• EP Stream: Music For Dead Birds – Nail & Tooth

    August 9, 2017 - By 

    Long favourites of ours here at The Thin Air, Galway experimental folk twosome Jimmy Monaghan and Dónal Walsh AKA Music For Dead Birds are a band whose lo-fi craft would not have been out of place on the roster of Sam Berger’s Homestead Records in the early 90s. Having first appeared on our radar back in 2011 via The Pope’s Sister – an album we said conjured the likes of Sebadoh and Polvo – the pair have drip-fed a series of releases in the interim, most recently 2015’s Your Brand New Life. New EP Nail & Tooth both marks the band’s 10th year in…

  • Watch: Elephant – Mirrors

    August 8, 2017 - By 

    Just last week we featured ‘Mirrors’ by Dundalk-based artist and multi-instrumentalist Shane Clarke AKA Elephant, an effort we called a “Bowie-coloured route with distorted, effect laden guitars, sparkling keys and prominent drums propping up Clarke’s vocals”. The third single to be taken from his forthcoming second album, the song – which is “a pining for youth, mourning its mistakes and trying to recall just when it was that you became so cynical” – has been granted another, wonderfully crafted resonance courtesy of visuals from the videographers over at Farney House. Roll on album number two.

  • Premiere: Joey Gavin – Rolf/Run

    August 8, 2017 - By 

    No stranger to provocative, accessibly experimental indie rock, the latest two-track from Thumper‘s Joey Gavin is called Rolf/Run, released on 7″ through prolific Irish DIY label Little L Records (Shamir, Homeshake, Alex Calder, Syd Kemp etc.). It’s a catchy psych-pop number whose acid-dripped King Gizzard-lite melody belies a more acerbic message, veiling a darkness even The Zombies would nary have attempted. It’s framed, as you might have guessed, around the shortcomings of institutional hierarchies, and the abuse of power that they’ve given rise to, without forgetting to check ourselves for letting it happen; evenly, he also explores the shortcomings of the witch-hunt that can, and does take place, it’s…

  • Watch: Meljoann – Private World (Live)

    August 4, 2017 - By 

    You know what’s great and extremely re-watchable? This brand new live video of Irish producer, DJ and musician Meljoann performing ‘Private World’. Featuring a nice range of instruments and interfaces (namely Ableton Live, Akai LPD-8, MOTU Ultralite mk-3, JoeMeek threeQ, Alesis Vortex Wireless Keytar, and a guitar for all your gear heads), it is – as top comment on the video accurately sums up – a “deliriously fantastic” rendition, conjuring the likes of Prince and Janet Jackson fed through a prism of darkly electro sounds. THAT SOLO.

  • Eraser TV – Buzzfeed Depression Quiz

    August 3, 2017 - By 

    Just released is Limerick post-punk noise-pop act Eraser TV‘s debut EP, the wryly-titled Buzzfeed Depression Quiz, that tells you all you need to know about the wry wit of the trio. Featuring zero short, snappy numbers and a nine-minute epic celebration of languor, no compromise has been made on the EP, filled with all the trimmings, creases, and slightly-off guitar lines you’d hope from a band with nothing to lose. Buzzfeed Depression Quiz is a completely unselfconscious release, and is all the better for it. The EP was recorded and produced by Chris Quigley, self-released and available on Bandcamp on a pay-what-you-like basis. Stream below:…

  • GOURD/Luxury Mollusc Split LP

    August 1, 2017 - By 

    Two of Ireland’s premier doom-laden purveyors of noise release a split record on August 21st through Cursed Monk Records. Melding the suffocating, guttural blackened doom of Gourd with the harsh atmospheric ‘scrap abuse’ of Luxury Mollusc, the split opens with two longer tracks from Gourd and five snappier little numbers from Luxury Mollusc. It’s available to pre-order on cassette from Bandcamp. Stream the split below: GOURD/Luxury Mollusc by GOURD/Luxury Mollusc

  • Stream: Autumns – Female Model/No More Luxury

    July 31, 2017 - By 

    Having first featured the project back in February of 2014, the music of Derry’s Christian Donaghey AKA Autumns has steadily mutated from shoegaze-inflected, willfully acerbic noise rock into a much darker, beat-orientated and industrially-inclined proposition. Following a string of single and EP releases, Donaghey is set to cement that gestation by unveiling his debut album, Suffocating Brothers, via Glasgow imprint Clan Destine Records on September 23. To accompany the new singles, two new tracks ‘Female Model’ and ‘No More Luxury’ are equally emphatic fist-clenched efforts that aim straight for the jugular. Featuring suitably stellar artwork from Belfast artist Claire Miskimmin (also of Girls Names/Cruising/New…

  • Premiere: Ryan Kelly – G.O.N.E.

    July 28, 2017 - By 

    Dublin’s Ryan Kelly set out his singer-songwriter stall earlier this year with the piano-driven ‘City Views’, a track which married his recognisable influences with a refreshingly stripped-back take on youth and becoming. New single ‘G.O.N.E.’ goes one step further. An easy-listening ballad, it is simultaneously an effort that is endearingly simple in its composition and tone, as well as one of that’s unashamedly pop at its very core. Sometimes, that’s more than enough. Have a first look at the beat-up VHSesque visuals for the single below.

  • Watch: Sleep Thieves – Is This Ready?

    July 28, 2017 - By 

    Having released one of the Irish albums of 2014 in the form of You Want The Night, Dublin-based synth-pop trio Sorcha Brennan, Wayne Fahy, and Keith Byrne AKA Sleep Thieves has spent the last couple of years concocting a strong return. Bolstered by a sublime short film accompaniment courtesy of Spiceburger, new single ‘Is This Ready?’ exceeds expectations. A simmering, four-minute burst of darkly electro-pop, it sees the band’s sorcerous brand of sonic nocturnalism as potent as ever. Speaking of the track, the band said it was “the sonic realization of memories, visions, emotions, and experiences, set to a backdrop of the…

  • Stream: Ciaran Lavery – Everything Is Made To Last

    July 28, 2017 - By 

    If you’ve been in any familiar with what we’ve done over the last few years, you’ll know that we have a lot of time for Aghagallon’s Ciaran Lavery. A rare breed of artist who navigates sorrow, wanderlust, love and the borderline mystical hidden spaces that both join and keep us apart, his music comes from a place of a potent grasp of the human condition. Having been zig-zagging around the continent playing shows over the last few months, his new single ‘Everything Is Made To Last’ is a four-minute distillation of what has made all previous efforts so profoundly listenable. Triumphant…