It seems suddenly that these Dundalk rógairí are huge, able to fit venues scarcely deemed possible a mere year or three back. And all based on ability to thrash through the Irish tradition like an ADHD Pogues, hyped up to the gills on Sunny D and the original blue Smarties. The potential to slip into cliche ever a risk, this outrider for album number 3 suggests that has been avoided, and that there are rather more nuances tucked up their collective sleeves than once appeared possible.

An almost sensitive ballad, at least by their standards, it has a typically barbed lyric, as the brothers Hendy and their pals mix up traditional tropes with spiky observation: it’s “about being in England and feeling like an outsider in all that colonialism“, the sweetness of the arrangement masking the critique implicit. The playing is increasingly measured, without this jarring any the sense of creative instability so integral to the band.

Bring on the album!

Simonetti & Taylor sounds like an accounting business in Acton, but is actually all part of Hot Chip’s Alexis Taylor’s bid on world domination, as, only weeks behind his debut solo long-player, here comes a collab with producer Mike Simonetti, one-half of Pale Blue.

The song is archetypically in the Taylor mould, awash with bubbling sequencer, that electronic swathe initially masking the song, it taking a moment to reveal itself as Will (Bonnie ‘Prince’ Billy) Oldham’s much covered I See A Darkness.

“Will Oldham is probably my favorite songwriter who’s still alive“, says Taylor, and this song has long been a feature of his DJ sets, it taking Somonetti to goad him into now interpreting it, to become a worthy companion to both the starker original and Johnny Cash’s memorably gaunt exposition.

Luluc seem to have avoided much scrutiny up here, the antipodean duo known mainly here for their appearances as part of Joe Boyd’s rolling Nick Drake tribute projects. Which seems a shame, as the duo, Zoë Randell and Steve Hassett, possess an innate gift of using melody to transport often sensitive subjects, without resort to twee or trite.

“There’s no cliché I wanna live by, no one else’s pen to write my love” is about as direct a statement of intent as can be imagined, and the studied simplicity of the arrangement slips around those words like a silk glove.

There are echoes of Art Garfunkel in the delivery here, unexpectedly so, not least as the construction smacks a little of Paul Simon’s less unctuous best. It is all rather lovely.

The new single from the California-based. (Louisiana & UK born) rock & roots powerhouse group is a typically high energy affair. A snarling, high-voltage blues-rock anthem that arrives alongside a music video as technically audacious as it is gloriously unhinged. Some, like us, might detect a hint of ZZ Top swagger; absolutely nailed on.
 
There’s a message in Me-Ye-Ye-Yow! and not surprisingly it’s not subtle. We live in a world of mass corporate surveillance, centralized data collection, and algorithmic systems designed to monitor, predict, and monetize human behavior. Most people accept this as the cost of modern life. Beaux Gris Gris & The Apocalypse, naturally yet respectfully disagree and make their case with a tremendous blast of vibrant Rock and Roll.

The song is only half the story as the video heads deep into the adventures of The Kitty Cat Gang. Not an outfit you;d like to meet down a dark alley – maybe? Essential!

So, not one but two songs seeming to emanate from the “auld sod” this week, with The Guzzlers, a pair of brothers from Liverpool via Limerick, who manage to make even the Mary Wallopers seems sophisticated.

Neither big nor clever, just insanely catchy, this is a piece of rousing shamrockabilly that’ll have you singing along in an instant, and quicker, should you be simultaneously slaking a summer thirst.

Tom and Cian O’Dowd moved across from the West of Ireland during 2025, since which time they have built up an enviable reputation, rallying the other ex-pats across Merseyside, of which there are a fair few. From busking to residencies, their songs are largely inspired by their rituals and routines, as two young scallies about town. This song is no different, a both self-deprecating and self-aggrandising tale of derring do, fuelled by guitar, banjo and the black stuff. I’ll have a pint of whatever they’re having.