• Meltybrains? @ The Academy, Dublin

    November 28, 2016 - By 

    The underappreciation of musicians and bands is a hot topic at the moment. The fact that creative output is criminally undervalued isn’t news but it seems that, here in Dublin at least, we’ve reached a moment. The fact that bands are openly citing financial and commercial difficulties as a reason for stop doing what they love should be a harrowing distant possibility rather than the hard truth that it is. Yet, as a fan, as a gig goer it’s often hard to keep in focus just how thankless the “job” can be. Just look at Zaska’s well deserved successful fund…

  • Dinosaur Jr @ Vicar Street, Dublin

    November 21, 2016 - By 

    Not least since their much-heralded 2005 reunion, Dinosaur Jr shows have always been something of a foregone conclusion in that the following facts will almost always hold sway throughout: it will be “should-really-have-brought-earplugs” loud; the band probably won’t verbally interact with each other and – perhaps most assured of all – those who kneel at the altar of J Mascis will spend the entire mass show gawking at the frontman, agog, often open-mouthed and expectant of the next face-melting solo. Having had its doors darkened by many a revered figure this year, Dublin’s Vicar Street is no exception to that trifecta tonight.…

  • HamsandwicH @ Live at St. Luke’s, Cork

    November 2, 2016 - By 

    Well, that was the best mass I’ve ever been to. St. Luke’s, a former Protestant church just on the northside of Cork City, is quickly becoming one of the premiere live venues in the city. Having entertained with the likes of Lisa Hannigan, Villagers, and Lynched in recent times, the church is building a reputation as a unique host of essential Irish artists. Combine that with the fact that it is the Jazz Weekend, in Cork and you have the potential for quite a raucous evening indeed. Offering support for HamsandwicH tonight is acoustic singer songwriter Sarah Buckley. A local,…

  • John Carpenter @ Vicar Street, Dublin

    October 25, 2016 - By 

    Not entirely unlike that scene in Wayne’s World where Wayne and Garth declare themselves all but contemptible in the presence of Alice Cooper, the sense of collective unworthiness when John Carpenter quite literally struts out on stage with his band in Vicar Street tonight is tangible. Hands down one of cinema’s greatest auteurs – a fiercely single-minded master of both sound and vision – the 68-year-old has accumulated very few naysayers over his genre-spanning, critic-slaying, five-decade career to date, a fact that is comfortably underlined by the idolatrous energy in the much-loved Dublin venue tonight. But from those first ominous ripples of the main title to his 1981 dystopian classic Escape…

  • Irish Tour: Sleaford Mods

    October 24, 2016 - By 

    In the latest installment of Irish Tour, Jonny Currie and photographers Dee McEvoy and Aidan Kelly Murphy capture the return of Sleaford Mods to Dublin and Belfast. Mandela Hall, Belfast Photos by Dee McEvoy Behold, hear the voice of one calling: prepare ye the way of the Mods. The prophecy of Divide and Brexit has been fulfilled. The importance of securing entry to key markets clogs up our newsfeeds. Meanwhile two blokes called Jason and Andrew have signed a record deal with Rough Trade this year that should project their hard-worn, under-heard music to the wider audience it deserves, without compromise. Sleaford…

  • Beat Root: Caoimhín Ó Raghallaigh & Metá Metá

    September 14, 2016 - By 

    Back for its second year, Beat Root, Moving On Music’s festival of roots music, offered a program as diverse as imaginable, from harps, fiddles and thundering rock to singer-songwriter mastery and psychedelic folk.  Traditions, and the bending of them, were the constant dualities at play across four evenings of uplifting music, that taken together, amounted to one of Belfast’s best music festivals of the year to date. Though often associated with formal recitals, the harp can be one of the most expressive and one of the most thrilling of instruments – just think of Colombian Edmar Castaneda or Shetland islander Catriona…

  • Sestina @ Clonard Monastery, Belfast

    September 5, 2016 - By 

    The men of Sestina, Northern Ireland’s unique early ensemble are striding out on their own tonight, leaving the women, for now, in the wings. For this gender imbalance you can point an accusing finger, into the distant past, at various Papal decrees that forbade women singers in the church.Not good news for aspiring female singers of the time, though we should perhaps spare a thought for the promising young male altos, who were castrated in order to preserve their angelic voices. Today, happily enough, Sestina relies on natural talent as opposed to radical surgical manipulation for results. This concert, in the magnificent…

  • Altan w/ Kern @ Feile An Droichead

    September 9, 2016 - By 

    It’s undoubtedly something of a coup for Feile An Droichead to have persuaded Altan to play at An Droichead, a much smaller venue than is customary for the legendary group. Few trad outfits can boast the sustained activity and international appeal of Altan, who have been thrilling audiences around the world for three decades. The band will be celebrating its 30th anniversary in 2017, but in truth, an Altan concert at any time is a celebratory event and tonight is no different. First up, however, is Kern. The Louth trio has been together for nearly three years and its dashing…

  • Josie Nugent @ The Belfast Barge

    September 7, 2016 - By 

    Now in its eighth year, Feile An Droichead has worked its way quietly, and with little fanfare, to a point where this annual celebration of Irish music and language arguably ranks as one of the signature events in Northern Ireland’s burgeoning cultural calendar. Beyond the confines of its An Droichead home, the 2016 edition has seen the festival extend its reach into the wider community, with performances in the Ulster Museum, Black Box and the Belfast Barge creating, at the very least, the possibility of bringing traditional music to a more general audience. The honour of closing An Droichead 2016,…

  • Sam Beam & Jesca Hoop w/ Erika Wennerstrom @ Marine Court Hotel, Bangor

    August 31, 2016 - By 

    Erika Wennerstrom breaks down in tears several songs into her support slot. Open House Festival Director Kieran Gilmore proclaims that “Bangor is the new Cathedral Quarter.” Jesca Hoop suggests that she and Sam Beam could be married by the end of the evening. Some context: on hiatus from fronting garage-rockers Heartless Bastards, Wennerstrom (below) is road-testing some emotionally direct solo material in Bangor tonight and it shows in her early nervous delivery. This is an intense and at times uncomfortable opening set, but she makes it through thanks to a hugely supportive audience. This is the Open House Festival’s fourth…