Myles Ni Gangstaleen is back with another look at a bitta Irish musical activity. Some new, some not so new. But first, we head to Scotland…for the day that’s in it…
LOKI.
Darren McGarvey AKA Loki, is a Glasgow-based rapper, community activist, journalist, and funny fecker. With years of gigs, battles, and recorded output under his belt, he has been quite vocal in the Scottish independence debate recently, and his new album addresses the issues of the referendum question in an ambitious multi-media project incorporating music, film, art and journalism. He’s dropped a few teaser tracks and a video in the run up to the release, and now the full album is ready and waiting for yiz to wrap yer ears around…
Stream ‘Government Issue Music Protest (G.I.M.P.)’ here.
TEISHI-1.
Dublin producer Teishi-1 has had a string of solid releases down the years on local labels such as !Kaboogie, First/Second, and Boy Scout Audio. His ‘Sunshine Hexagon’ from last year was beautifully bonkers, and up there with the best Irish electronic output of 2013. Since then, ‘Solstice’, and now ‘Votive’ have dropped independently on his own bandcamp site on a ‘name your price’ basis. Downtempo and lofi in general, tunes like ‘Wayfarer’ still show a heavy head-nodding groove shining through. I look forward to hearing more from this lad.
Check out ‘Votive’.
MELODICA DEATHSHIP / Rí Rá.
Jaysus. Seeing those two artist names beside each other should be enough to give most fans of quality Irish hip-hop the horn. Rí Rá steps up for this beefy new take on ‘Look To The Sea’ from the debut Melodica Deathship album. Sadly the Deathship no longer sets sail, but they leave behind a sea of satisfied punters who were lucky enough to catch ’em live, and hopefully the brilliant ‘Doom Your Cities, Doom Your Towns’ LP and ‘The Sunken Path’ EP will still be hittin’ fresh ears for years to come.
Check out the MELODICA DEATHSHIP bandcamp site… …And the Rí Rá bandcamp site.
FIRST SECOND.
Moving on to a damn fine Dublin based label now. We’ve covered some individual acts and releases from this collective before, but the sheer quality and variety of their output earns them a post of their own. First Second have a rake of ‘name your price’ EPs, LPs, and compilations to date. Their roster includes the likes of the aforementioned Teishi-1, as well as Ickis Mirolo, Boya, Lumigraph, Chris Hanna and most recently, Terrell with the ‘Untitled’ EP. Get shtuck in. There’s many hours of aural tastiness here.
Check out the FIRST SECOND bandcamp site.
EBAUCHE.
Ah yes. While trawling through tunes on an old hard-drive recently, I had one of those ‘Feck, I forgot how class this dude is!’ moments. Followed by some googling that brought about an ‘Ooh deadly, I haven’t heard these ones before!’ moment. Producing since 2001, Alex Leonard AKA Ebauche demonstrates a wide variety of electronic stuff here with his releases on the Alphabet Set and Invisible Agent labels. From ambient beatless and beautiful, to dark bangin’ and nasty. Get yourself acquainted/re-acquainted.
Check out the EBAUCHE bandcamp site.
BETHANIENS DUST.
Hailing from Belfast, this lad was originally known as DJ TROUBLEDSOUL in the 90s. Circa 1996 he recorded ‘Shoebox Perspectivs’ right onto cassette, no edits, using a turntable, a sampler, and an Atari ST. He then became EPIGON ADM and blasted out a string of excellent solo and collaborative work, and lately is operating as BETHANIENS DUST. Described as “contemporary hip-hop accidentalism”, this bandcamp features output from 1991 right through to this year. Fair fux.
Check out the BETHANIENS DUST bandcamp site.
Back soon with more aural goodies for ya. G’luck. Mind ye’reselves.