Raindrops on noses outside the Stiff Kitten, photos of new bands with whom I am smitten…these are a few of my favourite things! Latest addition to that mental corkboard comes in the form of New Amusement’s mini-album Any Port In A Storm released this Friday, 25 April. That same night they’ll grace The Village stage for more sweet renditions of Gone To Sea and We Are Winners, as part of IMRO’s Best Of Showcase.
Also performing for IMRO are Cashier No. 9, The Brothers Movement, Grand Pocket Orchestra, Halves, Hybrasil and The Kinetiks. Free guestlist is on offer so drop the bands a MySpace message!

If you’re in Limerick tonight, get down to Dolans Warehouse for a blinding gig as part of the Green and Live Sessions. Canada’s new BFF, Vesta Varro, were announced last-minute as the headline act of a line-up featuring Seneca, My Brother Woody and Femmepop. I’d love to be there!
Vesta Varro will also play alongside The Aftermath and Future Kings of Spain at Waterford’s Electric Avenue tomorrow night, 25 April. Then it’s back to their new-homeland where they’ll play THREE Canadian festivals in a row. If you’re a VV fan, check out this radio playlist from IndieCan.

Ohh, it’s all over the bloody Irishnet that Le Galaxie have a new single We Bleed The Blood Of Androids, complete with video, out 23 May. What no one else has told you is, code-named Yurn! it was recorded in space on thirty thousand silicon-chipped asteroids and left Le Alastair Galaxie undergoing non-cathartic osmosis in a Venutian rehab.*

Bravado and Gorbachov are the two finalists of Murphy’s Live 2008, which is set to reach a grand climax in Cork on 15 May, headlined by The Enemy. Tickets are available from info@murphyslive.com
For those who can’t make it to the final, thirty silicon-chipped asteroids are awaiting your perusal over on www.murphyslive.com, a comprehensive collection of new bands’ and you can vote who deserves the title Song of the Year. There’s nothing it for you personally but the lucky band will feel wonderfully loved.

79Cortinaz play hometown Carlow and mow on through hills and glens with their album Hopioki, visiting Omagh and Offally this week. If you liked what you heard at Vodafone Bright New Sounds, check out the free download of Feather Eggshells on MySpace.

Michael Knight launch new album I’m Not Entirely Clear How I Ended Up Like This at the Sugar Club on 3 May! Also playing on the night are mischevious Mr Patrick Freyne and Mackerel the Cat, fresh from their support to Holy Roman Army.
This will be good! I like Michael Knight’s songs about soap operas, books and real life, as if they were all the same thing. Richie Kennedy’s a jester with incisive wit and backed to his arrangements of Knights, should be championed by music counsel. Hopefully I’m Not Entirely Clear, album #2, will see justice. If the 3 May show clashes for you, watch ‘em do Irish Rail Power in support to iLiKETRAiNS:
May 8 Roisin Dubh, Galway
May 9 Cyprus Avenue, Cork
May 10 Crawdaddy, Dublin

Ham Sandwich have a Flickr. Soon they’ll have a video of Buckfast at Tubridy’s from their RTE visit last week, complete with a Gaelissimo save from Podge, pitted against the mighty Stephen Hunt.

So Cow and Big Monster Love play Anseo on Sunday for €7…BARGAIN! The bovine Brian also plays Roisin Dubh in Galway on the Monday before heading west for a North American tour with NoBunny and looks as though he’ll be away until late June, so this is really your last chance to catch the Cow we know and love before he returns with a drawl and cannabalistic penchant for huge, bloody steaks…

I love HumanMusic.ie and their recent shows! Every month will see its own City Fest split between Voodoo and McGruders, buffered by varying events from a wide spectrum of music. Rock Candy this Saturday boasts a chockah line-up:

After a very quiet period, Corsairs are back in the game, hitting the Death Via Satellite club at Dorans this Friday. They’ve promised a slew of new material, much of it shortlisted for their album, along with older favourites like The US Theorem. Also at DVS on Friday are the ace Lines Drawing Circles and The Parks. Good work is being done here.

Check, check, check out Red Brick House’s video for Make the Same Mistakes Again:

Bright Light Fiasco’s new single, A New Way of Living, released 25 April:

You’d be forgiven for thinking every Irish band is cramming le schedule of April full of gigs before the May invasions. You’d be right. Bringing the new sound to the Button Factory this Friday are The Amazing Few, More Tiny Giants and Walter Mitty and the Realists, three stonking, hard-working bands who’ve been giving their all to the gig scene of late. Hailing from Limerick, the witty Mitty bunch are fast soldifying a strong fanbase around the country. Despite paring back on live shows over May in order to focus on recording new material, they still have a fatter calendar than most. Check out their MySpace for freeeee stuff!

For a litta bitta downright obscure : Dublin band Minus Circus are announced as finalists in an Australian competition run by Hewlett Packard. Four others will pit their wits against our lads in a bid to win cool technology and a support slot to Australian songwriter, ‘Whitley’ in Melbourne. Best of luck to them, eh?

Colour System Failure and their Tinfoil-Chewing friends front an all-ages gig this weekend:

After which, CSF and Only Fumes and Corpses support super-intense hard-rockers Glassjaw for their debut Irish show on 12 May.

Here’s a video for Are You Not Wanting Me Yet? from The Aftermath, who have themselves a sleek new record in the shape of debut album Friendlier Up Here, officially launched at Button Factory on 30 April. You can see this short make its television debut on RTE2’s TTV at 6pm on this Friday (25 April) before it’s over to Channel 6’s Night Shift from Monday 28th.

Kowalski are in Oxford this week. They sound a little jaded but who wouldn’t, after thirteen-hour travel sickness marathons? Three brand-new songs will be recorded for their album while others are in the progress. In the meantime you can hear Phil Kansus, their contribution to Oh Yeah!’s new compilation album showcasing spades of NI talent: Panama Kings, Cashier No. 9, LaFaro, And So I Watch You From Afar, Mojo Fury, General Fiasco and The Jane Bradfords plus bonus tracks from In Case Of Fire and David Holmes.

Hard-rocking butterfly socialites should check Kowalski and friends in London this weekend, my old manor Brixton to be exact. They’ll be performing for the NI:NG Showcase in The Windmill, a popular London venue for Irish bands hosting Murder of Crows and Hassle Merchants in March.
The most exciting news from the Northern front I’ve heard at all this week is…as soon as they return from NI:NG, And So I Watch You From Afar are going straight to Rocky Oppenheimer’s Start Together Studios to record an album of almost completely new material! Be still, heart: the time is coming to write in great detail and furious danger, those who attempted to inspire and revive my post-rock brothers…
I magnamiously inform you a new live version of Clench Fists : Grit Teeth by ASIWYFA has just been posted on MySpace. I really should have kept that for myself…

Lotus Lullaby are back in the studio for their second album, bringing forth a chronicle of progress. Drums are laid down, much to the relief of the Lotus flowers. Describing percussionist John as “to drums and sticks what Freddy Krueger is to hot teenagers”, the hardware bodycount for LL album #2 is:
“1 split bass drum skin (brand new)
1 mangled snare drum skin (also new)
2 cracked cymbals
15 shattered drumsticks
1 ass-raped hard drive “
Guitars are finding a new direction in this latest venture too. “We decided on toning back the distortion and not making an album that sounds current, a more classic rock sound would make the album more timeless. Think The Who, Led Zep, Aerosmith, Rolling Stones… that kinda guitar sound!” Regular attendees of Cork’s Lotus Lullaby gigs will recognise four other finished tracks: Island, Evacuate, So Fine and A Little Something are all in the bag.

Via Eddie NoClarity, here’s the video of Japanese Popstars‘ Delboy’s Revenge, taken from forthcoming EP out mid-May. As I reported last week things are good in the Japstars camp after they signed an exclusive distribution deal with Japanese label Beatink Records, reponsible for handling Aphex Twin and Underworld Asian releases. Well, things just got better: Groove Armada approached the Belfast lads in search of a remix and now the track is being released officially as Get Down: Groove Armada vs The Japanese Popstars. It will be released through New York’s Strictly Rhythm in the next few weeks and celebrity fan Pete Tong gave the song its first spin on his Saturday night Essential Selection show on BBC Radio 1 last weekend…go now and listen on JPs’ MySpace.

Finally, how brilliant is this for Gemma Hayes? She’s been hand-picked by MY BLOODY VALENTINE to play New York’s All Tomorrow’s Parties festival which runs from 19 - 21 Sept. Kevin Shiels guested on her upcoming album The Hollow of Morning, due for release here on 2 May. The perks of such friends in high places is paying off for Ms Hayes: here’s hoping there’s more than a namecheck in store from Billboard USA….

* = he’s not really. They do have a single though!

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