10 songs you’ll want to hear at Beyond The Pale Festival

Avatar

Beyond The Pale is now just over a week away.

A blissful weekend in Glendalough back in festival mode with your friends is mightily appealing huh?

You’ve looked at the day-by-day lineup, the arts and performance offerings and the 10 festival debuts at new Irish festival, but let’s look to the nitty gritty, and the single tunes that have the appetites completely whetted for Beyond The Pale next weekend.

If this is getting you itchy, head over to the tickets page and hover over the red button…

1.

KH – ‘Looking At Your Pager’

A contender for dance tune of the summer?

‘Looking At Your Pager’ is the new Kiernan Hebden / Four Tet tune that samples R&B girl group 3LW’s ‘No More (Baby I’ma Do Right)’ and brings some crunchy wobbly dance dynamics with a high BPM perfect for the festival late-night hype.

The tune was captured by fans and posted with a track ID request at his recent gigs. Six weeks ago, Four Tet responded by saying the sample was cleared.

Sure, this is going to sound massive on a 360 surround speakers at the Big Romance area on the Friday night.

2.

Orbital – ‘Belfast’

The quintessential late 90s / early 2000s festival tune is back!

I remember hearing this at all of the festivals I attended when I started going to festivals. I was there when Orbital played their last show of that era, in a tent at Oxegen in 2004. This tune was third in, and really set the tent into a lovely mess.

‘Belfast’ is a tune which sounds even better live, there’s no substitute for hearing this with a packed crowd of ravers absolutely in thrall to two brothers with their silly light glasses and bags of classic, nay iconic dance anthems.

They play Beyond The Pale on Sunday June 12th.

3.

Stereo MCs – ‘Step It Up’

It’s the 30th anniversary of 1992’s seminal trip-hop house electronic album Connected, from the English duo of Rob Birch and Nick Hallam and band.

The title track ended up being co-opted by mobile phone providers in an ubiquitous and over-saturated fashion on their ads to the point of nearly ruining a decent tune,

‘Step It Up’ is still a little dancer of a tune though, with built-in instructional dance moves baked in, sure, it’s guaranteed to be a festival highlight.

They play Beyond The Pale on Saturday June 11th.

4.

Boy Harsher – ‘Autonomy’

Massachusetts electro-pop duo Boy Harsher 2022 album The Runner doubled as soundtrack album for a short a meta-style mockumentary horror film they made, but the tunes are really some of their best.

‘Autonomy’ is a big near-pop moment for the band. It sounds like a Human League track and softens the duo’s trademark darkness in favour of a lighter, more suitably summer feel.

Boy Harsher play the festival on Saturday June 11th.

5.

Bonobo – ‘Otomo’

Simon Green has bags of big electronic tunes that shake and kick but maybe none that kick quite as much as recent album Fragments highlight ‘Otomo’ with O’Flynn.

Having already elevated to headliner status thanks to subtle yearning electronic tunes songs like ‘Cirrus‘, ‘Kerala‘ and ‘Rosewood’, ‘Otomo’ is in the box marked “big festival banger.”

6.

Romare – ‘Je ‘T’Aime’

Oof. ‘Je T’aime’ is a dancefloor call to arms from Archie Fairhurst aka Romare, who spins found samples into modern electronic masterpieces on more than one occasion.

‘Je ‘T’Aime’ is my singular favourite of his work, and it lifts a festival I can tell you that.

Catch him live at BTP on Friday June 11th.

7.

John Francis Flynn – ‘My Son Tim’

Beyond The Pale might be the first time many of us get to see Stoneybatter trad artist John Francis Flynn play live in the festival flesh.

I managed to catch him twice last summer at reduced cap gigs, and there’s no doubt about the quality of the songs on his excellent debut album I Would Not Live Always, and on stage, this single with its rhythmic guitar, rousing violins at full clip, gives off a mantra sort of aura.

John Francis Flynn plays Beyond The Pale on Saturday June 11th.

8.

MurLi – ‘Odyssey’

A tune that absolutely slaps featuring Gemma Dunleavy from the Limerick rapper’s recent EP The Sky Has Windows.

MuRli always brings the festival crew energy.

He plays the Glendalough festival on Friday June 11th.

9.

HAAI – ‘Baby We’re Ascending’

Pulsating vocal techon euphoria from the Australian-born London-based artist’s new album of the same name.

Teneil Throssell collaborates with Jon Hopkins on ‘Baby We’re Ascending’ and I’ve no doubt, it’ll be a festival highlight among HAAI’s techno, house, drum n bass, downtempo and pop leaning electro music live.

HAAi plays Beyond The Pale on Sunday.

10.

Aoife Nessa Frances – ‘Emptiness Follows’

We were only gushing about this song earlier this week in the tracks of the month.

‘Emptiness Follows’’ is a foggy slice of psych-folk music with sounds analogous to Cate Le Bon’s latest work. The harp, synths, brass and warm instrumentation throughout really make this stick from the Irish singer-songwriter.

This whole set at Beyond The Pale on Saturday June 11th will be a gentle pick-me-up.

Beyond The Pale

Tickets are currently from €249 for the festival.

On-site Luxury Glamping, comfy Camping, Motorhome and Caravan Parking, Craft Beers, Cocktails, Food Village, Arts and more also available.

See the lineup in full.

See also:

10 Irish festival debuts at Beyond The Pale festival


Hey, before you go...

Nialler9 has been covering new music, new artists and gigs for the last 19 years. If you like the article you just read, and want us to publish more just like it, please consider supporting us on Patreon.

What you get as thanks in return...

  • A weekly Spotify playlist only for patrons.
  • Access to our private Nialler9 Discord community.
  • Ad-free and bonus podcast episodes.
  • Guestlist & discounts to Nialler9 & Lumo Club events.
  • Themed playlists only for subscribers.

Your support enables us to continue to publish articles like this one, make podcasts and provide recommendations and news to our readers, and be a key part of the music community in Ireland and abroad.

Become a patron at Patreon!

Sign up to the Newsletter

Get music news, features and new music into your inbox twice a week.

Please wait...

Thank you for sign up!