To paraphrase the late, great Brodie Lee, it’s the day after Valentine’s and you know what that means. Yes readers, the most mopiest day of the year is upon us and we think it’s fair to say that it will probably suck harder than 2020’s Vacuum Cleaner Of The Year competition (which is totally a thing, you don’t need to Google it *cough*). Aiming to help you through this period of torment, sorrow, misery and strife (gold star if you caught the reference) however, is a crack team of future chart-breakers who have joined forces to create an album full of swoonsome heart-swellers.

Dubbed Bangers ‘N’ Breakups, 15 acts from across the land have contributed a track each for the compilation including curators Problem Patterns and This Ship Argo plus Charles Hurts, Beauty Sleep and Arvo Party. There are many highlights to be found on the opus (which can be streamed and purchased on Bandcamp ) and some of our faves here at Hot Press HQ are Letterkenny’s Lunch Machine’s exceedingly tasty, Slumber Party and Hope Sandoval-spiced ‘Obi Wan For The Road’ and the playful yet potent ‘All I See’ by the pleasingly hard to pigeonhole art rock tour de force Cloakroom Q.

Belfast’s Big Daisy are the Tom Brady of the record and the Bangers ‘N’ Breakups MVPs' ‘Bee Mine’ is an outrageously catchy three minutes of garage pop goodness that wouldn’t sound out of place soundtracking a slow dance in The Bronze. We’re hoping for huge things for them over the year ahead.

Serving as both an exciting snapshot of part of the underground and an excellent introduction to a new favourite band, proceeds from the album will be donated to charity She Sells Sanctuary, which supports victims of domestic violence in NI.

Listen to Bangers 'N' Breakups below.