Category Archives: Music

Every kind of sound imaginable.

From left: Amelia Pim, Isla Gavin and India-Lily Muller launching the Imagine Arts Festival

The Imagine Arts Festival in Waterford enters its fourteenth year when it launches on of October 20-30.

Nearly sixty events across all genres and age groups will be happening across the city.

Writes Ann Power:

Some of the 2016 festival highlights include a wonderful visual art exhibition opening at Greyfriars Gallery with works from Artists Colin Martin, Martin Gale, Mick O’Dea and Eithne Jordan.

Musical highlights include gigs with U.S. indie country rock band Richmond Fontaine, fresh from Glastonbury, Malojian, BBC Folk Award winners Josienne and Ben and Kerry’s box maestro Seamus Begley, writers Mia Gallagher, Declan Hughes, Alan Glynn, Joe Duffy, Vincent Woods and Willy Vlautin, a ‘Rap and Rhyme Workshop’ lead by London based spoken word artist Potent Whisper.

Plus the premiere of a new opera ‘The Green One’, films, theatre and even a hoedown between Ring Gaeltacht Trad musicians and their Waterford city rivals at the John Dwyer Trad Weekend….

Imagine Arts Festival

Pic: Aileen Drohan

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Last month, TEDx CorkSalon presented #CorkLovesMusic, a two-night stint of talks and performances in Coughlan’s Live on Douglas Street, from musicians, DJs, singers, promoters, record-shop folk, music therapists and others speaking on their relationship with music.

In the playlist above is night one, hosted by your writer.

Talks from venue owner Sam McNicholl (Connolly’s of Leap), promoters Aisling O’Riordan & Caoilian Sherlock (Southern Hospitality Board), and record shop owner Ray O’Brien (Music Zone).

Performances from Dr. Dara O’Brien (sitar), Eamonn Cagney (percussion), M.Sea (vox/guitar), Arthur Itis (space), plus a guest appearance from Cork Sacred Harp Singers.

Night two on the ‘sheet tomorrow.

TEDx CorkSalon

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Dr. Strangely Strange – the return of legendary folk freaks

What you may need to know…

01. Started in 1967, folk experimentalists Dr. Strangely Strange were among the tenants of legendary Dublin rock lodgings The Orphanage, the same circle of people that produced Phil Lynott and Gary Moore among others.

02. Signing with Joe Boyd, producer/manager for the Incredible String Band, the band released debut LP Kip of the Serenes via Island Records in 1969, and the following year, recruited Moore for follow-up record Heavy Petting. The band disbanded in 1971 after a European tour, and have since reunited on a number of occasions inbetween other work in the arts, including for third LP Alternative Medicine in 1997.

03. Streaming above is one of the band’s calling cards, Strangely Strange But Oddly Normal, from the band’s first full-length.

04. The band plays its first gig in Cork city in over four decades this Sunday at the Kino, as part of IndieCork festival. Tickets €12, including a screening of a short documentary on the band filmed in 2007 before the performance.

VERDICT: One of the bands that helped set the scene for all manner of alternative music and experimentation in this country.

Dr. Strangely Strange

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SAND – second album for post-rock solo project

What you may need to know…

01. Keen observers of post-rock/instrumental ongoings may recall North Atlantic Oscillation, an Irish/English/Scottish outfit based in Edinburgh, releasing thru KScope, that came in for serious critical acclaim in the early part of the decade.

02. They’re fronted by Dublin/Limrock man Sam Healy, whose solo project SAND surfaced with a self-titled full-length in 2013, taking NAO’s soundscaping in a more introspective direction.

03. Streaming above is Seldom-Used Furniture, taken from SAND’s newly-released sophomore effort, A Sleeper, Just Awake.

04. The album is available now on CD and digital. Meanwhile, fans of Healy’s mothership will be happy to learn that a compilation of the band’s tunes is also up for pre-order at present via the band’s site.

VERDICT: Arriving at a mad intersection of post-rock, prog, psychedelia and taking on inflections of jazz, SAND plays with the various boundaries and lines between them all, to glorious effect.

SAND

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As Syrian refugees wait in purgatory in camps in Athens and Lesvos….

Tommy Flavin writes:

Thought you might be interested in this music video directed by me and a friend, we go under the name The Reelists. It’s for a Galway band called Rofi James. We shot the video out in Greece in several refugee camps, and it’s a documentary about the current state of the crisis.

The Reelists

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The world’s largest mirrorball, awaiting a lift to Dublin

Metropolis Festival goes down from November 3-5 at the RDS, Ballsbridge, Dublin 4 the second annual installment of the winter-time weekender.

Aside from a world-class line-up of music, art, conversation and performance, it’ll also have a ginormous mirrorball.

Sez Jenny Headen:

The size of a 3 storey building and covered with over 3,000 mirrored tiles, each the size of an A4 page, the Mirror Ball will take 8 days to build and will require 4 cranes to hoist it up so it can spin and cast its disco spell on Metropolis goers.

Certified by the Guinness Book of World Records as THE biggest mirror ball in the world, it is just one of the many art installations that will be onsite for this multi-disciplined and dynamic festival.

So there you have it. And perfect for Grace Jones on the Saturday.

Tickets on-sale now.

Metropolis

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Enemies – announce split and details of final long-player

What you may need to know…

01. Last time we checked in with Wicklow math/pop quartet Enemies, they’d put out single Play Fire and were gearing up for the festivals.

02. Unfortunately, the band announced this week that they’ll be winding up operations at the end of the year, calling it a day after the completion and release of their final album.

03. Streaming above is itsallwaves, the second single from the album, entitled Valuables. Releases on digital, CD, vinyl and cassette on December 9th via Topshelf Records.

04. Their farewell show will be their biggest ever, when they play Vicar St. in Dublin on December 18.

VERDICT: Another sad loss to Irish music in recent times, albeit a band that leaves a rich and varied body of art behind them, and arguably one of the cornerstones on which Ireland’s math/post-rock scene was built.

Enemies

Photo: Niall O’Kelly

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Filmmaker John Mulvaney is one of many to turn his lens on music in Ireland, in lieu of any support for the community by the industry/officialdom.

Thus was born Fractured, a documentary series with an eye on metal and other harsh noises in Ireland, running on Metal Ireland and screening at various festivals and events throughout the past year.

The newest episode focuses on Clonmel prog/sludge outfit zhOra, and explores the band, their music, and growing/sustaining music outside of the industry in Ireland.

New episodes will appear here as they happen, also, but for now, here’s a catch-up playlist of the rest of the series so far, with eight episodes ready to watch.

Fractured

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No Monster Club – lost somewhere in the backwoods

What you may need to know…

01. Bobby and the lads are off in Amerikay at present, pressing the flesh and raking up road miles to support their current 7″ record, Where Did You Get That Milkshake?.

02. It’s somehow the Dublin lo-fi lads’ debut 7″ after a rake of releases, but also their first for Stateside label Emotional Response.

03. We would hope that the video above, for single Do the Mess Around, has not been an accurate portrayal of events thus far.

04. Broadsheet readers situated Stateside might be able to show up and give ’em the shlag. The rest of their tour takes them to the Dev in Utica tonight; tomorrow night to Otto’s Shrunken Head in Manhattan; Candy Apple Island in Bloomfield, NJ on the 2nd, and New Funky Jungle in Providence, RI on the 5th.

VERDICT: Another pop gem the likes of which Bobby Aherne and the boys seem to just have in a stockpile somewhere. Grand.

NO MONSTER CLUB

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Magic Pockets – spacey synths/drones from No Spill Blood man

What you may need to know…

01. Magic Pockets is Ruadhán Meara, better known to fans of Irish heft as the synth-man from No Spill Blood.

02. Performing solo under the moniker since 2012, Meara’s sonic explorations emanate from a growing collection of vintage analogue synths, drum machines and various electronics. His odyssey has led him to share stages with Umberto, The Ex, Blanck Mass, and others.

03. Streaming above is Lunar Caustic, taken from the project’s debut LP Volcano of the Bleeding Skies.

04. The album releases on digital and vinyl formats on November 25, via Penske Recordings, the new label of ex-Out on a Limb/current PLUGD Records man Albert Twomey.

VERDICT: First listens of the record are promising, as synths usually heard poking from under chaos and distortion make themselves retail-VHS-clear and unfold at their own pace.

Magic Pockets