Pillow Queens (singer Pamela Connolly, bassist Sarah Corcoran, guitarist Cathy McGuinness, and drummer Rachel Lyons) released their third album Name Your Sorrow on April 19 and talk through all 12 songs on it in this interview. --- From the press release: It finds the group at their most vulnerable and self-assured as they explore themes of queerness, insecurity, desire and heartbreak as well as the positivity and strength that can grow from pain. Produced by Collin Pastore (Lucy Dacus, boygenius) at Analogue Catalogue in Northern Ireland, the collection sees the group chart new territory as they give fans an all new, uninhibited look at both their artistry and humanity ---- Pillow Queens play their biggest headline show to date at Iveagh Gardens, Dublin, on Saturday, July 13. Tickets: https://www.pillowqueens.com/live Buy Pillow Queens - Name Your Sorrow: https://pillowqueens.bandcamp.com/album/name-your-sorrow

Dublin-born, London-based Constance Keane aka Fears released her second album affinity on Tulle Records in March 2024. She talks through the 10 tracks on the album on this episode of the TPOE podcast. One part of the post-punk band M(h)aol, she also discusses their past year and latest single 'Pursuit', the first on which Keane takes lead vocals. --- Affinity follows her critically acclaimed 2021 debut album Oíche, that landed in the UK vinyl album charts, was chosen by readers of The Guardian as an album of the year, and received widespread radio support for debut single 'Tonnta''. The 10 tracks that make up affinity draw on human connection, intimacy, and 
moments of peace in a city; combining reflective electronics, acoustic samples, and stirring vocals with organic visuals, blurring the boundaries between music and visual art. Her minimalist yet striking approach centres on emotive subjects which are all-at-once deeply personal yet remarkably universal. Written and recorded between London, New York, and Dublin, affinity is a melancholy and at times playful exploration of the relationship 
between Fears’ physical surroundings and the work she creates. --- Fears plays the Sugar Club, Dublin, on June 1. Tickets: https://singularartists.ie/show/fears/ Buy Fears - affinity on Bandcamp: https://fearsrecords.bandcamp.com/album/affinity

Kieran McFeely aka Simple Kid released two acclaimed albums in the noughties before seeming to disappear around 2008. He sold his guitar and packed away his gear. A decade would pass before he went looking for the boxes in his attic. Simple Kid released third album Simple Kid 3: Health & Safety in 2022, and played a show at Whelan's in April 2023. Now, Simple Kid plays the Grand Social in Dublin on Saturday, May 4, and Cyprus Avenue, Cork, on Sunday, May 5, presented by Singular Artists. From Cork, it will be his first hometown show in 17 years. Ahead of the shows, he talks on the TPOE podcast about his journey, how he came back to the Simple Kid project after 10 years not thinking about it. We talk about his old band the V Necks/The Young Offenders, and how that led to his solo project in the early 2000s. Acclaim, charting, and an appearance on 'Later with Jools Holland' all followed. Buy tickets for Simple Kid live at the Grand Social and Cyprus Avenue: https://singularartists.ie/show/simple-kid-2024/ ----- Press release: Once upon a time, back in 2003, a young hopeful by the name of Simple Kid emerged with his first solo album, Simple Kid 1: full of optimism and arrogance, he was sure of his place in the Rock n Roll Hall of Fame. He garnered some awards nominations, some high profile tours, some good times, some bad. Like many before and since, he was ‘the next big thing’ with a UK Top 40, appearances on ‘Later With Jools’, Glastonbury slots and prestigious touring. In 2008, he followed this up with Simple Kid 2: not so many awards, not so much TV, lots of touring but running out of money, hair receding, girlfriend pregnant. Then along came ‘life’. And life said that Simple Kid needed to change the chapter in his book, to move on. So Simple Kid became Kieran and started to do things like: get a job, get tired, raise children, have financial struggles. Still some good times, some bad. But secretly in 2018, Kieran bought a guitar, a microphone and some speakers and started recording quietly in his loft. He didn’t tell anyone, not even his family. He started uploading songs to YouTube and eventually released 13 of these songs as an album called ‘Simple Kid 3: Health & Safety’ in 2022. Kieran has now changed his name back to Simple Kid and decided to come out to play again. He imagines there will be some good times, some bad.

Anamoe Drive is the solo project of Thumper frontman and guitarist Oisín Leahy Furlong. He released his debut album Breakfast in Bed via Faction Records on March 8 and talks through it track by track on this episode of the TPOE podcast. Oisin says Breakfast in Bed is a breakup album told in three parts. The non-linear narrative flits between the throes of heartbreak to the bliss of new love, from the depths of loneliness, to the slow dissipating of these feelings in the rearview mirror. The album’s title reflects different meanings depending on which song you view it through - from a kind gesture, to a lonely act, to the masticating of these themes in solitude. It also doubles as the place where most of these songs were written - perched on a bed, the morning after the night before, recapping these events in song. He says influences range from Sparklehorse to The Microphones, Bright Eyes to The Beach Boys, and Big Thief to Real Estate. Buy Breakfast in Bed: https://anamoedrive.bandcamp.com/ Tracklisting 1. The Same Asylum 2. Goodbye & Goodluck 3. Out Like a Light 4. Bulb 5. The Finder's Keeper 6. Long Time Coming 7. Procrastination 8. NYC 9. Holiday Song 10. Don't Walk the Wrong One Home

Singer/bassist Julie Hough and guitarist Matthew Harris from Dublin-based pop-punk trio Havvk talk through all the tracks on their third album To Fall Asleep, released on Veta Records. Julie's battles with insomnia are one of the influences on the album. She says: “I was waking up with an unshakable feeling of urgency, like I was forgetting something and then letting my thoughts spiral for hours. Sleep was something I had always taken for granted, so at first this felt like a huge betrayal from my body. But it wasn’t really. Actually, it was my body trying to tell me something. I had to really listen to it, and examine how honestly I was living my life, and how much energy I was giving to things that I didn’t have the capacity for." To Fall Asleep tracklisting: 1. Daylight Robbery 2. Expiry 3. Strong Possibility 4. You Say You Won’t (played in intro) 5. White Noise 6. To Fall Asleep 7. Take It From Me 8. Keep It to Myself 9. City Creep 10. Waste of Time 11. Nobody Told You (outro music) Buy To Fall Asleep on Bandcamp: https://havvk.bandcamp.com/album/to-fall-asleep

Dublin singer-songwrriter Danny Carroll released his debut solo album I am the Cheese on March 1. He talks through the nine tracks on this TPOE 304. --- Press release: Part of the Dublin music scene for years, Danny Carroll is co-curator of A Litany Of Failures compilation series showcasing independent artists from across Ireland.  Having gigged in various projects, he’s opened for kindred spirits such as Jeffrey Lewis and Pavement guitarist Spiral Stairs before the time came to work on his debut solo album. Enlisting the help of Belfast based producer Chris W. Ryan (New Dad, Just Mustard, Robocobra Quartet), the two developed songs with a playful, anything goes approach, with Carroll’s songs likened to softer touchstones of indie rock - Silver Jews, Jonathan Richman, and Lee Hazlewood. --- Danny explains: I Am The Cheese is an album I initially recorded with Chris W. Ryan in a week in June 2021. We did this in a terraced house in East Belfast - visited by Carl Eccles on two occasions to play guitar and sing some backing vocals. In the months that followed, Finn McCarthy emailed me bass parts, and I added various bells and whistles to the songs from a flat on North Circular Road in Dublin 7. Laura Ryder also contributed piano to the song Cheesemonger. The drums were performed and recorded by Chris on one day in January 2022 in Start Together Studios. He then mixed the album, and eventually I got it mastered by the late, great John Davis (Blur, The XX, Careerist) who passed away in September 2023. I've sat on the album a long time, in part down due to vinyl pressing, in part due to personal reasons. The mental fortitude it takes to independently 'emerge' and 'unleash' is not always forthcoming. At this point the album feels like a distant document. Nevertheless, it's still something I'm happy to have made for myself. The title is taken from the 1977 Robert Cormier YA novel, which haunted my adolescence. The final lines of the novel refer back to the folk song 'The Farmer In The Dell': "The cheese stands alone. The cheese stands alone. Hi-ho, the derry-o! The cheese stands alone" For a number of reasons it felt fitting to lift that title. credits

Singer-songwriter Niamh Bury released her debut solo album Yellow Roses on March 29 via Claddagh Records. Produced by Brían Mac Gloinn (Ye Vagabonds), it features Caimin Gilmore and Kate Ellis (Crash Ensemble) and Ryan Hargodan (Rachael Lavelle), but it is Bury's amazing voice that stands out as she weaves tales about travel, mysticism, and domesticity, with a theme of female empowerment coming through, particularly when she sings of her mother on one song and her grandmother on the title track. Comprising nine original tracks and one interpretation of an older song ('Lovely Adam'), Niamh Bury talks through Yellow Roses on this episode of the TPOE podcast. Niamh Bury tour dates: April 12: American Bar, Belfast April 21: Róisín Dubh, Galway April 24: Upstairs at Dolan's, Limerick April 25: Cleere's, Kilkenny April 26: Winthrop Avenue, Cork April 28: Whelan's, Dublin Buy Yellow Roses: https://www.niamhbury.com/

Willie Stewart runs Nyahh Records from his home in Co Leitrim. After releasing the brilliant I Am Kurdish by Mohammad Syfkhan in February, Willie talks about how that album came together and talks about Mohammad's story and musical output. Then he talks through other releases on the label, like Natalia Beylis' collaboration with Eimear Reidy, Ian Lynch's solo debut, and the two compilations from 2023: A Collection of Songs in the Traditional & Sean​-​N​ó​s Style and Under the Island: Experimental Music in Ireland 1960-1994. Nyahh Records discography on Bandcamp: https://nyahhrecords.bandcamp.com/album/under-the-island-experimental-music-in-ireland-1960-1994 Ley Lines: https://daily.bandcamp.com/ley-lines/ley-lines-february-2024 Mohammad Syfkhan tour dates: March 28: Record Room, Limerick March 29: Bello Bar, Dublin April 4: Vicar Street (Gig for Gaza, w/ ØXN, Junior Brother, Pretty Happy) Mohammad Syfkhan is a Kurdish/Syrian Singer and Bouzouki player. He began playing music in 1980 while he was in college studying nursing. When he got his degree in 1983, Mohammad moved to the city of Raqqa, Syria where he began working as a professional singer and started his own band, The Al-Rabie Band which played concerts, parties, weddings and festivals all over Syria. The Al-Rabie Band were a much sought-after group. Their live sets included Kurdish, Arabic, Turkish and some Western songs as well as Mohammad’s own original material. Mohammad continued to play with his band while also working as a surgical nurse until the war broke out in 2011. This unfortunately brought tragedy to Mohammad’s family when one of his sons was killed by Isis thus threatening the lives of the rest of his family. His family had no choice but to leave their home and seek safety in Europe. Three of Mohammad’s sons were resettled in Germany while Mohammad, his young daughter and wife were taken in by Ireland. Mohammad has spoken at length of his confusion and despair with fundamentalists and how their message is a far cry from the teachings of love and understanding that he considers the true message of Islam. Since arriving in Ireland, Mohammad has used the language of music to integrate into the local community by playing at private parties and concerts. He regularly plays at weddings and events for the Kurdish and Syrian communities all over Ireland and in Germany. He has collaborated with such Irish artists as Martin Hayes, Cormac Begley, Eimear Reidy, Cathal Roche and Vincent Woods. In 2023 he opened for Lankum at the Cork Opera House and received huge applause from the packed out room. Mohammad’s own brand of ecstatic music takes elements from Middle Eastern and North African music to create an atmosphere of joy, love and happiness. The songs on ‘I am Kurdish’ have been recorded and mixed with the view to make them to suitable for listening to at a small get together or to be played on a big rig at night clubs. Either way, it is a record that will make people dance. Three of the tracks on the album feature accompaniment by two fellow Leitrim-based musicians: composer, improviser, sound artist and saxophonist Cathal Roche and composer, improviser and cellist Eimear Reidy. Mohammad says: “I thank everyone who has stood with me and supported me. And I especially thank the Irish people who have engaged with my music in such a wonderful way. I consider myself lucky to have come to this wonderful country that has welcomed me and all refugees. I thank God for everything, and now, thanks to this wonderful country, I am a musician and have a safe home. Thank you to the Irish government and people for giving me the honour of calling this country my home.”

Driven Snow aka husband and wife Kieran and Emily released their debut album A Kind of Dreaming on February 9. An intimate collection of nine songs, it's a glance into a relationship, friendship, and all that that entails, with loss and doubt and worries along the way. But there's also hope - like they sing on closing track 'Nothing as Hard as Love': "Life calls me to breathe, calls me to breathe for us. Time makes me believe." On this episode, Kieran and Emily talk through all the tracks that comprise A Kind of Dreaming, how they started and developed, their lyrics, and inspiration. First they take us back 20 years to when and how they met - and their bands Delorentos and Republic of Loose. Driven Snow tour dates: March 22: Winthrop Avenue, Cork March 23: Kasbah @ Dolan's, Limerick April 6: Roisin Dubh, Galway

It's the 300th episode of the TPOE podcast!!! To celebrate, we asked some friends of the show to pick their favourite moment/gig/song/album of the past nine years or so since the show began (summer 2015, since you ask). Thanks to everybody who's listened to TPOE, thanks to all the guests over the years, and thanks to Irish music! You'll hear from: 13.45: Niamh Regan 16.01: Swimmers Jackson 20.55: God Knows 25.10: Brian Coney 29.50: Ailbhe Reddy 33.25: Steve Ryan 35.25: Stevie G 40.45: Jack O'Rourke 43.40: Brian Brannigan (A Lazarus Soul) 50.38: Lankum Choice Prize acceptance speech

Neil O'Connor aka Ordnance Survey released his latest album Turas (Journey) on December 1 and talks through the tracks and creative process in this interview. He says Turas (Journey) is the most ambitious Ordnance Survey record to date. The field recordings used on Turas were captured with both analog and digital devices at passage and wedge tombs across Meath, West Cork, Wicklow, Connemara and Roscommon. To make use of the tombs' acoustics, elements like percussion were recorded in the tombs and through the process of re-amplification (playing pre-recorded material back in the tombs), this 3000-year-old reverberation became a major part of the sound world that the listener experience. Turas is an electronically mediated journey that allows these historical sites to become an important collaborative factor in the creative process. Guest collaborators include Roger Doyle (Piano), Gareth Quinn Redmond (Violin), and Billy Mag Fhloinn (Yaybahar). Also known as Somadrone, all of Neil's work can be found and purchased at https://scintillarecordings.bandcamp.com/music