Also featuring Sharpson, Blakkheart, Durt Burd, Leo Miyagee, Jordan Kelly, Hazey Haze, Liam O’Connor, God Knows and more.
The best new Irish songs this week feature emerging tracks we’ve selected from artists from the island of Ireland, with more playlist additions below the main list.
Explore the best new Irish songs alongside our curated playlist for the week.
For more extensive Irish and new music coverage, follow our Spotify playlist or hit up the Irish section for individual track features.
Plus One
One Eye Shut
Matt Finnegan builds on the widespread acclaim of last year’s club track ‘Bonk’, with two bass-running garage club bangers. Could have easily picked the first track ‘Fresh’ here but the B-side ‘One Eye Shut shades it because of the shimmering vocal sample.
Jordan Kelly, Hazey Haze, God Knows, Scruffy Munnelly, MCB, Size
CC
From the excellent Strange Boy / Jordan Kelly Diaspora Green mixtape, which is easily one of the best Irish rap releases of the year so far (others include the Luas bell-ID-tagging c2’s Yola Xpress and Deathtoricky’s Spring Cleaning EP and Curtisy’s Beauty In The Beast).
‘CC’ is a classic posse cut, and it’s great to hear Limerick-rooted MCs back together on a track again (and Dubliner Scruffy Munnelly too). There’s very few things you can with nine and a half minutes more enjoyable than listening to this.
The whole Diaspora Green mixtape is a big recommend – not for free, i charge a fee plus the VAT.
Cormac Begley, Liam O’Connor
Ryan’s Rant
Ireland’s Jimi Hendrix of the concertina Cormac Begley and the traditional archivist and fiddle player Liam O’Connor have linked up for an album called Into the Loam, which is available on Bandcamp on digital and CD only, the latter of which is presented in a cut-out tunnel effect landscape cover, in an envelope that is also seeded to encourage the buyer to plant it back in the earth.
The emphasis on the landscape is an astute one as the album captures the earthy tones of two players in an unadorned fashion, performing a collection of musty trad grade A bangers, with ‘Ryan’s rant’ the opening salvo.
It continues be an abundant time for trad, and Into The Loam is a nice follow on from Begley’s solo album B from 2022.
Burglar
Fate Fades
Dublin duo of Willow and Eduardo AKA Burglar met in college a few years back and are a band on many ones-to-watch-lists.
They released their debut EP – Unlucky – last month on the TULLE label run by Fears’ Constance Keane.
‘Fate Fades’ is the best of the bunch, a classic rollicking alt-rock single.
“I got into something really special that I knew had an expiry date and couldn’t go on for reasons beyond my control. So ‘Fate Fades’ is an internal debate on whether I wanted to let myself go under the circumstances that were at hand.”
Eduardo
Sharpson, Blakkheart
Not To Your Taste
The man known for playing his DJ decks backwards and running the Choki Biki label among other things, Dónal Sharpson is back linking up with Cork producer and singer Blakkheart on a ‘BOTA’-esque dance single.
Durt Burd, Leo Miyagee
Hall Of Fame
Belfast rapper Durt Burd dropped the 15-track DB SZN VOL. 1 mixtape in July setting out the rapper’s fun bilingual style.
It features Jun Tzu, Crutch, Leo Miyagee and 86INK, and “Celtic Phonk” beats by producer Atomic Adam that swing between club bass, afro house, drill and classic 2000s dance – some of it reminds me of Diplo’s early percussive work with MIA from the Piracy Funds Terrorism mixtape era, with the spirit of Kneecap.
For a single track spotlight, I’ve gone for the Leo Miyagee-featuring ‘Hall Of Fame’, which Durt Burd only features a small part in, so I’ve also included ‘No Socials’ too for a fuller main artist flavour.
For more extensive Irish and new music coverage, check into the Irish section for individual track features…
For this and more Irish songs, follow the Nialler9 New Irish Spotify playlist.
Other Playlist additions this week:
- NewDad – Pretty
- C2 – hands tied (8t33n)
- Neosupervital; Def Nettle – Factory Presets (Def Nettle Remix)
- Caoilian Sherlock – Big Time
- DUG – Have At It!
- Shakalak – Thinking
- Alex Gough – on my way
- DUBLE RR; Don Django – FENG SHUI
- Zaska; shiv – What We Had
- Adore – Sweet Keith
- Ahmed, With Love.; David Armada – Poser Selzter.
- Nerves – Don’t Let Go – Radio Edit
- Caolan Ryan; Jafaris – DO IT
- ActionRec – Cack
- Swoose – Love Message
Niall Byrne is the founder of the most-influential Irish music site Nialler9, where he has been writing about music since 2005 . He is the co-host of the Nialler9 Podcast and has written for the Irish Times, Irish Independent, Cara Magazine, Sunday Times, Totally Dublin, Red Bull and more. Niall is a DJ, founder of Lumo Club, club promoter, event curator and producer of gigs, listening parties & events in Dublin.
