• Stream: Oh Volcano – Rush Of Blood

    June 23, 2015 - By 

    Forming from the embers of General Fiasco early last year, Belfast brother duo Owen and Enda Strathern AKA Oh Volcano have consistently piqued our interest over the last couple of years with sporadic live shows and singles including ‘Oceans’ and ‘See No Evil’. Taken from their forthcoming debut, Don’t Know Love, new single ‘Rush of Blood’ goes one further, proving a very considered, wonderfully produced piece of electro-pop. Oh Volcano play their next show at Belfast’s Empire on July 3, alongside Goons, Dutch Schultz and Parapa Palace. Stream ‘Rush of Blood’ below. Artwork by Stuart Bell.

  • EP Stream: Rosseau – Rosseau

    June 12, 2015 - By 

    Having delivered a convincing set supporting SOAK at Belfast’s Empire on Wednesday night, new-fangled Derry duo Colm Hinds and Daniel Kerr AKA Rosseau have hit the ground running with their new six-track, self-titled debut EP. Calling to mind the likes of the Appleseed Cast and Codeine, the release traverses moments real, beguiling fragility, striking a nice balance between sparse emo, imaginative musicianship and slowcore-esque passages. According to their Bandcamp page, Rosseau “was formed in the late summer of 2014 following some shitty circumstances.” Rosseau EP by Rosseau

  • Watch: The Emerald Armada – This House

    June 10, 2015 - By 

    Hands down one of the country’s very best live acts, Northern Irish alt-folk trouveurs The Emerald Armada have spent the last few years building a loyal, suitably armada-like fanbase. With a new EP set for release in November – the highly-anticipated follow-up to last year’s sublime Five Beating Hearts EP – the Neil Allen-fronted five-piece have unveiled the video for their new single, ‘This House’. Betraying a real sense of pop-centric progression from the band, the video for the song – recorded by Start Together’s Rocky O’Reilly – was directed and edited by Wilson Lynn.  

  • Watch: MOLARBEAR – Highclops

    June 10, 2015 - By 

    A year on from grabbing our attention with their debut single, ‘Fierce Brosnan’, back in August last year, Belfast-based riffmasters general MOLARBEAR have unleashed the equal parts lethal and livid ‘Highclops’. Comprised of members from Jackalfeud and the Big Grizzly, the band recorded the six-minute track at Belfast’s Bearcat Studios. Its video, for all its inventiveness, borders on the nightmare-inducing. Nightmares you want to have and tell everyone about. Not that they’ll listen, but you’ll still tell them. Anyway. Watch the video for ‘Highclops’ below.

  • Stream: Girls Names – Reticence

    June 1, 2015 - By 

    Three months on from the release of eleven-minute post-punk odyssey ‘Zero Triptych’, Girls Names have re-emerged with one of the their strongest tracks to date, ‘Reticence’. With guitars returning to centre-stage from the off, the track unravels from a scourging intro to reveal a band exuding an air of confidence in the latest manifestation of their constantly evolving yet always instantly recognisable sound. Stream the track – taken from the band’s forthcoming album Arms Around a Vision – below.

  • EP Stream: Craft Work – 3 Songs

    May 25, 2015 - By 

    A more abstracted and sample-heavy affair when paired against the comparatively more linear jazz-punk experimentalism of his band, Robocobra Quartet, Belfast-based musician and producer Chris Ryan AKA Craft Work has unveiled 3 Songs, a triptych of hip-hop-leaning tracks featuring samples from the likes of Le Mystère des Voix Bulgares, Olivier Messiaen and Steve Reich.  Whilst parallels can be drawn to Ryan’s Beat-like lyricism in the aforementioned quartet (who play our Tuesday Throwdown at Belfast’s Lavery’s tomorrow night, don’t you know?), there is a distinctive open-ended sense of freedom to the release that lends to its all-too-brief charm and appeal. 3 Songs by Craft Work

  • Stream: Hot Cops – Decay/Six

    May 20, 2015 - By 

    We’re going on the record here: Belfast trio Hot Cops are one of the best up-and-coming bands in the country at the minute, and easily the most satisfyingly spot on indie rock power-triptychs Ireland has probably ever produced. “Aye, right!” cries out an ill-informed, anonymous voice in the proverbial crowd. And we refute that refutation with the following link to the Carl Eccles-fronted trio’s blisteringly brilliant new double single, ‘Decay/Six’. Familiar in all the right places, with a carefully-considered lack of affectation (paradoxes are “in”, man), both tracks are outright highlights from the band’s ever-impressive live show – one that you shouldn’t pass…

  • Inbound: Oaks

    May 21, 2015 - By 

    When he’s not drumming for the likes of Matua Trap and Kasper Rosa, Belfast-based drummer and producer James ‘Tree’ Bruce is concocting some sublime electronic sounds as Oaks. Having just released his consistently impressive, hugely promising debut release, L’etoile Mysterieuse, Brian Coney chats to Bruce about the project. You’re a drummer in a couple of different bands – what inspired you to branch out (no pun intended) into Oaks? I’ve been making music on my own for years but it was always just for the pleasure of doing it, seeing what I could come up with. It was actually a…

  • Stream: Rams Pocket Radio – Resevoir

    May 6, 2015 - By 

    Having laid low for a few months, Lisburn singer-songwriter Peter McAuley AKA Rams Pocket Radio has re-emerged with ‘Resevoir’, a strong, electronica-infused effort hinting at some very promising things in the making. Driven by McAuley’s immediately recognisable vocals and a wonderful string trio, the track was mixed and engineered by Rocky O’Reilly at Belfast’s Start Together Studio. Stream/download ‘Reservoir’ below. Reservoir by RAMS’ Pocket Radio

  • Stream: Pleasure Beach – Go

    April 23, 2015 - By 

    Belfast dream-pop bands are few and far between. Deeming themselves just that – exactly 3,339 miles to the east of Baltimore’s Beach House – are Pleasure Beach, a new-fangled five-piece who met whilst working in the “estimable coffee shops of Belfast”. Featuring members of Northern Irish acts including Yes Cadets and In An Instant, the band’s debut single, ‘Go’, takes its cue from “pounding stadium Americana, hypnotic krautrock and blurry-eyed Scandinavian pop”, forging a self-assured and decidedly mesmeric four-and-a-half minutes of sun-kissed, wanderlust-driven pop. A self-proclaimed “part bruised break-up song, part existential post-apocalyptic horror story”, you can stream the track below.