• Parquet Courts at The Helix, Dublin

    June 14, 2022 - By 

    As the stage crew carry out the last of their tasks, the countdown to Parquet Courts’ arrival draws imminently closer. The stage of Dublin’s Helix is bathed in a low red hue, which gives off more of a dance club aesthetic to proceedings, as opposed to the fact it is about to host one of Brooklyn’s foremost indie bands. With the crowd beginning to gather, the club vibe is emphasised even further as the sounds of Todd Terje’s take on M’s ‘Pop Muzik’, and a remix of Timmy Thomas’ 1970s’ song ‘Why Can’t We Live Together’, pulsate from the PA.…

  • Parquet Courts Set For Dublin Return

    September 23, 2021 - By 

    Parquet Courts are coming back to Dublin. Having last played the city back in 2018, the New York indie-rock quartet will play the Helix in Dublin on Saturday, June 11. The announcement comes as part of news of the band’s forthcoming seventh album Sympathy For Life and its accompanying world tour. Tickets for the Dublin show cost €29.80 and go on sale on Friday, September 24. Watch the video for the band’s new single ‘Black Widow Spider’ below.

  • Parquet Courts @ The Academy, Dublin

    November 5, 2018 - By 

    In the giddy days leading up to Parquet Courts‘ sold-out Academy show, social media was strewn with desperate pleas aimed squarely at the #ticketfairy. It came as no big surprise. Riding high off the back of their sixth – and easily most accessible album to date – Wide Awake!, the Brooklyn indie rock heroes are, without question, at their all-time most happening right now. Take a well-earned bow, the marketing team at Rough Trade. Capped at a cosy 850, the heaving Dublin venue tonight buzzes like a glorified in-store, relocated to what could feasibly be some neony student union of the early 2000s (that the room is promptly transformed into…

  • Parquet Courts – Wide Awake!

    May 24, 2018 - By 

    Parquet Courts’ latest is a petrochemical explosion of fiery politics and sprawling creativity. Building upon their established art-punk sound, the Texan outfit’s experimentation with technicolour keyboard textures, funk grooves and Latin rhythms makes for their most immediate and stylistically diverse release to date. Aptly titled Wide Awake!,  the album is an unapologetically political outing, showcasing A. Savage’s lyrics which seethe with rage and indignation, his thoughts seemingly drawn into sharper focus by the U.S.A’s ongoing political calamity. Crunchy garage rock opener ‘Total Football’ indulges the bands more mercurial instincts with elastic time signatures and a jerkily danceable bassline, providing the…

  • Label Mixtape: What’s Your Rupture?

    April 14, 2016 - By 

    Running an independent record label can often seem like one of the more concrete definitions of a ‘labour of love’. Brooklyn-based label What’s Your Rupture? (WYR?), founded in 2003 by one Kevin Pedersen, has managed to strike a superb balance in its release strategy – giving a platform to newer bands while simultaneously bringing older artists to new audiences. Oddly enough, the label originally started off the back of the notoriety gained by Pedersen’s stand-up comedy act, but has since gone on to become one of the most venerated underground labels in contemporary music. While fairly discerning in what he…

  • Parquet Courts w/ Cian Nugent & The Cosmos @ Limelight, Belfast

    September 6, 2015 - By 

    It would be a surprise if Parquet Courts play a gig of this size in Belfast again. The Brooklyn-via-Texas quartet are squeezing in this trip up north after gigs in Galway and Limerick, and before an appearance down at Electric Picnic the next night. Not very practical perhaps, but for a band in thrall to the pre-internet era of following your own muse free from promotional “practicalities,” it makes perfect sense. This is an early show at the Limelight. Good news for Parquet Courts fans who want an early night, bad news for any staff with the difficult task of…

  • Parquet Courts w/ Oh Boland, Cian Nugent & The Cosmos @ Roisin Dubh, Galway

    September 4, 2015 - By 

    From the offset of tonight’s festivities it is made plainly clear that no one will be leaving this room with ears as healthy as they were when they came in. Getting things going, local institution and ever-progressing garage maestros Oh Boland (below) break into their brand of screechy, uplifting and loud jams. Guitarist and vocalist Niall Murphy flaps about the stage like a moustachioed Crash Bandicoot while the rhythm section of Eanna MacDonnacha (bass) and Simon McDonagh (drums, backing vocals) provide equal measures of sweaty energy. The songs sound like taking a trip to the beach on a sunny day, except…

  • Parquet Courts – Sunbathing Animal

    August 12, 2014 - By 

    There must be a sense of relative trepidation whenever an underground band are thrown into the media spotlight from the depths of relative obscurity, and viewed by many a rock critic as the latest bearers of the indie rock torch. That sort of instant exposure was something that befell Brooklyn via Texas natives Parquet Courts, in the early part of last year, following the release of their second record Light Up Gold, especially after the success of the utterly infectious ‘Stoned and Starving’. Light Up Gold was considered a little rough around the edges, which resulted in the group being…