the entire album on its day of release. Recorded over the last few years while the outfit have been together, it’s released on cassette through Drogheda arts & culture collective Thirty Three – 45. Although the project is based around the compositions of frontman Phil Christie – of O Emperor, the substantial cast of musicians credited on the album includes some of the island’s most…
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Day Five of the Clonakilty International Guitar Festival at De Barra’s, Fahey’s and The Galley in Cork featuring live performances from Otherkin, The Lovely Eggs, Bean Dolan Band and Ganglions. Photos by Jason Lee
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Following its digital release earlier in the year, Cork psych-tinted post-punk outfit Any Joy release their debut album, Cycles on vinyl. The five piece, formed at the start of this year by Oisin Dineen, self-released the album earlier in 2017 digitally, Cycles. With all the hallmarks of a great post-punk indie rock record – glistening guitars, anxiety-fuelled lyrics centred around the cyclical nature of thought – its psychedelic hue, peppered with documentary samples & unexpected instrumentation while maintaining a healthy minimalism that avoids any air of pomposity, à la Parquet Courts; you can add Any Joy to the list of essential post-punk & psychedelic bands from a city…
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Today and tomorrow are the last to see a fascinating new body of work by Damian Shiels in Cobh’s Sirius Arts Centre. Titled Portraits: Women of Cork and the U.S. Navy 1917-1919, the exhibition looks at the social outcomes of America’s entry into the First World War. Their participation in the war saw thousands of US soldiers emerge into the communities around Cork. This influx of soldiers, and their subsequent socialising in the city, saw many Cork natives become ‘war brides’. While these relationships were generally greeted with celebration in America, on this side of the Atlantic hostilities arose, which then turned to violence. Ultimately the US Navy banned…