One of the defining music documentaries of the 90s was 1991: The Year That Punk Broke, which captured noise-rock pioneers Sonic Youth on tour in Europe in 1991 with a rising young band called Nirvana. […]
Category: Interviews
Journey man: The story behind Michael O’Shea’s mystic folk masterpiece
Like many great legends, the story behind one of Irish music’s most revered cult records starts with a door. Not some metaphorical passageway, but an actual busted door that travelling folk musician Michael O’Shea dragged […]
Talos interview: This album is a bit more widescreen
“The next thing always has to be 10 times better than the last or else what are we doing?” says Eoin French. You get the idea that he’s facing the ‘difficult second album’ cliche head-on. The Corkman is talking […]
‘Art is one of the vital things that makes us human’: Interview with Tony Wright (VerseChorusVerse)
The gift wrapping has been scrunched up into the recycling bin, the Christmas tree is hanging around like a hungover mate at a rollover party and you’re allergic scrolling through inspirational quotes and pictures of […]
Interview: Author Nick Soulsby on his oral history of Swans – Sacrifice and Transcendence
For a band that inspires so much devotion and cult hyperbole, a book about Swans was always set to be a colossal task. Since the early 80s, the name Swans has been used as a […]
Gruth interview: ‘This is music born of intense personal experiences’
Gruth is an artist whose style has been hard to pin down over his three releases on the Brazilian experimental label Tormenta Electrica. Finnish producer Juha Puuperä brings a black metal aesthetic to his dark […]
Steve Van Zandt interview: I walked out on $100 million, but I saved a few lives
In the infinite list of shocking moves by rock stars over the years, Steve Van Zandt’s decision to leave Bruce Springsteen’s E Street band right after the release of Born in the USA is up […]
John Lydon interview: ‘I’ll go another 40 years… I don’t do full stops’
From punk provocateur to post-punk pioneer, John Lydon has been one of the most singular and divisive figures in popular music for over 40 years – and he reckons he’s got 40 more where that […]
Jimmy Cliff interview: ‘I wanted to accomplish a lot of things in this lifetime’
Few artists can boast about changing the face of music, but Jimmy Cliff was there at the crossroads at two points in reggae’s growth into a global movement. In 1972, Cliff starred in the ‘first […]
Interview: Dave Clarke and the art of never selling out
Near the end of my half-hour chat with Dave Clarke, he says he’s most proud of not selling out at any point, even if he “didn’t have a personal life for 30 years”. He’s talking […]
Tinfoil interview: ‘We feel techno in a very primal kind of way’
There’s a cliche of modern dance music as a solitary pursuit — of producers locked in studios fine-tuning DJ tools, hunched over screens, nano-checking every frequency for big-room optimisation. Irish duo Tinfoil’s visceral analogue techno […]
Loah interview: ‘It’s all just a big human experiment of creating stuff’
After the recent Imagining Ireland showcase at the Barbican in London, the Guardian nailed it in a review by saying “this was Ireland, but not as we are told we know it”. The concert could […]
Donal Dineen interview: ‘The middleman is a dope’
The phrase ‘What’s the story?’ may have been turned into shorthand Dublin slang over the years, but it’s a greeting that taps into cliched Irish openness and curiosity: “So, what are you all about?” Telling […]
Mango & Mathman interview: ‘Grime isn’t alien music in Ireland anymore’
When it comes to street art in Ireland, the North’s politically-charged pieces have always got the headlines, but a recent mural of Stormzy that appeared in Dublin dragged the pop culture discourse down south. Back […]
Going the Distance: Columbia Mills interview
Columbia Mills have just released one of the late-stage Irish albums of the year, their debut A Safe Distance To Watch. The album builds on their previous EPs, — melancholy shoegaze and electronica with a […]
Moo Kid 