Phoenix, Arizona alternative rock heroes Meat Puppets live in Dublin and Belfast. Empire Music Hall, Belfast Photos by Colm Laverty Whelan’s, Dublin Photos by Moira Reilly
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Arizona alternative rock heroes Meat Puppets will play three dates in Ireland in June. The band – who formed in 1980 by brothers Curt and Cris Kirkwood with Derrick Bostrom – will play Limerick’s Dolan’s on June 7, Belfast’s Empire Music Hall on June 8 and Whelan’s in Dublin on June 9. The shows will take place as part of a tour marking the band’s new album, Dusty Notes, which will feature the band’s original line-up for the first time since 1995. Tickets go on sale this Monday, February 10 at 9am.
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With new material very much on the horizon, it’s no surprise that North Coast singer-songwriter Tony Wright AKA VerseChorusVerse is a bit of a lifelong Nirvana fanatic. With his music-making nom de plume deriving from the legendary trio’s non-album track of the same name, Wright has gone one further and released a striking, decidedly lo-fi cover of a song that they too covered (and thereby made famous the world over): the Meat Puppets‘ prophetic ‘Lake of Fire’. With the aforementioned original studio material set for release in the coming months, Wright’s rendition is the lead track of a new collection of…
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The sun continues to bless Optimus Primavera Sound on the festival’s second day. Arriving on site in the late afternoon there’s ample time to have a cocktail from one of the stalls dotted around the Parque da Cicade before the day’s schedule begins, and with a nice strong caipirinha costing a mere €4 it would be rude not to. People-watching whilst sipping on a drink and strolling around is an oddly compelling pastime, but it’s best to conserve energy for the moment as today sees a further two stage areas opened up to the public – the ATP Stage and the…
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The wonderful thing about a deplorable culture like that of the 1980s is that the counterculture is sure to be interesting; this brings us to SST Records, one of the landmark independent record labels filed away in the lower, yet equally storied recesses of popular music. Originally purposed as Solid State Transmitters – a small electronics business formed by a 12 year old soon-to-be founding member & guitarist of pioneering hardcore act Greg Ginn – SST Records opened for business in 1978 as a way for Ginn to release and distribute his own material with Black Flag, and shortly thereafter…
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It’s something of a miracle that the Meat Puppets’ last three of their fourteen records have been among their most chilled-out, considering the trauma that’s plagued their careers in recent years – one notable exploit being bassist Cris Kirkwood’s 21-month prison sentence for assault on a police officer in 2003 – but despite, and perhaps in spite of these things, the brothers Meat have come full-circle. Starting out as a bunch of Deadhead hippies, Curt and Cris Kirkwood soon discovered hardcore and had several bouts of musical schizophrenia before Kurt Cobain propelled their name to alt. rock cult heroes via…