NPR album streams 30th July 2012

See below links to this weeks NPR album streams:
Redd Kross "Researching the Blues": http://www.npr.org/2012/07/29/157237664/first-listen-redd-kross-researching-the-blues

Lianne La Havas "Is Your Love Big Enough": http://www.npr.org/2012/07/29/157234142/first-listen-lianne-la-havas-is-your-love-big-enough

Various - "Just Tell me that you want me", a tribute to Fleetwood Mac - featuring Mac covers by Best Coast, The New Pornographers, Lykke Li and MGMT among others: http://www.npr.org/2012/07/29/157244844/first-listen-just-tell-me-that-you-want-me-a-tribute-to-fleetwood-mac

My Fun review on High Browse

See link below to my review of Fun's album "Some Nights" on High Browse:

http://tinyurl.com/bruyfdg

My Sunday Hat self titled EP review

“If Ryan Adams and Tom Petty had a weird baby with Explosions in the Sky and Bon Ivor, we’d be that baby” is how My Sunday Hat describes themselves on their Twitter biography. After a good few listens of their self-titled debut EP the Belfast 4-piece seem to have the comparisons spot on.

The band has only been together since January this year. They play their own style of classic rock n’ roll similar to the likes of Tom Petty & the Heartbreakers, U2 and Ryan Adams. They band consists of lead singer and guitarist Patrick Haughan, Conor Fearon on bass, Aidan Stow on drums and Darren McKay on lead guitar.

My Sunday Hat release their self titled debut EP on August 30^th. The EP contains 3 songs. Lead-off single “Further on Down the Line”, “Cold Winter” and “Explosion”.

“Further on Down the Line” is a cracking little tune. Its dark opening guitar chords sound similar to “Turn on the Bright Lights” era Interpol before things brighten up with the Darren McKay’s lead guitar. Patrick Haughan’s vocals are fairly distinctive. His voice reminds me of The Gaslight Anthem’s Brian Fallen. He sounds like he is really enjoying himself as he sings “further on down the line, too drunk to notice”.

"Cold Winter” is another little corker which reminds me very much of “The Joshua Tree” era U2. Again the lead guitar is very much to the fore throughout - possibly even too much so as it even ends with an extended guitar solo. Possibly this could have been reduced and then a final verse included.

More early Interpol similarities on final track “Explosion” with flicks of lead guitar complementing the rhythm guitar strum. Like “Cold Winter” the lead guitar solo is slightly too overwhelming.

The band has been gigging plenty since they started out. Playing live seems to be what the love the most. They’ve played in some fine venues of Belfast including the infamous Auntie Annie’s and The Pavillion Bar. As well as playing their own songs they’ve also had some covers thrown into their sets including Bruce Springsteen’s “Born to Run”, The Racantours’ “Steady As She Goes” and Tom Petty’s “Casa Dega” and “Free Girl Now”.

They band have recently been given a slot at the Tanglewood Music and Arts Festival to be held at Narrow Water Castle, Co. Down on Saturday 04^th August. They’re opening the main stage before eventual headliners Aslan.

With all the gigs promoting this well recorded debut EP I think My Sunday Hat will do well and hopefully be around for a while to come.

Pre-order new Croupier album

Pre-order Croupier's brand new album here: http://elevenelevenlabel.bandcamp.com/album/croupier

The album will be released on Friday 24th August with a cracking gig in Whelan's Dublin. For more info and tickets see http://www.whelanslive.com/index.php/archives/12934

The Jepettos review on Chordblossom

See link below to my first review for Chordblossom:
http://www.chordblossom.com/musicreviews-thejepettos-startanewpeople

The Jepettos "Start a New People" E.P Review

The Jepettos “Start a new people” E.P    

                                                                                                       

The Irish music scene is in fine fettle at the moment, especially in Northern Ireland where all these new bands are coming to the fore and trying something new. Northern Ireland has always produced some great bands over the years from Ash and Snow Patrol to The Undertones. The most resent band making a splash in the mainstream is Two Door Cinema Club from Bangor. Their debut album “Tourist History” won the Choice Music Prize back in 2010.

Released on 06^th January this year “Start a new people” is the debut EP from Northern Irish 5 piece The Jepettos. The band is fronted by husband and wife duo Mick and Ruth Aicken. They produce a fine folk experience rock akin to the likes of Laura Marling, The Civil Wars, Lisa Hannigan and Sufjan Stevens. They also share similarities with Heathers with the dual female vocals Ruth shares with Emma Flannigan who also plays clarinet and recorder. The 5 piece is made up with Colm Hinds on bass and Daniel Kerr on drums.

The band take their name from Geppetto, the Disney character and woodcarver who made Pinocchio. Their name is spelled differently but pronounced that same. Mick from the band said on Cool FM radio recently that Geppetto tried to bring the wooden people he carved to life and that that’s what the band are trying to do with their instruments “bring the wooden instruments to life”.

The first line of this album, from lead single “Goldrush” really sets off the brightness that shines from this set of songs (“When the morning comes, it’ll be okay”). The flutters of clarinet and dual female vocals add to this effect beautifully. A certain Duke Special guests here on piano. On the recent issue of Hot Press the band get a good mention and this song appeared on the accompanying CD.

Despite “Goldrush” being the lead single the best song here is “Something in the air”. This is a beautiful lament with slight flickers of electric guitar and Mick’s backing vocals really coming to the fore. This song includes the line where the EP takes its name.

Third track “Journey” has a slight country music feel to it. You can really notice the Lisa Hannigan comparisons here - a short, cutesy folk song similar to those on the Juno movie soundtrack. It’s made incredibly sweet by the backing vocals of Mick and Ruth’s daughter Freiah-Beth.

The weakest song here is “Should’ve kissed you more”. This song is about getting over a relationship break-up and features a guest appearance from Jonny Leddy on trumpet.

"It was a starry night, shining above your head, stinging my bloodshot eyes” Ruth sings at the start of album closer “Good Times”. This is a cracking little song to end the EP. You can really here the Northern Irish accent in Mick’s voice.

I for one am really looking forward to seeing them play live. Mick and Ruth played with another band in the past called The Lowly Knights and supported Snow Patrol back in 2009 so they have some experience with playing to larger crowds. A video on YouTube sees the band playing “Should’ve kissed you more” in what looks like someone’s hallway together. You can really see that they are all very connected. There seems to be great chemistry between then especially when you see Mick and Ruth face each other during the track.

There is also another Lowly Knights connection. David Clements recorded and mixed “Start a new people” was also on mixing duties for The Lowly Knights EP “The Rifles” back in September 2008.

I happened to be driving through Dublin city centre while listening to this in the car. It was a particularly sunny day and The Jepettos seemed to fit the scene perfectly. Let’s hope that they continue for many years to come.

Stand out track: “Something in the air”

For fans of: Lisa Hannigan, Laura Marling.

Tracklisting:

1.       Goldrush 3.33

2.       Something in the air 3.53

3.       Journey 2.07

4.       Should’ve kissed you more 2.48

5.       Good times 3.19

Bat For Lashes - "Laura"

"Put your glad rags on and sing along" - check out Natasha Khan's Bat For Lashes brand new tune "Laura" from her forthcoming album "The Haunted Man": http://www.batforlashes.com/

 

Thenewno2 album stream on NPR

Listen to the brand new album by Dhani Harrison (son of the Beatles' George)'s band Thenewno2 "thefearofmissingout" - http://tinyurl.com/c9m6gp7

The Dublin Tall Ships Race & Festival 2012

Dublin hosts the Tall Ships Race & Festival from Thursday 23rd August until Sunday 26th August. Full line up of music included:

Thurs 23rd Aug:
Foreign Slippers
The Riptide Movement
Scullion
Foy Vance
Duke Special
Cathy Davey
Jerry Fish

Fri 24th Aug:
This Club
Funeral Suits
The Minutes
Lost Brothers
Mark Geary
Ryan Sheridan
Ash

Sat 25th Aug:
Mighty Stef
Rams Pocket Radio
The Spook of the 13th Lock
Delorentos
The Frank & Walters
Therapy?
The Undertones

For more details please see http://www.dublintallships.ie/

Pitchfork's review of Strange Passion

"Strange Passion" gets a review from Pitchfork. See here http://tinyurl.com/c2hayov

New Mumford & Sons album - "Babel"

Check out some tunes from Mumford & Sons' brand new second album "Babel" which is due for release in September.

http://tinyurl.com/crf767n

The XX "Angles" - listen here

Check out The XX's new tune "Angels" which is the opening track on the brand new second album "Coexist" due for release on Friday 07th September. Enjoy.
http://tinyurl.com/bvyuon9

NPR album streams 16th July 2012

See the latest album streams from NPR:

The Gaslight Anthem "Handwritten" http://tinyurl.com/c7jadkg

Purity Ring "Shrines" http://tinyurl.com/cpahnkm

Passion  Pit "Gossamer" http://tinyurl.com/74z2b2l

Fun "Some Nights" album review

Welcome to “Some Nights”, the second album by New York’s latest indie poppers Fun. These guys released their debut album “Aim & Ignite” back in 2009. The album was produced by Jeff Bhasker who has worked with the likes of Kanye West and Alicia Keys in the past.

Fun are fronted by the enigmatic frontman Nate Ruess with Andrew Dost and Jack Antonoff completing the line-up. The guys seem to be trying too hard at times. Trying to be this flamboyant, Queen like sounding band. Opening track is the short “Some Night Intro” which is this quiet, slow building track with massive shouty vocals at the end announcing “some nights”. This is ok as it is an introduction track to the album. Then the actual track itself “Some Nights” appears which is surprisingly quite good.

The album also contains the massive hit single “We Are Young” which features Janelle Monae on backing vocals. It went to No 1 on the recent Billboard 100 is the US. Seemingly this is the first indie/alternative track to do this since Coldplay’s “Viva la Vida”. Everyone has probably heard this track by now. It’s getting plenty of airplay at the moment. It has this incredible, catchy chorus line “tonight, we are young, so let’s set this world on fire” that just gets into your head and you find yourself singing it away all day.

So at this point you think that maybe these guys have something going. You can really hear the potential in the band. But, unfortunately the songs start to get very ropey from track 4. The rest of the album is pretty much forgettable, you could probably press stop after track 3 and not have to worry about missing anything. “It Gets Better” is unbelievably bad. It’s repetition of “it gets better” is just mind numbingly annoying. Surely they had better tracks in their armour than this to include on the album, some half decent B side maybe. A few too many tracks are just like this - too annoying, “All Alright” tries it’s hardest but again is too repetitive, “One Foot” sounds almost like Eminem in places. “Stars” is pretty decent but the echoed vocal effects in the second half of the track sounds like the band are trying too hard.

I just hope that they don’t become another one hit wonder band because unfortunately for Fun this album will only be remembered for 1 track –  “We Are Young”.

Croupier in Whelan's

Kilcoole's very own Croupier play Whelans, Dublin on Friday 24th August to launch their new EP. Read more here: http://tinyurl.com/cjgaqvf.
Check them out here: http://croupier.bandcamp.com/

Deer Tick "Divine Providence" review on High Browse

See my recent review of Deer Tick's "Divine Providence" album on High Browse: http://tinyurl.com/7jo775s

For more information, movie reviews, music reviews on High Browse please visit www.highbrowse.ie.

Channel Orange album stream

Here is a stream of the whole "Channel Orange" album http://tinyurl.com/c6jn34u

Frank Ocean "Channel Orange"

Odd Future's Frank Ocean releases his debut solo album "Channel Orange" on Friday 20th July in Ireland. With all the recent media blurb about him "coming out" etc I thought I should give this performance of him performing new tune "Bad Religion" live on Jimmy Fallon's show in the States.

Now I'm not the biggest R&B fan in the world by any stretch of the imagination but I have to admit that this is pretty excellent.

Check it out here: http://tinyurl.com/73lvhku

Band of Horses new album

Band of Horses are to realease a brand new album soon called "Mirage Rock". See information here at Pretty Much Amazing including new single "Knock, knock" http://tinyurl.com/ckhfzvg.

The band are playing Dublin's Olympia Theatre on Saturday 17th November. Tickets are available at €26.00 each on Friday 13th July here http://tinyurl.com/btstnnz

NPR's Tiny Desk Concerts

Check out some on NPR's Tiny Desk Concert series:

The wonderful Exitmusic who recently played Whelan's Dublin in support of Sharon Van Etten. They'll be back there on Monday 12th November. Tickets are €15.00 each and on sale on Thursday 12th July: http://tinyurl.com/cxa4am7. Footage is a little jumpy but stick with it.

You'll all know this fellow. Watch Glen Hansard performs tracks from his debut solo album "Rhythm and Repose": http://tinyurl.com/clxrbdd.

Latest NPR new album streams Monday 09th July 2012

See below for the latest album streams from NPR:

Jeff the Brotherhood "Hypnotic Nights": http://www.npr.org/2012/07/08/155723171/first-listen-jeff-the-brotherhood-hypnotic-nights

Baroness "Yellow and Green": http://www.npr.org/2012/07/08/156292608/first-listen-baroness-yellow-and-green

Fang Island "Major": http://www.npr.org/2012/07/08/156137589/first-listen-fang-island-major

Strange Passion at Project Arts Centre

16th of July sees the release of "Strange Passion", a compilation of Irish new wave post punk tracks from the early eighties. It'll be released on vinyl and CD with an official launch party at the Project Arts Centre, Temple Bar, Dublin at 7pm, admission is free of charge. For more information please see http://tinyurl.com/bum54ts.

For full track listing and to pre-order see here: http://tinyurl.com/cqrsncy

Dirty Projectors "Swing Lo Magellan" album stream

Check out stream of Dirty Projectors brand new album "Swing Lo Magellan" here:
http://www.guardian.co.uk/music/musicblog/2012/jul/02/dirty-projectors-swing-lo-magellan?newsfeed=true

Latest NPR album atreams

Sorry for the delay in getting these out to you. I've been away sunning myself for the last few weeks.

Here are the latest album streams on NPR. Enjoy.

Delicate Steve "Positive Force" http://www.npr.org/2012/07/01/155356662/first-listen-delicate-steve-positive-force

Debo Band "Debo Band" http://www.npr.org/2012/07/01/154840343/first-listen-debo-band-debo-band

Beachwood Sparks "The Tarnished Gold" http://www.npr.org/2012/06/17/155049993/first-listen-beachwood-sparks-the-tarnished-gold

Deer Tick "Divine Providence" album review

Welcome to the wonderful world of Rhode Island 5 piece Deer Tick. “Divine Providence” is the band’s fourth album and it’s a dirty, raw, rocker of an album. I have to admit that it took a few listens for me to fully appreciate it. At first I just thought that the band we’re simply being lazy but I think now that they are just having an absolute ball with this. They don’t take themselves too seriously at all, they just rock out.

Opener “The Bump” is a prime example of that raw sound. “We’re full grown men but we act like kids” shouts lead singer and guitarist John McCauley. This line perfectly explains the foundations of the album.

The messing around really comes through especially with deep drawl of “you fuckin’ douche bag” opening the second track “Funny Word”. As you can see this is definitely not an album for the ladies. Some more profanities are spat around – “Let’s all go to the bar” is a good aul’ Ramones style drinking song which even features some hiccups and burps at the end of the track. Charming.

“Chevy Express” sounds like it could of fit perfectly onto Spoon’s 2005 rather underrated album “Gimme Fiction”. Britt Daniel and Co would have been proud of that one. The haunting e-bow guitar sound throughout the track made it a stand-out for me.

My other favourite tracks on display here are “Clowninaround” which is a slowed up acoustic jangle where drummer Dennis Ryan takes control of the vocals. Other slightly more off  kilter song is “Now it’s your turn”. The band soften up slightly here with this more melodic approach. This song is definitely worth checking out online.

So if it’s good old fashioned guitar based rock n’ roll like old school Rolling Stones and Black Rebel Motorcycle Club you’re after then look no further than Deer Tick’s “Divine Providence”.

B y the way if you skip on about 28/29 minutes after the final track “Miss K” you will find the bonus track “Mr. Cigarette”.

70/100