Michael Gira tells me he’s “just a little braindead”. He’s having a rare day off tour with Swans at his home in upstate New York, ears ringing as he tries to recharge for the short final […]
Push the Sky Away: Primavera 2013, day three
Day three begins with a pact to massage the head and turn the dial down a notch, so we set up camp from 4pm in the 3,000 capacity Rockdelux Auditori, the indoor concert space in […]
Full of Fire: Primavera 2013, day two
A bit of customary second day dilly-dallying means we miss a lot of the hipster Beyoncé, aka Mrs Carter’s little sister Solange at the Pitchfork Stage. Like Jessie Ware on the same stage the previous […]
It goes it goes it goes it goes: Primavera 2013, day one
There’s a level of smugness and one-upmanship that comes with Irish music fans’ annual pilgrimages to foreign festivals. Most of us are guilty of the gloating Facebook status updates and links to obscure headliners, the […]
Taking the edge off: !!! – Thr!!!er
After spending most of the last decade pogoing in and out of punk-funk/disco-punk circles, !!! (Chk Chk Chk) may have taken the edge off with their fifth album. The California crew’s raucous early records took […]
Hive mind: Autechre – Exai
If the copyright ever runs out on the term ‘heavy metal’, Autechre should claim it back from the guitar gods. The future-industrial clang on Exai has a greater metallic yield than any down-tuned Fender, and […]
The fear: Berberian Sound Studio soundtrack by Broadcast
The recording rooms in the movie Berberian Sound Studio could easily be Broadcast’s rehearsal space – a Formica-panelled Aladdin’s cave littered with hanging cables, whirring reel-to-reel tapes, valve oscillators and chunky dials. The studio looks like […]
Millions and millions of stars in your eyes: Swans in Manchester
Swans’ leader Michael Gira once said the band’s mission is to fuck your insides, in “that deep sex death place in your stomach”. The band’s live reputation is a mix of urban myth and early-80s […]
Just for the fuck of it: Death Grips – No Love Deep Web
Just as the big dick on the cover can’t be unseen, you won’t be forgetting No Love Deep Web in a hurry. Death Grips’ third album staples itself to your inner ear, a hip-hop headbutt […]
Kamerad, komm tanz mit mir: Laibach in Berghain, Berlin
I’m a stone’s throw from the Berlin Wall and a blood-soaked axe-swastika is spinning behind five silhouettes in strobe-lit slow motion, grinding out 10 factories’ worth of industrial clatter. The screen lingers on deepthroat blowjobs, […]
Ethiopian jazz-hands: Debo Band
It’d be a hard sell for some: an 11-piece band from Boston, led by an ethnomusicologist, plundering the Ethiopian jazz, pop and folk vaults. It could’ve been so academic, so worthy, so deferent – musical […]
Down to the woods: Body & Soul 2012
After hatching as a wormhole at Electric Picnic where you could lose yourself in offbeat gigs, theatre, holistic therapy and various other beatnik mischief-making, Body & Soul is now a tentpole attraction on the Irish […]
This shit is… fuckin ridiculous: Kanye West and Jay-Z in Dublin
This shit is… fuckin’ ridiculous. Kanye’s own lyric could be a one-line review of his Watch the Throne live show with Jay-Z, a 40-song epic that cashes in all your craic tokens at once. It’s […]
Primavera Sound 2012: 10 of the best
A$AP Rocky (Pitchfork stage, Thursday) The next young Harlem big thing is the consummate rap chancer at Primavera, laughing all the way to the bank that’s been beefed up by a $3m advance for his […]
‘The decades come and go’: Interview with composer Roger Doyle
Have a listen back to the voicemail messages on your phone. You probably won’t save those fleeting hellos and routine exchanges and use them as the backbone to a modern composition project a few decades […]
Moo Kid 