In 2018, he was artist-in-residence at the Cathedral Quarter Arts Festival, working his chops and winning friends. This year, Joshua is the headliner dude in the big marquee. Surprising, eh?
Well, not if you’ve seen him at the Elmwood Hall in 2021 or witnessed the sold-out hallelujah in the Ulster Hall, last December. Sometimes he looks like an endearing shambles, but Joshua’s art doesn’t fail and the curve is ever-excellent. Here then, are ten good things about the show: Continue Reading…
You knew that CS Lewis was from Northern Ireland as soon as you read the description of Narnia as, “always winter, but never Christmas”. In the same way you know this is a Therapy? album from the outset, when that unalloyed Andy Cairns east Antrim gulder delivers opener ‘They Shoot the Terrible Master’ like a smack around the chops. Continue Reading…
The Joe Nawaz one-man show, Five Days, premiered at the Imagine! Festival of Politics and Ideas in March and will be returning to the stage in the autumn. Joe is publicist with Cathedral Quarter Arts Festival, and a writer and performer who lives and works in Belfast. The Cathedral Quarter Arts Festival runs from 27 April – 7 May. This is his Playlisted feature for Dig With It, Issue 10. Continue Reading…
“Sometimes these are the best dreams I’ve ever had,” goes the opening lyric on Mark McCambridge’s latest album under the name Arborist. “….but they’re not real, I understand.”
There has always been a comforting stoicism within Arborist. An indifferent shrug to acknowledge the trauma that is life in the 21st century. None of his songs are particularly optimistic, but there’s enough subtle humour and sonic warmth to make everything feel okay…ish. Continue Reading…
Ferna’s debut album Understudy makes you flinch.
At its core, the record feels like it’s reaching out in a gentle, or sometimes rivetingly forceful, way to shake you out of disconnection or a self-imposed detachment. “Open your mouth wide,” she commands on the opening track ‘Open Up’. With our jaws agape, Ferna breathes life into what lurks beneath the surface of our being, that which we often find too painful to touch. Continue Reading…
The opening line of her debut single ‘The Ghost of You’ sees Rachel Craig shedding her self-doubt, as she sings, “I’m not afraid anymore.” The haunting ballad sees the Portstewart native come to terms with the dissolution of a father-daughter relationship, seeking out strength instead of sadness. Although the track is haunted by the spectral presence of nostalgia (the single artwork contains a faded family photograph), there is something uplifting lying beneath the fragile vocal performance and layers of swirling electric guitar. Continue Reading…
They are stronger than Mensa. They spit out Derek Jarman, Karin Bergöö Larsson and Charlotte Perkins Gilman. Every New Pagans gig is a schooling, an alternative history and a major lesson in riffology. Continue Reading…
The Strand Cinema is a landmark piece of architecture in Belfast, shining like a beacon of artistic endeavour, reflecting the energy of the city back upon itself. Phil Kieran is one of the city’s foremost electronic producers, consequently securing pride of place in creating this space of sound much like the building itself does. Continue Reading…
Some albums come with a view. They have the power to place you in a landscape that is vivid in the mind’s eye. There’s something about New Pagans’ second full-length LP that puts me alone in a car that I cannot drive (no license), cruising nonetheless down a road that resembles a weirdly pristine rendering of the Wild Atlantic Way. I feel a breeze and the summer sun on my back – it’s a scene to roll credits to. This landscape comes with a mindset, too: I’m laboriously leaving something, whilst chasing the unknown. Continue Reading…
Twitter