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1 week ago | 
hotpress.com | Peter McGoran
Berlin-based artist Tara Nome Doyle took her listeners to interesting places on her two previous albums. 2020’s Alchemy followed the four phases of alchemical transformation, while 2022’s Vaermindealt with the Jungian psychological concepts of persona and shadow.
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2 weeks ago | 
hotpress.com | Peter McGoran
Paddy Hanna’s fifth album, Oylegate, came into existence after the artist pushed through a period of doubt and “embraced the strange beauty of uncertainty”. It’s notable that uncertainty has always lain at the heart of Hanna’s music. The Dublin-based baroque-pop songwriter has kept listeners on their toes with each new LP release, offering us something markedly different every time he’s come out of the studio.
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2 weeks ago | 
hotpress.com | Peter McGoran
Following the publication of her debut novel Little Scratch in 2021, Rebecca Watson received international attention. The book offered a searing look at trauma, told by a woman over the course of a single day. Its success led to Watson being chosen as a New York Times Book Review Editor’s Choice and as one of the Observer’s 10 Best Debut Novelists of 2021. Watson’s second novel, I Will Crash, was met with similar acclaim when it was released last year.
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2 weeks ago | 
hotpress.com | Peter McGoran
Few bands can claim to be as resilient as Black Country, New Road. Following the amicable departure of their lead vocalist, Isaac Wood, back in 2022 – after the release of their second studio album – the Cambridge act were forced to reinvent themselves. Their next album, 2023’s Live At Bush Hall, was brave, considering that it was made up of entirely new songs, with several of the other members – Tyler Hyde, Georgia Ellery and May Kershaw – sharing vocal duties.
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3 weeks ago | 
hotpress.com | Peter McGoran
Having come together on 2024’s single, ‘Never Too Late’, Elton John and Brandi Carlile announced in February that a full collaborative album was on the way. The result, Who Believes In Angels?, is big-hearted, soaring, and generous in a way that classic Elton John records – Goodbye Yellow Brick Road and Tumbleweed Connection – also were.
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1 month ago | 
belfasttelegraph.co.uk | Peter McGoran
Some are travelling thousands of miles to watch the 79-year-old perform in Belfast. Van Morrison might be celebrating his 80th birthday later this year, but the multi-million-selling soul artist — who hails from Hyndford Street in East Belfast — still keeps a formidable touring schedule.
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1 month ago | 
hotpress.com | Peter McGoran |Pat Carty
How far can you get these days with just six strings and the truth? Jason Isbell, the six-time Grammy winner, known for his work with The 400 Unit and Drive-By Truckers, seems determined to answer that question on Foxes In The Snow. Recorded with just an all-mahogany 1940 Martin 0-17 acoustic guitar, over the span of five days in a New York studio, the record is a pure and potent slice of Americana. The eleven songs deal variously with love, creativity, and the American experience.
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1 month ago | 
hotpress.com | Peter McGoran
The DUP might’ve triggered endless problems since they came into power in the North 20-odd years ago, but occasionally, they also offer solutions. Typically, these solutions are unintended by the party itself. One example is that, following endless attempts to suppress and defund Irish language initiatives, interest in Gaeilge has skyrocketed in the North. Why?
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1 month ago | 
hotpress.com | Peter McGoran
Maria Kelly’s 2021 debut, The Sum Of The In-Between, was a critically-acclaimed streaming hit, which documented the Irish artist’s mental health journey through intimate alt-folk songs. Recorded between Start Together Studio in Belfast and Black Mountain Studios in Dundalk, the title of Kelly’s new LP was inspired by the long hours she spent in sterile clinic waiting rooms, hoping for answers to the chronic pain from which she was suffering.
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2 months ago | 
hotpress.com | Peter McGoran
In some ways, Adrian Crowley has it easy. With his gravelled, dignified baritone, he could pretty much sing-speak the phonebook and you’d still want to listen to it. In other ways, though, he has it more difficult. With a voice that has drawn plenty of comparison to Leonard Cohen over the years, there’s no doubt there’s a lot of pressure for the singer to conjure tunes with a lot to say. Still, on previous albums, Crowley has never failed to deliver, and album number 10, he’s on top form once again.
