• Lisa Hannigan @ The Duncairn, Belfast

    November 6, 2017 - By 

    Lisa Hannigan and her band have just edged into the first verse of their fifth song at Belfast’s Duncairn Centre for Culture & Arts. I’ve quickly nipped to the bathroom, where I overhear this brief tête-à-tête between two gentlemen: “Some gig, isn’t it?” “I’ve only just arrived. Stuck in traffic.” “Oh, Jesus.” As I leap up the stairwell back into the venue space, it suddenly hits me: the “Oh, Jesus” immediately (and very tellingly) severed the exchange between the two strangers. When it comes to a Lisa Hannigan show, it really is in your best interests to be present from the very first note…

  • BNQT @ The Button Factory, Dublin

    November 6, 2017 - By 

    The initial seeds of BNQT were planted by Midlake’s Eric Pulido while touring their Antiphon album back in 2013. He hoped he could convince several of his favourite vocalists into a collaboration of sorts that mirrored something akin to the Traveling Wilburys crossed with The Band, with vocal and songwriting duties being shared. Fast forward to April of this year and BNQT’s debut Volume.1 finally blossomed, with Grandaddy’s Jason Lytle, Travis’ Fran Healy, Franz Ferdinand’s Alex Kapronas and Band of Horses Ben Bridwell joining Pulido and some of his fellow Midlake colleagues; Jesse Chandler, Joey McClellan and McKenzie Smith. With…

  • The Jesus and Mary Chain @ Vicar Street, Dublin

    October 19, 2017 - By 

    It seems that there’s a different vibe in The Jesus & Mary Chain camp since the release of Damage and Joy in March of this year; antagonism replaced with affability and scorn with humour. It’s in and around six months ago that the band visited The Academy with their first studio album in almost twenty years fresh off the presses, and tellingly on that outing it was Psychocandy material that made up the bulk of the setlist. Not so in Vicar Street – their seminal debut rears its head, but tonight’s is a much more rounded selection and the band…