Pillow Queens
Gone
From their third album Name Your Sorrow, Pillow Queen’s ‘Gone’ is a more distorted and looser look for them, but it’s all about that chorus and those cathartic backing vocals.
The band says, “‘Gone’” is a song that looks into the vapid nature of brief romantic encounters and the hyperbole that can become so monotonous, it makes you jaded.” The track came about at the end of a jam session during a songwriting retreat in The Burren.
Lead vocalist, guitarist and bassist Pamela Connolly adds, “Lines like, ‘I was in your top five things to do’ convey a lack of self-worth that’s tackled throughout the album. It’s a song that showcases a vulnerability that allows for no silver linings – it’s the reality of how someone is feeling in the moment.”
SPOOKLET
Délicieux
Hannah Worrall’s Dublin-based electronic production project SPOOKLET debut EP IN THE BELLY OF THE MOTHER, has a stated intent of seeking the comfort of the womb.
As the EP heads towards its final two tracks, the atmospherics give way to breakbeats on ‘Délicieux’, a head-spinning garage-track featuring lust-driven spoken word vocals in English and French.
And So I Watch You From Afar
Do Mór
The Belfast post-rock band’s seventh record Megafauna is billed as a love letter to the two places they call home – seaside town Portrush and Belfast city.
‘Do Mór’ “serves as an anthem for the whole album and for a band of friends reunited and reinvigorated too; proudly wearing their distinct juxtaposition of joyous euphoria and jarring musical confrontation on their sleeves.”
It’s classic ASIWYFA crashing rock euphoria.
Filmore!, Twin Pumpkin
BOSS MUSIC
Max Zanga aka Filmore!’s EP Idle Death Gamble mixes pop punk, 80s synths, D&B breaks and hyperpop and it’s not all for me, but I Love this screamo industrial noise pop record on it.
Negro Impacto
Fangirl
The return of Chi-Chi and Strangelove’s Negro Impacto, the Dundalk duo who have impressed us so much with so few songs since lockdown.
‘Fangirl’ is a slow jam that leans on smooth soft synth grooves and Chi-Chi honey-dropped Erykah Badu-esque vocals.
Wastefellow
Haunt You Back
Diolmhain Ingram Roche is more recognisably active as the singer in the band Really Good Time lately, but he started out as the electronic producer Wastefellow, a project he returned to for the first release on the Patrúin label in four years.
‘Haunt You Back’ is the finest of the three tracks on the release, a bass and breaks fizzy production.
There’s also a fine long sleeve tee with funds going to Medical Aid for Palestinians and designed by Mel Keane.
Chameleon
I Never Knew You Well
There’s a James Blake vibe to this song from Irish singer and producer Chameleon.
Taken from the Call Me Twice Pt. 1 EP , the track spins some edifying synth lines into a delicate vocal that recalls serpentwithfeet in its undulating feeling.
“Everybody’s got secrets. We’re all living a double life. ‘I Never Knew You Well’ puts our hidden desires, fears and anxieties under the microscope. This song has been in the works for nearly 3 years, and I kept coming back to it for its awkwardness and its freakish groove as its beaten production limps onward to the noise of the kick/snare conversation. To me, this song represents the tired, yet determined cry of someone at the end of their tether. I was heavily inspired by the production of James Blake, the vocal delivery of Thom Yorke and the theatrical extravagance of Childish Gambino in the Redbone era. This song has let me explore a slightly more experimental and electronic sound which I hope to incorporate more in the future”.
The Redneck Manifesto
Hidden Hands
It’s always good to hear one of the best Irish bands of the last 25 years come back to release music. Redneck founding members Niall Byrne (no relation), Richie Egan and Matthew Bolger made ‘Hidden Hands’, the band’s first bit of music since 2018’s The How, with an album forthcoming.
They still got it.
‘Hidden Hands’ was recorded along with the other new material over three weekends with James Eager at the Clinic in Dublin and subsequent recordings were made across two sessions in Malmö, utilising Richie’s RARN Studio and Studio Möllan. Additional drums and percussion on the recordings comes from Markku Hilden and this song was mastered by Sean MacErlaine in Dublin.
D*mp
don’tunderstandaword
Producer Ryan Dwyer aka D*mp’s ‘don’tunderstandaword’ is a woozy slice of AMSR electronica that works well alongside the work of John Glacier.
From the f2f EP of demos which Dwyer says “some slightly sadder spoken word and noises taken from my grandads piano back in Dublin, reworked into logic as an instrument and then these kind of sounds come out.”
Kean Kavanagh
The Portlaoise Queen
‘The Portlaoise Queen’ is Kean’s take on a traditional song that has an Irish Celtic folk feel, an almost Christmas feel to it.
“‘The Portlaoise Queen’ is our iconic song in the town, written by Christy Conroy and most famously sung by the Doc Fitz. I remember being 9 years old on the pitch in Newbridge after Portlaoise won the Leinster Football Final and him up on the podium singing down at us over the tannoy. That’s him there on the cover art. It was a hard song for anyone else to sing because there are so many names and verses and you’d only ever be able to remember one or two lines from it; the Jimmy Brown mentioned in verse three was my great-grandfather so we’d always give that bit a good belt. But anyway, I was homesick over the summer and figured I’d learn the words properly and I found a way to play it that gave it a feeling that I loved.”
CMAT
Aw Shoot!
‘Aw, Shoot!’ is a standalone song CMAT song released after second album Crazymad, For Me, inspired by going stir crazy holed up in a Paris apartment writing songs and not seeing any other people.
I’m a sad country song of a woman / Should do good for the brand but it doesn’t / She saw my flat, I saw the joy drain from her eyes.”
Christy Moore
Palestine
It’s so hard to write a good song about the genocide in Gaza, but Christy Moore is one of Ireland’s finest folk songwriters, and here he places the current situation in the context of the last 70 years of Zionist oppression.
Free Palestine.
Brién
Everybody’s Here
A devastatingly simple melody and production about good familial and friend gatherings. It’s not that deep, but it’s so effective.
Silverbacks
Selling Shovels
‘Selling Shovels’ from Silverback’s third album Easy Being A Winner, has the band’s cerebral wonky alt-guitar pop style intact, inspired by Dan Kelly’s penchant for jumping straight the death info on Wikipedia on famous people.
“The idea for these lyrics came from a habit I have – maybe everyone does it? When reading a historical figure’s Wikipedia page I often lose interest and so I jump straight to the ‘personal life’ and ‘death’ part of the page to see how they died and the circumstances they were in at the time. The lyrics flicker between mundane distractions and fairly horrific images of war. Selling Shovels is a reference to ‘selling shovels during the gold rush’.”
Yenkee
Southside
The Cork artist Graham Cooney has released his debut album Night Golf on Soft Boy Records, and Yenkee leans soft glow daydream indie pop and mellow psych guitar music he’s known for across the record.
‘Southside’ with its Thriller-esque pulsing bassline and hooky chorus is my favourite from the record.
Julie Dawson
Bottom Of The Pool
NewDad singer Julie Dawson made a whole album with Jack Hamill aka Space Dimension Controller and this title track is a gentle meander into cool blue water.
The album central theme revolves around escapism, “reflecting Julie’s desire to create something entirely separate from her daily routine”.
Jarjarjr
Split Tongue
Cork producer and rapper jarjarjr’s Catch The Dusk (September album trades in the instrumental beat tapes for live jazzy funk hip-hop style allowing Rob O’ Halloran to showcase his best flows front and centre.
“See I never was “Live at the Blue Note”
I never stepped foot in London Town
But I crept through the cracks, kept it underground
A laptop and some botched midi
And touched hearts round the world out of Cork city“
See also: ‘Last Call’ and ‘Sense The Beer Bought’
Plus One
Wonder
London-based Dubliner Matt Finnegan dropped a garage-leaning dancefloor release on First Second label in February.
‘Wonder’ is my preferred style, pitched-up vocal and plinked synth notes with a bubble of melody and crisp bass beats.
Fizzy Orange
Choo Choo
Brandishing 60s guitar pop and classic rock styles, Fizzy Orange’s song ‘Choo Choo’ is a Beach Boys-esque hoot.
“We first played this tune during a writing session in an attic in co. Leitrim last year. Kev (lead singer) had penned the lyrics about the experience of using our local train service in Dublin. The Dublin-Area-Rapid-Transit or the DART as it’s better known. Always late, northbound or southbound, we all got his experience straight away.
It was originally played as a fairly stripped-back blues. But once that distorted repetitive guitar riff came in from Jack (lead guitar) we knew this track had to come up to that energy. We recorded it a few days later in Sonic Studios back in Dublin. It’s our heaviest playing so far, the bass and drums could have filled out the track by themselves! Complemented with classic boogie-woogie piano playing and 60’s vocal harmonies, our own style and sound really starts to creep in.”
Papa Romeo
Chicken Town
The London/Dublin five-piece Papa Romeo’s album Late Night Load Out builds on the band’s single output to date since 2021, with a collection of music that melds indie, jazz and rock styles into one chillwavey package, that is a perfect soundtrack for a summery evening.
‘Chicken Town’ is one of the album tracks that followed recent singles that stuck with me, a dreamy yet driven post-punk-flecked track.
Niamh Bury
Budapest
Folk singer Niamh Bury released a debut album Yellow Roses on Claddagh Records.
With production by Brian Brían Mac Gloinn (Ye Vagabonds), we’ve heard a few tracks to date – ‘Budapest’ is a folk song adorned with fine colour touches of piano and violin.
“Budapest was written during a cold February in Dublin. It’s about the places we escape to in our imaginations – outer space or a city we’re dreaming of packing up and leaving to. It’s about the yearning to step outside of your own story to chase that feeling of being a small part of a bigger picture.”
Dumb Posh Hippies
Scrunched Up Fists
Dublin psych-punk-rock band Dumb Posh Hippies followed up their remix EP with a fun little colloquial ditty, a mix of apology, regret and rage with a wry smile.
Saoirse Miller
In The Smoke
I caught Saoirse Miller supporting Róis over Halloween, and the Dublin artist’s set was filled with this sort of ethereal spacey music that reminds me of Julianna Barwick, suitable for as Miller pointed out – for the The Thinning of the Veil at Samhain.
Like Maija Sofia, the song is inspired by the life and death of Bridget Cleary, whose husband burned her alive in 1895 because he believed she was a changeling.
Qbanaa
Demons In The Liffey
The Cuban-Irish singer-songwriter’s ‘Demons In The Liffey’ is a stripped-back but not sparsely produced song, that uses spacious atmospherics and muted guitar tones to emphasise Qbanaa’s heartfelt vocals, addressing the artist’s relationship with her mother in Dublin while living away in London, rising with strings, voice message recordings, sitar and close hushed harmonies.
The video by Q and Babygirl, features footage of the singer as a child, underscoring a life lived, a close relationship enduring over time, with the title inspired by “the haunting memories of trauma that surface during conversations with her mother.”
