Tag Archives: new music

Marlene Enright Picture. John Allen

Marlene Enright – releasing new single Alchemy

What you may need to know…

01. The breathy, considered voice of Cork alt-folk outfit The Hard Ground, Marlene Enright has struck out solo in recent times with a run of singles.

02. Having helped see the Hard Ground through a crowd-funded trilogy of EPs, Triptych, in 2014, Enright’s debut solo album, Placemats and Second Cuts, is due in March of next year.

03. Streaming above is the video for new single Alchemy, filmed and directed by Cork filmmaker Barra Vernon.

04. Catch her touring Ireland in support of indie-rocker gone solo John Blek. John Cleere’s in Kilkenny on the 19th, Coughlan’s in Cork on the 25th, Phil Grimes’ in Waterford on the 26th, on the Other Voices Music Trail in Dingle on December 2nd and 3rd, capped off with a show at Whelan’s on the evening of the 3rd.

Verdict: Taking that slight, yet mighty voice in its own direction is a good fit, as Enright relays her own experiences with the help of purposeful writing and arrangement.

Marlene Enright

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ELLLL – releasing new extended-player Romance

What you may need to know…

01. Last time we checked in with ELLLL, she’d been putting the finishing touches on her first “proper” collection of songs after years of gigging and composing under the name.

02. Veering from her initial explorations in drone, ambient & noise, and into an atmospheric take on minimal techno, her debut extended player, Romance, finally releases across various formats this winter.

03. Streaming above is the eponymous leadoff tune from the extended player, with a full stream/interview over at the 405.

04. The E.P. releases this week digitally and next month on 12″ vinyl, via Sligo-based label Art for Blind, with the quest apparently on to assemble more tracks for a follow-on E.P.

Verdict: Laden with textures, and built on menacing, foreboding reinterpretations of a multitude of samples, this ought to be something else entirely to hear on wax.

ELLLL

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Overhead, the Albatross – Dublin post-rockers cover Hans Zimmer’s Time

What you may need to know…

01. Last we checked in with Overhead, the Albatross, they’d just launched their absolutely immense debut LP Learning to Growl.

02. Today, the band has released a wee stopgap between now and their big December gig in Vicar Street: their first ever attempt at a cover. Hans Zimmer’s Time, accompanied by Charlie Chaplin’s final speech from The Great Dictator. For the time that’s in it.

03. The video for same, directed by Luke Daly, is streaming above.

04. The band’s big year-end excursion happens at Vicar Street, December 9th. Tickets €20 plus various service fees.

Verdict: A brave take on a masterpiece, layered over with the pep-talk humanity needs at present.

Overhead the Albatross

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OST – reflections on Election Night

What you may need to know…

01. OST is the solo project of former We Come in Pieces man Shane Harrington. Last time we checked in on him, he’d just released third album Uncaused.

02. New single Bleed Line was released overnight Irish time, and takes a stab at fathoming the atmosphere in New York on the night of Trump’s election.

03. Writes Harrington:

This piece was recorded as an attempt to bottle the atmosphere on election night in Harlem, NYC, 11.08.16. Simultaneous feelings of uneasiness, uncertainty and a sort of involuntary detachment dominated. The mixing process, carried out a day later, added different colors. Concepts like America, time, depression, duality, escapism/arrival oscillated. The video collage was added last with an eye on media narratives, history and political OBEs.

04. Streaming above is the accompanying video collage, also assembled by Harrington.

Verdict: A stark and poignant reminder that when times get hard, the artists get to work, taking stock, documenting and fomenting change via organisation and discourse.

OST

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Ailbhe Reddy – Dublin folk/rock soloist

What you may need to know…

01. Folk-laden alternative drawn from personal experience is the order of the day for Dublin singer-songwriter Ailbhe Reddy.

02. Getting a start in 2014, she first drew attention from a wider audience after her tune Cover Me appeared across radio, while first single Flesh and Blood garnered good reviews and song-of-the-day features across the UK and Irish blogosphere.

03. Debut E.P. Hollowed Out Sea released this year, with production from Sacred Animals‘ Darragh Nolan. Streaming above is the video single Distrust.

04. Reddy is among the artists in the running for the fan vote to co-headline Other Voices and appear on the RTÉ TV show of the same name, alongside Jafaris, Meltybrains?, BARQ and Basciville. Vote here.

Verdict: Reddy clearly has the knack for big songwriting, but it’s tempered with a certain elegance that makes it all the more intriguing.

Ailbhe Reddy

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T-Woc – new album Sentinelas due soon on Rudimentary

What you may need to know…

01. Last we checked in with T-Woc, aka beatmaker Mick Donohoe, he’d just released his Jetstar E.P. on Limerick label The Unscene.

02. His follow-up is the first ever long-player released on Belfast hip-hop label Rudimentary, and comes from a trip to Brazil. Happening across Sao Paulo’s Feirão de Uma Milhao LPs market, Donohoe went digging, and among the stacks were some children’s comics that boasted of soundtrack 7″s that had long gone missing. A soundtrack for a lost kid’s comic, then, is Sentinelas, named for the comic’s villains.

03. Pre-orders are available now via Rudimentary‘s Bandcamp. Streaming above is a two-song preview, including lead-off tune O Tronco.

04. The album launches on November 19th in the Triskel in Cork, joined by Cholera House, Diamond Dagger and Automatic Tasty.

Verdict: Warm, bright, and vibrant music that’ll go down equally with math-rock and post-rock nerds as with beat hounds.

T-Woc

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Ensemble Ériu – trad revivalists tour second LP

What you may need to know…

01. Seven-piece outfit Ensemble Ériu are among a brace of bands and artists taking a modern approach to Irish traditional music.

02. Second album Imbas (an Old Irish word that is used to describe inspiration or creativity) follows their eponymous 2013 debut, and released this past June on Ensemble Music/Raelach Records. It’s streaming and available for download here.

03. Streaming above is video footage of some of their 2014 set in Coughlan’s of Douglas Street, Cork, taken by Meade Films.

04. Playing next in the wilds of the wild West, Connolly’s of Leap, this Friday. Doors 8pm, tickets €10. Next Wednesday seems them at An Lab, in An Daingean; Thursday week at Belvedere House in Dublin; and Friday week in Hollywood, Co. Wicklow.

Verdict: Bringing a wide range of contemporary ideas to the trad oeuvre, taking in jazz and ambient elements, the Ensemble are among the forefront of the genre’s revival.

Ensemble Ériu

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The Smoke Clears – Galway-based electronics

What you may need to know…

01. The Smoke Clears is a pseudonym of Galway-based house/techno producer John Daly, a project in which he eschews genre tropes for experimental electronics.

02. A leader in his field, Daly has been well-travelled, co-founding and rebooting Irish label Feel Music, and releasing on well-renowned independent labels, among them Drumpoet, Secretsundaze and Running Back.

03. Streaming above is a teaser for the project’s second eponymous LP, released in September via Dublin label/shop All City Records.

04. Appearing live next at the Triskel in Cork on November 12th, with support from WRY MYRRH and Huerco S., as part of the Cork Film Festival.

Verdict: With more in common with ambient electronica and post-rock than with any established club fare, The Smoke Clears allows Daly to explore his own outer limits.

The Smoke Clears

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That Snaake – reissue first two E.P.s

What you may need to know…

01. Dublin noise-rock four-piece That Snaake riff equally on no-wave angularity and bleary-eyed early ’90s pop, a concoction referred to by the band as “seshcore”.

02. Hailed by Goldenplec as “unfashionable”, the band have been steadily gigging in Dublin over the past while, and have notched up stage time with Proto Idiot, Cat Palace and Sister Ghost, among others.

03. Streaming above in its entirety is newly-released E.P. compilation, In the Court of the Baby Kyng. Collecting the band’s first two extended players, Go Bricker and Blinded by the Smell, two equally ramshackle statements of intent.

04. Available now for streaming, download, and on limited-run cassette via tape-slingers Little L Records. That’s purple spray-painted cassette, we might add.

05. Also, the label is still selling its entire back catalogue for a fiver/pay-more-if-you-like. That’s a fairly ridiculous deal for nearly 125 singles, E.P.s and full-lengths, if you so desire, including the above.

Verdict: A succession of noisy, entirely smart-arsed, but eminently likeable tunes. Full taste.

That Snaake

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Ropemaker – playing Galway with Hope is Noise and The Magnapinna

What you may need to know…

01. Math-rock three-piece Ropemaker hail from the alternative-music capital of Ireland, Portarlington, Co. Laois.

02. Having gigged sporadically the last few years, they’ve already shared stages with Steve Strong, the dearly-departed Terriers (the real ones, not the Dublin-based pretenders), ZINC and others.

03. Streaming above is the band’s 2015 extended-player, Abyssinia, available for download via the band’s Bandcamp.

04. Catch them live next at the Roisín Dubh on the 19th, in support of FEAST’s Cork takeover of the Roisín Dubh, featuring Hope is Noise and The Magnapinna.

Verdict: Swaggering, striding math-rock in a Battles or Alpha Male Tea Party vein. Grand.

Ropemaker