- Music
- 24 Jul 15
It's all about Ed Sheeran this weekend as the honorary Irishman plays two insanely sold-out shows in Croke Park which, natch, will be covered on hotpress.com...
To get you even more in the mood for the gigs, we've assembled another quality collection of Free Music Friday downloads, streams, videos and trailers. Play 'em loud and play 'em often!
Our favourite FMF thing this week is 'Bodyline', a new tune from Peaches featuring the fuzzboxed-to-infinity guitar of Yeah Yeah Yeahs man Nick Zimmer.
One of the Body & Soul standouts and returning on October 21 for their own show in Whelan's, Malian hotshots Songhoy Blues this week treated NPR to a stripped-down set that's just begging to be iTuned.
The tunes are taken from their Music In Exile album, which is an absolute peach.
This week also saw the station welcoming Kate Tempest, the firebrand English poet who regaled Chuck D with one of her rhymes a few years back in the Hot Press Chatroom at Electric Picnic.
Leading this week's Noise Trade charge are Third Eye Blind, the San Francisco rockers who celebrate the end of a six-year hiatus by gifting us a sampler EP of songs from their upcoming Dopamine album.
Wild Ones, a Portland, Oregon outfit who know how to shake an electropop leg have a whole album's worth of tunes awaiting your download pleasure.
Thad Kopec, a Nashville resident who's got a bit of a Sufjan Stevens thing going on, wants you to hear six-tracker The Ridge.
Depeche Mode man Martin Gore is inviting you to remix one of the tracks from his new instrumental MG album, 'Featherlight', with the best one appearing on the digital EP he's got coming out in October. Get all the relevant stems you need from [link]bundles.bittorrent.com/bundles/mgxmg[/link] and then give it maximum sockage!
Kicking this week's streams off are Titus Andronicus, The Mynabirds whose pop is as bombastic as it comes and new wave folkies Red River Dialect.
Over at [link]3voor12.vpro.nl/luisterpaal/albums.html[/link] there's new music from Omar Souleyman, Warren Haynes, Sleaford Mods, C Duncan, The Wooden Sky, The Smoking Trees, Nap Eyes and Rachel Sermanni.
The quality over quantity [link]www.nytimes.com/interactive/arts/music/pressplay.html?_r=3&[/link] offering is Seraph, the debut album from Montreal producer Thomas Arsenault under his Mas Ysa alias. As stylistically diverse as it gets, it's top of our lazy summer listening list.
It's our first time visiting [link]hypem.com/premiere/lane+8[/link] where you can check out another quality electronic release from German producer Lane 8.
Funky Corkonians White Boys are giving their Stylin' EP away in return for signing up to their [link]whiteboysmusic.com[/link] mailing-list. We reckon it's an extremely fair trade! Catch the chaps live tonight at Cobblestone Joe's, Limerick (July 24) and tomorrow at The Greyhound, Tralee (25).
Declan O'Rourke's series of monthly free downloads continues with 'Gettin' Married', a rockabilly-ish thumper you can bag from [link]www.declanorourke.com/newsletter[/link]
Receiving its Irish premiere this week in the IFI, The Ecstasy If Wilko Johnson is another '70s rock 'n' roll stunner from Julien Temple who'd previously documented Wilko's old band, Dr. Feelgood. Do not, whatever you do, miss it!
Attending the IFI screening, Temple revealed afterwards that Wilko is working on a project with Van Morrison. Talking a while back to Clash Music, the guitarist revealed that one of his all-time faves is Them's 'Here Comes The Night'.
“The first time I wanted to ask [my wife] Irene out, I was walking down the road on Canvey Island," Wilko reminisces. "I was going round her house to ask her to come out with me. To keep up my courage I was singing ‘Here Comes The Night’, which was a hit song for Van Morrison and Them at the time. I went and asked her out, and it was ages later that somebody pointed out that her name was, in fact, Irene Knight. I'd been walking along singing ‘Here Comes The Night’. I told Van Morrison this little story once: ‘Yes Van, you were encouraging me to get my first date with Irene.’”
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Feminist commentator Caitlin Stasey and X Men: First Class star Edi Gathegi explore the trials of living with blindness in the vid for ace new Matthew E. White single, 'Vision'.
Back home soon for Indiependence and Le Cheile festival appearances,
Not music but definitely popular culture related is The Black Panthers: Vanguard Of The Revolution, a documentary account of how African-American communities fought racism head-on in the '60s. John Lennon was among those who vociferously supported their cause and is featured in the film.
Finally, as we all psych ourselves up for Mr. Sheeran, here he is blasting out 'Chasing Cars' with two of his Snow Patrol mates last weekend in the Other Voices tent at Latitude, and wowing Whelan's - again! - on Wednesday with Jamie Lawson: [link]www.nova969.com.au/music/ed-sheeran-just-blew-us-away-performance#1[/link]
We're sure he has some other surprise guests up his t-shirt sleeves for Croker!
Anyways, have a fab weekend and we'll catch you on the other side. We love getting your music and video links, so keep them coming to @stuartclark66