Last year’s NI Music Prize winner Ryan Vail teamed up with BAFTA-nominated film & TV composer Sheridan Tongue, AKA IN-IS to bring us a remix of the latter’s ‘Broken Ones feat. Haula’. Another characteristically panoramic blend of balmy atmospheric washes and lush synth arpeggios, Vail continues to deliver in abundance as a collaborator, remixing with the same verve and creativity as can be found across his body of solo compositional work. Of the remix, Sheridan told us: “Ryan Vail is a producer I have admired for many years. Coming from the world of film and television soundtracks, I find his ability to create an expansiveness and…
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Never one to balk at a remix, Herb Magee aka Arvo Party’s latest re-imagining is arguably one of his most inspired to date. The Belfast producer and musician (who also features in our round-up of the best Irish tracks of last month) has taken the slick, slow-burning alt-pop of HEX HUE’s ‘Numbers’ and reworked it as a widescreen electro gem in his own image. Stream it below.
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Taken from one of the Irish releases of last year, the five-track Death of the Shadows, ‘Black Moon’ found Kilrea singer-songwriter Robyn G Shiels‘ funereal folk craft stripped back to a plaintive, five-minute ode. It was a fitting curtain call for an EP that doubly confirmed the Belfast-based musician as one of the most incisive songwriting voices around. Three months on, Herb Magee aka Arvo Party has given the song the remix treatment. And how it comes off: leaning into the innate spaciousness and yearnful quality of the original, Magee’s inspired washes of ambience and decay reveal a whole new character to Shiels’…
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Via the likes of his 1/1/2017 EP, this stellar John Carpenter cover in back in October, remixes for the likes of Rory Nellis and New Pagans and the release of his Northern Ireland Music Prize-nominated self-titled debut album – one of our Irish albums of the year, no less – it’s safe to say Belfast producer and musician Herb Magee AKA Arvo Party has a very strong 2017. Sealing the deal on the last few months is Magee’s brand new remix of ‘Snow II’ by Wyvern Lingo, a six-minute electro re-imagining that nocturnalises the original in fine fashion. Having already confirmed his…
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After the release of True Care, James Vincent McMorrow released the stems for two album tracks ‘Pink Salt Lake’ and ‘Holding On’, opening up the floor for remixers to explore and interpret the album in new ways. In an Instagram post he said: “Everything about True Care has been different. I want that reality to extend to the remixes.” Dublin-native Amsterdam-based producer Sean Arthur AKA Kobina has stepped up to the plate with a languid remix of ‘Pink Salt Lake’, taking the hushed, velvety ambience of the original and decorating it with light, pulsing beats, down-pitched vocals and giving the gospel choir backdrop a welcome…
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Currently on tour in Germany with Dave Hause, Kilrea doom-folk master Robyn G Shiels released arguably his strongest single to date, ‘If I Were Thy Demon’, back in November last year. Four months on, the track has been totally – and rather brilliantly – reworked by Belfast drone-pop band Documenta. Alternatively titled ‘DocuDemonta’, the remix – which is released as an exclusive pre-order of upcoming Robyn G Shiels EP, I Have Loved The Stars Too Fondly To Be Fearful Of The Night – makes for a blistering four and a half minutes. …Fearful Of The Night by Robyn G Shiels
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Whether teased out via whim or intention, collaboration is often the key to unearthing untested majesty. In the case of Jealous of the Birds and Ryan Vail, ‘Love is a Crow’ recently saw two worlds collide in perfectly curious fashion with the former’s spoken word spirals and vocals melding with the latter’s bubbling electronica and chopping rhythms. Taking the collaborative buzz one step further, Dee Lucille AKA DIE HEXEN’s remix of the track is a spectral masterclass, quietly dragging the original through a velvet netherworld of Badalamentian synth-work, heaving textures and warped vocal refrains. Have an exclusive first listen to that below.
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Rounding off a busy year that saw them unleash their stellar, Bella Union-released debut album, Scan The Blue, Belfast’s Daniel Todd and James Smith AKA exmagician have bookended 2016 with the release of a wonderfully simmering High Noon remix of STB highlight ‘Desperado’. Following on from Jacknife Lee’s sprawling 18-minute remix of single ‘Job Done’ and the band’s own sublime re-imaging of ‘Tear On Let Off Steam‘, the track – which sees harmonies and rhythmic patterns come to the fore – is stripped back to its skeletal core, bursting forth with a subtly propulsive electro swagger. Dig it below. Photo for the…
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With the launch of their debut album, Birth, taking place at London’s Electrowerkz tonight (May 7), Cork electro-pop duo Young Wonder are an Irish act very much on the up. Having released a stream of the original a couple of weeks ago, the pair have now unveiled a wonderfully understated remix of ‘Sweet Dreaming’ by London’s Tusks, a re-working that really drives home the track’s darkly, earworming melodic flourishes. Where the original is a dusky, beguiling effort, Tusks’ remix is a much more nocturnal affair; something for soundtracking that solitary headspace back home after a night out. Win tickets to the duo’s…
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“I am not a loner, I’m just alone.” Ahead of headlining our gig/club night, No Tomorrow, at Belfast’s Voodoo on Saturday, May 3, Dublin indie rock duo We Cut Corners have had their track ‘Blue’ masterfully contorted by Galway producer Daithí. Set to feature on We Cut Corners’ forthcoming second album, Think Nothing, the remix of ‘Blue’ is both structurally warped and vocally frenetic, resulting in a brilliant schizoid rendering of the original. Think Nothing is released on April 25 in Ireland) and May 12 in the UK. Believe it or not, our show with We Cut Corners on Saturday, May 3…