A lot music from Ireland and Northern Ireland comes Nialler9’s way and every week, we listen through it all and select the tracks from emerging artists (and some established acts) that deserve to be heard by you.
For more extensive Irish and new music coverage, follow our Spotify playlist or hit up the Irish section for individual track features.
1.
Monjola
Pain Don’t Die
‘Pain Don’t Die’ only Monjola’s fourth solo single released (there’s also a collaboration with Aby Coulibaly, also on Chamomile Records) but the Dubliner is also making music that feels a cut above a lot of Irish modern R&B, and that’s down to the overall package. The repeating guitar line and distant sax give this song an “awake at night thinking too much” feel, and the song has a on-repeat quality that buries deeper than most.
2.
Tolü Makay
Behavin Like a Lil B**
It’s hard to know what is coming next from Tolü Makay, but the songs are coming thick and fast and ‘Behavin Like a Lil B**’ is miles away from her cover of N17 and her recent single ‘Aye.’
I was inspired by 90’s hip-hop and a really cool artist I found called Kahlo. I’m enjoying incorporating more parts of my background into the production and lyrics, and having fun with the process of bringing this album to life.
Tolü
Makay is playing a socially-distant show at Vicar Street on October 15th.
3.
Brian Deady
Magenta Blue
The Cork artist Brian Deady has made a lot of different styles in recent years whether it’s dusty R&B blues or the lockdown-produced electronic-toned album The Healing.
New single ‘Magenta Blue’ is closer in tone to the electro-pop of Future Islands.
4.
Cat Dowling
Animals
‘Animals’ is a welcome return to these pages for the Irish artist Cat Dowling (I premiered the Kilkenny musician’s album here back in 2013), a sprightly song which hits a payoff towards its final third.
It’s a song from Dowling’s forthcoming album of the same name on the label FIFA Records on November 12th.
‘Animals’ was written when everyone was sleeping. It started with the driving repetitive rhythm which had to be restrained so as not to wake a soul. It thus became hypnotic. It starts as minor and ends up major. It’s about the major and minor of life and of love and the constant pull in everything between major and minor and the light and the dark. It’s a song ultimately of passion, wildness, sensuality and love.”
You can also hear and see ‘Freedom’ and ‘Trouble’ from the record.
5.
Erica Cody
Erica Cody wants you to know that things are going to be OK and you’ve got this, with her latest ’90s-indebted R&B pop track. I wonder is Erica available for life coaching?
“Comparison is the thief of joy. Be you FOR you while unapologetically yourself. You control your own happiness, so make your happiness happen. Live your life for you, don’t pay attention to the bullshit, it’s a distraction. Your time is on the way, stay patient, persistent and authentic. Everything else will follow.”
6.
Windings
The Ground
One of Limerick’s finest guitar bands are back, and are heralding a new Windings album called Focus on the Past 5 on Out on a Limb Records on November 5th, and to my ears I’m hearing strains of the band Grandaddy on new song ‘The Ground’.
The album to come was produced by Girl Band’s Daniel Fox.
“This album is a deep dive into half remembered truths of youth, confusion and doubt, uncertainty and fear, the perception and resigned acceptance of the inevitability of end times, but also an awareness of place, and reminding ourselves to take comfort in the familiar.”
7.
Riawaavy
DMBH
The artist Erica herself sent this on with literally no info other than a Spotify link, which you should definitely not do. However, I enjoyed the track enough to include here, and the artist is on Twitter.
8.
ZOID
Wish You (feat. Esosa)
Cool, groovy, jazzy, saxy, funky. The new song from Daniel Jacobson aka ZOiD is a soulful danceable Frankenstein with vocals byu Nigerian-Irish vocalist Esosa Ighodaro O’Brien.
9.
Carrie Baxter
You
London-Irish artist Carrie Baxter comes through with more of that soul.
“I wrote this song for a friend who was experiencing long distance love! He wanted to write her a song and so I thought about what he was willing to go through to be with her and wrote it! I wanted this song to feel classic, that old-school, lay down and die for you, black and white movie kinda love – hopefully you feel that.”
10.
Sea High
We All
Dundalk MC and Off Key Collective member Sea High has featured here before as far back as 2018, and his newest is an open-hearted paean for tolerance.
For more extensive Irish and new music coverage, follow our Spotify playlist or hit up the Irish section for individual track features.
