• St. Vincent @ The Olympia

    February 24, 2014 - By 

    The Olympia Theatre quickly fills up as Slow Skies take to the stage as tonight’s warm-up for the impending spectacle of St Vincent. Possibly to make the latter’s immaculate stage set up possible, the former are down to headcount of three, and squeezed to the front of the stage. With the reduced set up, all the pressure is on the delicately soaring voice of Karen Sheridan (below) to carry them into the attention of the waiting crowd. After a slightly nervous start, she settles into the new surroundings and by the time they swell into on the shore (the lead…

  • Foals @ The Olympia

    February 10, 2014 - By 

    Last time Foals played Dublin’s Olympia Theatre, eccentric frontman Yannick Philippakis took a wobbling stroll around the outer rim of the second floor balcony, pulling hip-swinging moves through the encore as he clung on with one hand. We can only assume the Olympia’s insurance company wasn’t in attendance: had they been, tonight might well have been subject to a safety veto. Foals, clearly, don’t do anything by halves. Emerging into a theatre borderline steaming from the storm outside, they firmly boot things into gear with a ‘Total Life Forever’, ‘Miami’ and ‘My Number’ trifecta, the singles launching a sing-along that…

  • All Tomorrow’s Parties: End of an Era Part 2

    December 5, 2013 - By 

    All Tomorrow’s Parties is a festival that’s had a place close to my heart across the past four years of my life, since my first foray, lured by a reformation gig by underground heroes Sleep. So perhaps I should have had a sense of sorrow looming over me as I sat on a minibus toiling along a motorway in the south of England, for I was on my way to the final ATP festival, at least in its classic form in an English holiday camp. Truth be told, the mixture of familiarity (not limited to buying three times as much…

  • Hannah McPhillimy: Freedom Songs @ Crumlin Road Gaol

    November 25, 2013 - By 

    Belfast Music Week has been host to many an interesting gig this year, from bookstores to bars, from balconies to boats, there doesn’t seem to be a shortage of quirky or fascinating venues, and now Hannah McPhillimy finds herself playing at The Crumlin Road Gaol. In conjunction with No More Traffik, ‘Freedom Songs’ is less of a traditional performance for the Belfast based singer/songwriter and more of an interactive journey through history. Tonight’s show is down in the depths of the now renovated and rejuvenated jail where Hannah uses all three corners of the triangular room to tell a capella…

  • The National @ The Odyssey, Belfast

    November 15, 2013 - By 

    Restraint. A hard quality to achieve in one’s day to day life. Musically, however, it’s very difficult indeed. Amplified by speaker stacks and placed in the glare of spotlights, many bands affect emotion by stomping on a distortion pedal or guldering angst-ridden couplets. In stark contrast, the austere members of The National continually reign in such fits of childish pique. Take, for example, ‘Bloodbuzz Ohio’, with its spiralling drum patterns, mournful horns and droning guitar. It’s a perfect storm albeit one that never breaks but pulses and throbs towards a climax which never quite arrives. It creates a thrilling tension,…

  • Enablers, Blue Whale, Selaah @ Voodoo, Belfast

    November 16, 2013 - By 

    Five years on from wowing a close-knit assembly at Lavery’s Bunker, one of the most distinctive post-rock bands of a generation return to the Belfast tonight dogged and purposeful despite founding guitarist Joe Goldring having his guitar stolen in Dublin the night before. Founded in 2004 and fronted by poet and spoken word artist Pete Simonelli, San Francisco’s Enablers are all but an act unto themselves, their thoroughly immersive brand of abrasive yet introspective instrumentalism propelled by a masterful confrontational voice that just about guarantees special things on the stage time and time again. Kicking off proceedings in typically inimitable fashion…

  • PigsAsPeople, El Ten Eleven, Droids @ Radar

    October 29, 2013 - By 

    Since resuming service in September Radar has hosted numerous strong acts, and tonight proves to top them all, should you have a taste for a bit of noise and jumping around. Droids open the night up with a guitar-led onslaught of enormous chords and hooks, alongside big vocal anthems. They play 30 minutes to a relatively quiet Speakeasy, but the slowly growing numbers in front of them doesn’t put them off. There are more than a few nods given to post-hardcore band Thrice throughout, with distorted walls of sound topped by piercing melodic riffs being a common factor in most of…

  • Soundgarden @ 02, Dublin

    September 19, 2013 - By 

    Three years and one surprisingly decent album into one of the lesser ill-advised “iconic” reunions of recent times, the return of Seattle four-piece Soundgarden has been met with a largely positive response from critics and fans alike. Where many legendary, genre-defining acts have faltered in the disparate gleam of contemporary life – where every action made, word said and note played is scrutinised no end by the hyper-mythologising masses – the Chris Cornell-fronted band have fared admirably. The question remains: how will their long-awaited return to Irish shores play out on the ninth date of a heady European tour? Following a crowd-winning…

  • Belsonic: Nine Inch Nails

    August 23, 2013 - By 

    With their eagerly anticipated eighth studio album, Hesitation Marks, primed for release at the beginning of next month, Trent Reznor’s genre-defining, decade-spanning Nine Inch Nails stop off in Belfast for Day Three of Belsonic 2013 experiencing quite possibly their most marked period of acclaim to date. Twenty-five years since Reznor formed the band as an effective solo project, there is an almost touchable urgency about the band and the music following a four-year incubation period. As fans rove in their thousands, everything, it would seem, is pointed in the general direction of a monumental first visit for the five-piece. Having endured the…

  • Spiritualized @ National Concert Hall, Dublin

    August 15, 2013 - By 

    There was no small sense of anticipation in the run-up to this one. Not only did Spiritualized announce that they were playing their Ladies & Gentlemen We Are Floating In Space album in its entirety, they were doing so in Dublin’s National Concert Hall with an orchestra, and it would be the only such performance of 2013. So, tickets were duly snapped up for what was a pretty low-key announcement, all things considered. As the more NCH-savvy members of the audience file in for the eight o’clock sharp start time, there is a palpable air of excitement in the ornate…