On the Trail

Super Extra Bonus Party - ALT*

Only 42 more shopping days till Christmas! I mean… I’m about to shoot off on a train to Cork for a few days. Nobody knows if or when I shall return or what I’ll be doing down there but the clever money is on me being back this weekend and more than likely checking out Art Trail goodness and Basement Project Space. But if you’ll bear with me while I don my Le Cool hat for just a few moments, there’s some top notch shizzle going down here in the capital while I’m gone, so I’ll leave you a shopping list and some money in the jar before I go.

Thursday

If you move at lightening speed you could catch Mumford & Sons playing in Tower at 1pm. They are good. Run. I assume there are some art openings somewhere at 6pm, there always is. If you’re the type who buys ringtones, you might head to La Roux at The Academy, but my advice would be to hold off for the late show in the same venue. Irish DJ & Radio 1’s dance supremo Annie Mac takes a few hostages on tour and later tonight she’ll have Benga & Ou Est Le Swimming Pool playing at gunpoint for your amusement. Should be fucking savage fun, if I do say so myself.

Friday

Did you know that badminton is about to become cool again? Wait, again? More on that another time. Fuel the raging hangover beast with a visit to Temple Bar Gallery & Studios at 6pm for the opening of a new show, Aleana Egan’s “Sunday Night”, curated by Padraic Moore. After you’ve nicely stained your teeth with red wine upstairs on the balcony you can face a tough decision on whether or not to head to Crawdaddy for We Have Band, who are playing a late show presented by fresh-fish Yours Truly. It’s a very enticing option and the young English band are sure to bring the party, but how do you compete with a Super Extra Bonus Party? I assume it’d have to be a Super-Duper Mega Extra Add-On Bonus Deluxe Party Extravaganza. Luckily, that’s exactly what the lads have prepared with a big, bulging line-up as diverse as, well as diverse as a Boners album really. But that’s impressive. The extendo-night in the Academy will only set you back €17.50 and you’ll get support sets from Band On An Island, Heathers, BATS, Le Galaxie and some Disc Jockey types. The Bonus fellas will be bashing out tunes from their scary-robo-horse endorsed second album with occassional accompaniment from the aforementioned (and brilliant) Heathers, Captain Moonlight, White Noise and Rodrigo Teles who, along with Mike “Bad Taste” Donnelly will be performing as part of the collective SEBP pelvic thrust for the last time. Sad face. Go down and say hi, bye and “hey, look at his stupid moustache!”. It’s going to be an amazing night as always.

Saturday

The match. Oh god, the match.

Marina & The Diamonds – Photos

Marina & The Diamonds - Academy

Last night saw Marina & The Diamonds make her Dublin debut in front of a jam-packed Academy, a few months after wow-ing a decent crowd in one of the small tents at this year’s Electric Picnic. Valerie Francis opened the show with a pleasant set and some admirable banter with the crowd, but her songs seemed more than a little lost on those that were fashionably early. This could be because she was playing without her usual backing band, but – in this form – she wasn’t a clever choice of support act.

Marina is blessed with the vitality and personality to carry a show without the tunes, but luckily she also comes armed with a small, but impressive bunch of songs. As she belts through her 10-song set at breakneck speed, her stomping dance routines and endearing nature keep everyone engrossed and deliriously happy. She’s notably more professional than in Stradbally, but still remains loveably genuine enough to get away with her gushing. She even stops mid-ramble to thank Joey for coining the term “Emeralds” for the Irish branch of her Diamonds Club. Her set starts with “Seventeen” and “I Am Not A Robot” and includes her other recent mini-hits as well as very, very old songs and one or two new ones. Returning to the stage to close the show with a second, full-band rendition of “Mowgli’s Road” (single out in Ireland tomorrow!), it turns into the highlight of the night and the crowd finally start to really let loose. Unfortunately, it’s all over but there were no grumbles about the length of the show and many were eagerly awaiting the trip down to Carlow tonight for the Heineken gig featuring Marina along with Miike Snow and Digitalism. I imagine I’m not the only one counting the days until she returns on the back of her forthcoming debut album The Family Jewels early next year.

More photos below, full set on Flickr and Niall’s review should be up on State shortly.

You’re All Fired

TV3's Apprentice

The Apprentice is on TV3 again tonight. I’ve been half watching it this year having never watched it or anything of its ilk before.  It is hilarious television in a jaw-droppingly frustrating way. They’ve obviously copied and pasted the reality TV formula in which teams of desperately thick people with delusions of intellectual grandeur fail miserably at simple tasks while we – the viewers – sit there, stunned at their ability to bicker over the tiniest and most insignificant details in an attempt at some sort of corporate posturing. It’s been delightfully funny to watch every contestant brag about how they’re “very creative” when the evidence – their team name choices in the first episode, or the charity product ideas in a recent task, for example – seem to hint at the fact that, between them, they have all the creativity of a ham sandwich. And then, oh yes, then the judges. Bill and your one with the botched face-lift go for the “damned if you do and damned if you don’t” approach. If they chose A, they should have chosen B. If they went left, they should have gone right. If they made a fortune, they should have lost it all. Brilliant. It’s all about keeping up the negativity while the other fella contributes periodical “Pfffft!”-s.

Is there some sort of modern fetish for television where people (who used to go to college with my friend’s sister’s flatmate’s ex-boyfriend’s cousin’s optician!) are berated for their dull attempts at scheming, cooking, singing or whatever it is the show purports to be based on. I fear that it’s a matter of time before our education system gets an overhaul and reduces the Leaving Cert to a 10 minute audition in front of three faux-celebrity judges behind a desk. This seems to be what everyone, and I mean everyone, wants to see these days. The X Factor juggernaut (though I’m proud to say I haven’t watched it either) seems to peddle the same concept but with occassional teary-eyed support for whichever act is put forward as the greatest performer ever to grace God’s green earth for long enough that they claim the Christmas number 1. They also seem to scale up the Winning Streak-style banner-waving lunacy by about a billion times.

What’s my point? I don’t have a point. I don’t have to. We live in a country where David McWilliams is rewarded for the monstrosity of awful television that was Addicted to Money with the job of being the new permanent host of The Panel. Do RTÉ have an obligation to people like him to keep trying new things until they find something, anything at all that he’s good at? Or are they just so god-damn lazy, that they can’t look beyond the personality-vaccuum in their own staff canteen for new talent?

I’m emigrating to a place where they don’t know the meaning of the word Jedward.

Richard Hawley – Photos

Richard Hawley - Olympia

Photos from Thursday’s gig in the Olympia. Nice perormance by the Sheffield man despite being a little under the weather. As usual, there’s a couple of photos below and plenty more on Flickr. The State review by Steve Cummins is here.

Dublin Expression

'Su casa es mi casa' by Chris Judge

There was a while there, after the realisation that Recession 2.0 meant something far worse than the return of Bosco and long-ball football, when it seemed the ubiquitous drinks-sponsored gig was about to become a thing of the past. Lately it looks as if the booze-makers are back on board and are once again willing to stick some cash in someone’s back pocket in exchange for big fat logos and ominous hoods over the taps of their competitors. Heineken have been better than most at this in Ireland. Yes, they sponsor the brainless orgy that is Oxegen but they also do those Green Spheres gigs for free. The list of acts they’ve gotten for those is diverse (patchy) and the idea is great. Some of the double/triple-headers they’ve put on around the country have been outstanding. Take for example the upcoming Carlow gig featuring Digitalism, Marina & The Diamonds and Miike Snow. That’s good value for bus fare to an otherwise pointless town.

Their new baby is an interesting series of Expression gigs around the country featuring music and UV art that’s so cutting edge you could get a nasty paper-cut from it and have to get those Winnie The Pooh plasters from Lidl to stop it bleeding. The gigs in Dublin, Cork & Galway will have a team of artists, illustraors and other messers wrecking the gaff with UV nonsense “in celebration of the Heineken bottle” (?). The Dublin event – in Tripod tomorrow night – features work by a couple of Irish artists you might be familiar with, such as Chris Judge (pictured above) and BrenB, along with international scrawlers brought in for the occassion. Even more exciting, perhaps, is the music line-up for the night which consists of Inflagranti, Donal Dineen (DJ), Sarsparilla, The Field and The Juan Maclean (DJ). I’m quite the fan of The Juan Maclean having been listening to their album The Future Will Come quite a bit over the months between winters where summer is supposed to be. They’re signed to DFA Records so that should be about all I need to tell you about their sound, attitude and why you need to go and see them. Their glitchy, bleepy, blissful groove shares a lot in common with label-mates Hercules & Love Affair and some of LCD Soundsystem’s extended jams. This is a great opportunity to catch the Maclean party in Dublin with plenty of other good acts and fun art so I’d recommend you buzz down. Ticket info here. As they’ll be doing a DJ set in Tripod, I’ll give you a taste with this remix The Juan Maclean did of a great song by Duchess Says last year.

MP3: Duchess Says – Black Flag (The Juan Maclean Remix) – [Buy]

Limited Damage

This might be the most pointless thing I’ve ever posted here, but then again it has many purposes in my own demented mind. Yes, I’m really just posting a song I like because I like it, but damn it I really like it. Yes, I’m posting a nostalgic video of the 2002 World Cup, but damn if that wasn’t one of the best games I’ve ever seen. Missed penalties, late goals, extra time, Hierro molesting Niall Quinn, tears of all varieties and Mark Kinsella… it had everything. So, thanks to a friend posting a video of the classic Ireland v Germany match (thanks Graham!), I ended up watching the video above. While it was on, my iTunes shuffle selection made an excellent choice.

MP3: Lambchop – Pre

Now, some of the commentary by the English lads on that video is pretty funny, in particular the line about buying a replica jersey, but I think this song accidentally fitted the narrative quite well. I was going to post both the video and a link to the song in response but found that “Pre” doesn’t seem to exist on the internet which is a terrible shame. Lambchop are a fantastically talented bunch whose downfall may be the sheer volume of music they produce. They’ve banged out more albums than Miroslav Klose’s scored headers, but they’ve still got an astounding collection of superb songs and their Aw C’mon/No, You C’mon double album would deserve a decent placing in any poncey end-of-decade best of list I’d make.

This track however seems to have slipped under most radars, which is a shame. Of course, it means I can feel as if I am doing it some sort of service by sending it back out into the stormy waters of the interweb on the back of my little rubber duck of a recommendation. It first appeared on a bonus disc version of Lambchop’s 2006 album Damage and subsequently turned up on a Foggy Notions magazine freebie and a free Drag City sampler, which is where I think I originally got it. Either way, it’s a beautiful instrumental piece in a similar vein to some of their soundtrack work but with a slow, bittersweet melody that perfectly soundtracks Matt Holland smacking it against the bar. Or you can take your pick of audio/video, what do I know? I know we’ll be needing another heartbreaking song for a montage in mid-November, that’s what.

Welcome Returnees

Thao & The Get Down Stay Down

Two lovely acts have just resurfaced on the international music scene. One has come back with a new album not long after she won legions of new admirers with her last album and the other seemed like they’d run their course and might not return. We’ll start with the prompt one.

Thao Nguyen and the guys she calls The Get Down Stay Down only released We Brave Bee Stings And All in 2008, granted it was very early 2008 but it feels like no time at all has passed since that album full of short, sharp folk numbers slowly worked it’s way into many a foot-tapper’s brain. Great reviews and praise followed but her gig here in Crawdaddy last year (picured above) was shockingly underattended considering it was a cheap gig on a sunny Bank Holiday weekend. But now they’re back with Know Better Learn Faster, a new album which maintains everything that was so charming about the last album. They’ve gotten producer Tucker Martine on board this time and, although I might be crazy, I think you can hear some of the oddball-funk style of his work with Spoon in there. Her vocals are as brilliant as ever, from stubborn child-like bursts to layers of delicate exasperation, and it’s an album that’s full of the kind of material that will inevitably endear her to many more fans in the near future.

MP3: Thao & The Get Down Stay Down – When We Swam.mp3 – [Buy]

Originally from Bergen, Norway by way of some time spent in the UK, Kings of Convenience were everywhere about five years ago, albeit in a very soft and gentle way. Erlend Øye (also The Whitest Boy Alive) and Eirik Glambek Bøe have’t done or said much as a duo since their second album Riot On An Empty Street (which introduced me to Feist and in turn Broken Social Scene) in 2004. And as you might have guessed/heard, they’re back with a new album entitled Declaration of Dependence which, like Thao’s new one, doesn’t stray too far from previous work but still serves as a reminder that few can match the Norwegian pair for writing songs so soft they’re barely audible but still pack a unique punch.

MP3: Kings of Convenience – Mrs Cold – [Buy]

HWCH ‘09 Preview

HWCH '09 Launch

Festivals! We might not actually be all that good at them in this country but, by God, we sure have a ton of them. 67 outdoor gigs/festivals this summer! Fringe! Theatre Festival (featuring Playhouse)! DEAF! Darklight! Red Line Roots Festival! A fucking Chocolate Festival in Temple Bar! And this weekend we have Ireland’s annual showcase of rock n’ roll hopefuls. Hard Working Class Heroes, now in its seventh year has gone from a Jools Holland-style revolving gig in Project to a swarm of gigs around Temple Bar, to a hectic band orgy in the Pod complex and back to Temple Bar again. They say they consider this their spiritual home, but returning there last year and dealing with the awful Meeting House Square issues hardly felt welcoming. For my money, the whole thing was at it’s best in 2007 down Harcourt St way. The location made it possible to see a stupid number of bands each night and I felt the line-up that year was the strongest and most exciting.

Now, the fact that quite a few of the acts from that year’s list are still present doesn’t exactly help the line-up and realistically it hinders it quite a bit. I’m not that excited about this year’s bunch because the 99 acts seem to consist largely of a mix of bands I’ve never heard a peep out of before and ones that have been round this block so many times they have their own bus route. What purpose the inclusion of bands like Ham Sandwich and Angel Pier serves I don’t know. These are the kind of bands that have done this gig every year and had plenty of media exposure before. It might not have worked so far, but this can be put down to the fact that they’re just not good enough to make the next step. I understand the reasoning behind established acts headlining some of the venues: SEBP who are always great live are still really touring their excellent second album while Fionn Regan is returning from a long absence and it’ll be interesting to see what he plans to do. But are bands like those mentioned previously going to bring anything new or worthwhile this year to justify their inclusion? And are bands like Sweet Jane and Robotnik going to stop being so insufferably shite?

Obviously, I’m hoping that some of these new names are going to knock me on my arse and I’ll be singing their praises next week, but for now I’ll leave you with the ones I know can cut the mustard. My picks of the stuff that might be worth a dash across the cobblestones/Liffey/Dame St is below, but first the science bit: Tickets for HWCH are on www.hwch.net (€40 for a weekend pass, €18.50 for a night). I’m sure they’ll be on sale in the Info Centre or something on the night too. Don’t forget about some of the discussions and seminars taking place during the days too. They’re got a really interesting crowd of people in to talk at various panels and dish out obvious advice to young hopefuls.

Most days of the year are unremarkable.

(500) Days of Summer

The confused looks. The sudden bursts of laughter. The half-full room. These are all good signs. Not necessarily for the film, but these things reassure me that we are not the last people in the country to see (500) Days of Summer. Heading into the Savoy last Sunday night, I could not forsee the film justifying the fact that most of my acquaintances had already parted with their cash to see it – at least once – in the past month.

In the end it didn’t. It’s a nice film and parts of it were clever. It was mostly full of beautiful shots and the story had just enough subversive twists to set it apart from most other indie rom-coms. But everything about the film seemed a little too easy. We’ve all seen the slew of “indie” movies coming from American studios who are a little too big to be calling themselves indie in the past ten years. The formula has become simple, profitable and ubiquitous. We are now spoon-fed a supposedly quirky, but nonetheless heartwarming, indie success each year in the mould of Garden State, Little Miss Sunshine, Juno and now (500) Days of Summer. And hey, look, the soundtrack is like the Hype Machine’s popular list!

It’s these similarly blatant attempts to pander to the increasingly mainstream indie market that stop me from enjoying the film. I like both of the main actors and I think their talents have yet to be put to good work. But this was all too easy. The casting of Deschanel in particular secured the cash of a generation of walking fringes for whom Zooey is their Audrey Tatou. They should do a census to see how many American males would consider themselves thoughtful, misunderstood, sensitive types and compare this with regional ticket sales for this film. Selling tickets to this kind of thing is easier than selling tickets to a Galway Utd v Bray Wanderers match, but then what isn’t?

From the way this film was marketed all year long, it was clear that their cool soundtrack was key to their gameplan. The trailer’s use of the endlessly appealing “Us” by Regina Spektor surely swayed a lot of excited Spektor fans although the unavoidable link between the film and The Temper Trap’s “Sweet Disposition” is surely working more in favour of the latter. The song comes along twice in the film. Lord knows why. The first time it appears is an awkwardly trimmed snippet during a pointless scene where Tom (Joseph Gordon-Levitt) takes his lovely lady on a tour around his favourite architectural sites in LA. The song’s only purpose is to help cover up the fact that they forgot to write anything intelligent regarding the architecture they observe. The second time, it gets a decent airing and masks not only the long train journey but the difficlt transition from being uneasy exes to heartily-laughing buddies. The problem for me was that their all-important soundtrack just feels like it was stuck on late in the game. With Pritt-Stick. Look at the woeful scene involving Feist’s family-friendly ditty “Mushaboom”. It’s like watching an episode of One Tree Hill (yes, I’ve seen it) where the latest cool chart tracks are plastered all over every scene, relegating the actual dialogue to the level of DJ chit-chat. Oh well, the songs are pretty good though…

MP3: Spoon – The Infinite Pet – [Buy]

For Music’s Sake

Lough Allen

Some kTunes for the hell of it. Music for music’s sake.

This is my contribution towards getting us all through these miserable times. Also since my laptop’s keyboard is still only semi-responsive, thus making any significant amount of typing thoroughly painful. Here’s a batch of unrelated songs that have been inserting smiley emoticons into my life in the recent past. I feel like we’ve suddenly been plunged into the winter after that one week of good weather after the Picnic and I feel entirely unprepared for the seasonal change so hopefully these songs will help.

MP3: The Avalanches – Radio – [Buy] An oldie but a goodie, The Avalanches at their sample-tastic best.

MP3: YACHT – Psychic City – [Buy] The whole album is an absolute joy, but this song is too much fun to possibly avoid.

MP3: Dat Politics – Wish Ya – [Buy] The French group’s album Mad Kit is equal parts annoying/confusingly infectious.

MP3: Beth Jeans Houghton – Golden – [Buy] I’ve been liking the early signs from this adventurous young folky singer.

MP3: Fanfarlo – Luna – [Buy] Another album where any track could be called a standout, this is one of my favourites.

MP3: Lisa O’Neill – Anonlikely Scale – [Buy] Got re-acquainted with Lisa and her tunes when we played with her in April. “Has An Album” is out now!

MP3: Matt & Kim – Daylight – [Buy] I just keep coming back to this song. It’s brilliant. Just now discovered it’s on a Bacardi ad.

MP3: The Hood Internet – If I Could Rock (It Would Feel Like This) The mash-up experts blend more ludicrous R Kelly nonsense with some classic Jens Lekman to wondrous effect.