Articles by Sophie Ann Crowther
Brendan Benson – Vicar Street, Dublin
There’s always been something mildly melancholic and definitively downbeat about Brendan Benson. Could be his mournful-yet-cosily genial vocal timbre cradled by self-pitying tales of bitchy girls and under-achievement, or maybe it’s the fact that his knack for a knock-out power pop tune has been entirely undermined by his association with one of the most…
Xiu Xiu – Whelan’s, Dublin
Xiu Xiu’s Jamie Stewart is not some one given to reservedness or restraint when it comes to his music. So it is generally with trepidation that people tend to approach Xiu Xiu gigs (if you could even call them that). Having built up a hardcore following since their inception in 2002, it’s not surprising…
Four Tet – There Is Love In You
The lazy ‘folktronica’ moniker has been slapped on a number of poor unfortunates over the years, but no one seems more associated with it than Kieran Hebden aka Four Tet. As dance music came of age, in some senses, in the mid-to-late Noughties, it seems apt that Hebden’s fifth studio album is one of…
Cheryl Cole – 3 Words
In a tale that’s as old as time itself, we of a certain age have seen the rise and fall and eventual rise again of Ms. Cheryl Tweedy. Once arch WAG and toilet attendant-baiter, she has of late been reborn as Cheryl Cole, Britain’s favourite big sister and heroine-with-an-air-of-tragedy. However, it has to be…
Interview with White Lies
It’s been one of those oft-mentioned rollercoaster years for indie darlings White Lies, due back here in December for Heineken Green Spheres gigs on the 9th in The Academy, Dublin and the 10th in The Opera House, Cork with support from Neon Indian and the Kissaway Trail (Get free tickets from Heineken Music).. Their…
EP roundup: Land Lovers, Brian Cullen’s Love Bullets, Disconnect 4
Immovable Feet is the second release from Land Lovers, the brainchild of Padraig Cooney. Wordy indie pop is their specialty, and Immoveable Feet is pleasingly refreshing to that end.
The eponymous ‘Immoveable Feet’ and ‘Paul Tracey Probably Knows’ showcase the inherent wit and ear for a cutesy melody that Land Lovers possess
The Cribs – Academy, Dublin
There are few less salubrious gig venues than Abbey Street’s Academy, which formerly housed Dublin’s infamous Spirit club, but there’s something that rings true about a band like The Cribs kicking off their latest tour here. Like the band, the Academy’s history does not always sit well with what it has become, and somehow,…
Fatboy Slim, David Guetta, Dizzee Rascal, Calvin Harris – Marlay Park
A queue in your run-of-the-mill convenience shop where every second person is a woman under the age of 30 buying a naggin of vodka wouldn’t always bode well for any kind of event that may happen to be taking place in the surrounding environs. Indeed, the marauding crowds of neon-clad girlies (and smattering of…
Discovery – LP
Since the heady days of the early nineties at least, it has been a generally accepted rule that the worlds of modern chart R&B and indie music do not and should not ever really collide. The melding of rock and rap has had varying degrees of success over the years (Puff Daddy and Jimmy…
Autokratz – Animal
The ubiquity of the male, Euro-centric dance-electronic duo is almost a joke in the ever-so-self-aware music world, at this point. Obviously, the roll-call is impressive, even up to recent times, so it’s generally hard to write them off in the same manner as, say, the all-male indie band. However, Russell Crank and David Cox,…
Pink Mountaintops – Outside Love
If Stephen McBean’s Black Mountain are the loveable hippie friend we all had in college, it could be argued that his side project, Pink Mountaintops, are his foil: the understated sensitive indie guy in the denim jacket with the ridiculously intense love life who, surprisingly, likes all the ‘right’ bands (and some of the…
Peaches – I Feel Cream
With a title like I Feel Cream, and with the fact that Peaches, after three albums, has something of a reputation for foul mouthed gender-bending and electro-subversion, one would be forgiven for assuming that this latest offering is more of the same. It always was going to be difficult for Merrill Nisker to move…
Handsome Furs – Face Control
The world of the husband/wife entertainment double act is a notoriously odd one, both professionally and personally (just ask Paul Daniels’ publicist. Or any of Abba). However, when done right, the clash of male and female sensibilities and styles along with the possible sexual frisson (or friction) provoked from working alongside a spouse can…
