Recent winners of the Australian Music Prize and bloggers’ darlings Cloud Control are on something of a clichéd, meteoric rise these days. Having toured with the likes of Vampire Weekend and Aussie-scene stars The Temper Trap, debut album Bliss Release… – a euphoric, dreamy piece of catchy summer pop – has been making more than

The Vaccines have barely existed a year. Already at the heart of a backlash from the likes of The Quietus following their (admittedly suspiciously fast) rise to the forefront of the UK rock scene that – in some corners – already proclaims the band as it’s saviours, there’s undoubtedly a whole lot of buzz surrounding…

This time last year, 2010 Choice Music Prize winners Two Door Cinema Club were a little-known but critically acclaimed three piece whose biggest Dublin appearance was a slot supporting The Maccabees at the 1000-odd capacity Academy. Tonight, twelve months later, sees the Northerners convert their status into massive ticket sales with the first of consecutive…

Sleigh Bells serendipitous getting together back in 2008 is already the stuff of indie legend. A chance meeting in a restaurant led to waiter Derek being hooked up – in the musical sense – with session singer Alexis via her enthusiastic, young-at-heart mother. The quick-fire demos and debut album buzz that’s developed since has propelled…

Little Comets are not your typical indie-rock band. Cult heroes in their hometown of Newcastle, they eschew the rock and roll lifestyle in favour of late night baths in Travelodge hotel rooms (for which they have an almost pathological hatred) and a deep-seated longing for the comforts of home. Aside from the music, tours are…

Somewhere along the line where indie rock meets hip hop, Bollywood infiltrates Brighton and samples become morphed to the point of unrecognisable, you’ll stumble across The Go! Team. Third album Rolling Blackouts… takes their ever-quirky formula, plays off the diverse influences of a band who claim their only shared musical love is the music they

Owensie’s been hanging around the Dublin music scene in his various guises for so long that he’s practically part of the furniture. In all that time, though, Aliens… is the first time we’ve seen him out on his own, and in it the guitarist abandons his rock roots and explores an intelligent brand of toned-down,

Simply by the way it was made, The Fall marked a moment in modern music history before anyone but the label had even heard the first note. Produced by Albarn during the course of the US leg of Gorillaz recent tour, The Fall… is the first album by a genuinely mammoth name to be produced

Despite having surfaced briefly two or three years ago as part of Concerto For Constantine, JJ72 front man Mark Greaney seems, largely, to have been tucked under a rock since his childhood band’s sad demise. The split in 2006 came four years after their second album I To Sky…, with fingers of blame largely

Oh Duffy, what were you thinking? Where did it all go wrong? We remember first unwrapping Rockferry…, and finding something this decade hadn’t seen yet: a 21st century twist on a mid-20th century style, and one with sincere originality. You were soulful, and crammed your music with genuinely dazzling vocals. You soared, explored and

There aren’t many bands that will induce and entire, packed concert audience to stride through the ice and sleet from all across the city, and leave barely a space to be found. Interpol, though, pull it off three nights in a row. Two thirds even come early enough to see ‘one to watch’ support act…

Has the recession finally hit Ireland’s music industry where it hurts? Sure, Underworld could reasonably be nudged into the ‘slightly past their best’ category of mega bands (and it’s snowing hard outside), but tonight’s RDS has gaps around the edges and down the back that you could march a herd of elephants through. Once Underworld…

Tonight must be the revamped Workman’s Club’s biggest triumph yet, crammed to the point of bursting with an eclectic and sweaty throng determined to strut their way through Le Sac Vs. Pip’s last gig for a year. The crowd includes Scroobius Pip’s beleaguered mother, a lad whose so determined to get the urban poet’s autograph…

At first glance, you could be forgiven for dismissing The Temper Trap as a one hit wonder. In a sense, after all, they are, but to make such an all-encompassing judgment of the band on the basis of ad-producer’s uber-hit ‘Sweet Disposition’ is to conveniently ignore the fact that this band is only three singles…