The Cork music community is a bricolage of fascinating idiosyncrasy, but if there’s one through-line, it’s a hint of lysergic, and Limerick-born, Cork-based Elaine Malone‘s latest single is no exception. Where Malone has long been followed by the psych-folk tag, the psychedelia on her debut Land EP was implicit, bubbling under the surface in textural and compositional choices, as well as Sam Clague’s airy restraint on production. With Altered Hours’ Cathal MacGabhann engineering this time around, she’s accomplished her first bona fide electric wig-out in ‘My Baby’s Dead’ with spectacular finesse. We had a chat with Elaine about this hard left turn and how it came about.…
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Is it towering, climactic psychgaze you’re after? Dublin’s Sun Mahshene has you covered. Out today, ‘This Girl I Know’ is the third single from their forthcoming debut album Contradictions and Tales of Fiction, set for release later this summer through Reckless Records. Its three guitars forging an impenetrable wall of sound, the song oozes Ride-worthy euphoria and the midtempo-swagger of Oasis at their most clamorous – think ‘Columbia’ via Creation Records at the end of a Danny Boyle film – helped in no small part by its production at Darklands Audio, Dublin. You can catch Sun Mahshene play The Thomas House on June 21 with Galants, or at Electric…
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At the heart of Bangor three-piece Gender Chores‘ fuzzed-out punk craft is ardent political consciousness and incisive activist spirit. Staring down and decimating everything from Northern Ireland’s archaic abortion laws, the patriarchy and more, new EP Womensplain is a self-assured and vital statement that, rather than meekly express the desire for change across the board, positively demands it. Stream the EP in full below.
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Comprising members of NI alt-rock royalty in Throat and Element, the music of Portadown/Larne trio Duellists is full-blown, riff-fuelled testament to the power of perseverance and pushing forward. Off the back of lead singles ‘Into the Fade’ and the recently-released ‘Perspective’, their long-awaited debut album, Into The Fade, makes for a breakneck, twelve-track statement of intent across 35 minutes. Recorded by Caolán Austin at Smalltown America Studios in Derry and mixed by Kurt Ballou (Converge) at Godcity Studios, it’s a release that firmly reveals the threesome to be at the peak of their collective powers. Duellists play Dundalk’s The Spirit Store on…
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Dublin-based indie-noise outfit The Elephant Room are one of a select number of DIY artists in Ireland assimilating a broad range of influences from the 60s through to the present year with complete seamlessness. We’re pleased to be premiering their sprawling new single ‘Juniper & Pine’, complete with the band’s self-made video. The song itself is an almost ten minute marriage of experimental noisecraft and lo-fi pop that somehow never outstays its welcome as ekes out new levels of its conceptual framework. Easing in with a Laurel Canyon-indebted neo-psych groove, its lysergic-soaked corners quickly darken into a clamorous sonic ego-death parallel, before returning to consensus reality as something familiar, yet altered.…
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Despite their relatively young age, kitchen sink indie rock five piece Buí have been crafting some of the most earnestly well-crafted power-pop tunes around. Not ones to tread the beaten path, they debuted with a fully-fledged long-player in 2017’s Eugene, and have since been built their DIY profile from the ground up. The video for new single ‘Something Else To Talk About’ is an astounding feat – an 8-bit video game animation that not just acts as an apt visual companion to the song, but functions as its own winsome arcade fable. As if the band were collectively assimilated into a Scott Pilgrim fever dream – each…
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Dublin threesome Sissy know a thing or two about breakneck lo-fi punk. Take new single, ‘Not In My Head’. Racing out of the traps, almost bursting at the seams with pure-cut gusto, it’s a four-minute romp of stellar guitar shapes and feverish refrains. And what a video. Shot at Dalymount Park – the Phibsborough home of Bohemian F.C. – it captures Leigh, Michelle and Eoin well and truly in their element.
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A self-proclaimed fuzzy account of a long night out in Dublin (hey, we’ve all been there) ‘Nightshade’ by Dublin quartet Tomorrows is a sorcerous five-minute effort that marries slick, woozy textures with an overarching air of wanderlust. Initial recordings for the track – which will feature on the band’s new album, The Night Chorus 1 – were made on an 8 track Tascam reel-to-reel machine, before being brought to Christian Best (O Emperor, Marlene Enright) who recorded the drums and mixed the track. Driving it all home is Irish artist Ursula Woods’ sublime video to accompany the single. Shot on an Autumn evening…
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Not that you need reminding, but Dublin indie quartet Bouts released one of the Irish albums of the year (thus far) back in January. Released today, the fourth single to be taken from Flow is ‘Passing Through’ and what a timely, sun-drenched cut it is. Bounding with starry-eyed hooks, it’s a brisk but brilliant effort that faces down “the transience of life – friendship, music and attachment.” Move over ‘Get Lucky’ – this is the sound of the (Irish) summer. Check out Teresa Weikmann’s video for the single below.
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Ahead of only their third show to date, supporting Beak> this Saturday, May 18 at Whelan’s, tri-city post-punk trio Grave Goods have kindly given us a first recorded glimpse of their visceral power. ‘Source’ is the first release from a session filmed by experimental filmmaking platform IMPATV, which records & broadcasts the heavier side of DIY, experimental & underground culture. Featuring members of Pins, Girls Names and September Girls, ‘Source’ forgoes the brooding atmospheres & jangle of the aforementioned in favour of primal urgency. More than delivering on the promise of its constituent parts, Sarah Grimes & Phil Quinn’s Girl Band-recalling rhythmic syncopation lay claustrophobic, anxious loops between which Lois MacDonald’s buzzsaw guitar finds voids to…