• Premiere: Cat Palace – Slime EP

    September 10, 2015 - By 

    Having positively kicked our ass (in the perfectly non-physical realm of being smitten) with the release of his ache-laced, quasi-mystical debut self-titled EP back in February, Dublin artist David Blaney AKA Cat Palace elicited the following rather grandiose words from yours truly:  “… an Irish singer-songwriter doing something very singular indeed.” In relatively recent hindsight, it transpires we were so on the money we may as well have been resting on a goldmine – a fact doubly confirmed with Slime, Blaney’s second, four-track EP. Whilst continuing in the generally hushed, lo-fi leaning vein of Pedro The Lion, Jason Molina and Bonnie Prince Billy, Slime sees Blaney’s decidedly…

  • Premiere: Linebacker Dirge – Livia/Motion Parallax

    August 11, 2015 - By 

    Co. Down singer-songwriter Jason Gibson is an artist who thrives on collaboration. Formed back in 2005, his project Linebacker Dirge has seen him write and record with the likes of A Plastic Rose’s Ian McHugh, A Northern Light’s Colm Laverty and James Bruce of Kasper Rosa/Matua Trap. Ten years on from the release of his debut, Postcards, Distance and Sleep (written and recorded with Harry Ffitch of Hello Newman over MSN Messenger, no less), Gibson’s new EP, The Worried Well, is a real re-affirmation of those early stirrings, going that bit further in driving the point (the unspoken and profound…

  • EP Premiere: Feather Beds – Ah Stop

    August 6, 2015 - By 

    Having just returned to Dublin following two years living in Quebec, Dublin producer Michael Orange AKA Feather Beds has hit the ground of his homeland running with Ah Stop, a stellar new EP was recorded “in the middle of a particularly gruelling and sub-zero winter in Montreal” back in February. An appendix of sorts to his debut album, The Skeletal System, which was released at the start of the year, the EP shows a self-described “marked shift in direction towards a more electronic feel and brings an introduction to the second full-length album, which is scheduled for release in 2016.” As just under…

  • EP Premiere: Shrug Life – The Grand Stretch

    July 23, 2015 - By 

    Having all but soiled ourselves listening to and shouting about its second track, ‘Funderland’, yesterday, we’re rather happy to present an exclusive first listen to The Grand Stretch, the debut EP by Popical Island’s latest – and perhaps some day greatest – outfit, Shrug Life. Life sucks and we all know it, but not all of us (in fact, very few of us) have the creative or whimsical tools at our disposal to express said utter despair and pointlessness via inescapably deadly, stupidly catchy, lo-fi indie rock. God knows we’d all love to, but who’s got the time to give…