The Underground of Happiness

Tunes for you. Including the wonderful Cool Ghouls (pictured). And Jane Weaver who is playing an actual live show (it's next year, in January, but still). And plenty more. Enjoy. x Playlist 1. Buffet Lunch – Red apple happiness (Upset the Rhythm) 2. Cathal Coughlan – The knockout artist (Dimple Discs) 3. Bobby Oroza – I got love (Big Crown Records) 4. Brainstory – Bye bye (Big Crown Records) 5. Marina Allen – Oh Louise (Fire Records) 6. Julia Holter – Sea calls me home (Domino Records) 7. Virginia Wing – Out for something… (Fire Records) 8. Jane Weaver – Modern reputation (Fire Records) ( playing Whelan’s, Dublin, Jan 28th 2022 ) 9. Stereolab – Ping pong (Duophonic) 10. Skinshape feat Idd Aziz – Afande (Lewis Recordings) 11. Talking Heads – Love -> Building on fire (Sire) 12. Toler Gibson – Country queen (Rocket Girl) 13. Dntel – The lilac and the apple (remix) (Morr Music) 14. Coll...

A couple of Cork bands taking to the road soon on the show this week. The Bonk feature Philip Christie from O Emperor and friends. On their debut album there’s a great mix of doomsday jazz and prog pop with some swamp rock on the side. Fixity you’ll know if you’re a regular listener to the show. Based around drummer (and many other things) Dan Walsh and a rotating cast of collaborators. Thrilling dreamy soundscapes you can dance to. Imagine. Also. Cool Ghouls , wonderful Byrds meets Creedence Clearwater Revival grooves. PINS , more stirring anti anthems – “I’m only here to serve the rich.” And some autumnal gems from The Kinks & Lee Hazlewood . More on these pages. The Underground of Happiness uplifting pop music of every creed www.theundergroundofhappiness.blogspot.com www.facebook.com/theundergroundofhappiness Twitter: UndergroundOfHappy Playlist 462 Tues Oct 3 2017 11.00am-12.00pm (repeated on Tuesdays 8.30pm) UCC 98.3FM listen li...

Bracing new single from the San Francisco band... ...as if John Fogerty was stepping out with The Byrds. So. Muscular. But cosmic in that harmony drift. Glorious and uplifting pop music to coin a phrase.

So here's the final instalment of this Best of 2016 loosely centring on Psych Pop and some offshoots. I must say it was great listening back to the tunes over the last few weeks. It seems I always say this, but it really was another great year for music. It’s also very interesting when compiling a list like this to spot trends over the year, or longer, some kind of pattern that might be developing, or on the other hand any glorious one offs. I think I always say this too but no harm in repeating. These lists aren’t meant to be representative in any way. I know there are glaring omissions here out of the sum of music released last year but this list is made up of the music that struck a chord with me and in almost all cases was played (generally quite a bit) on the show. So once more with feeling, these are in no particular order. Enjoy. ************************************************************************** 1. Weyes Blood – Front row seat to Earth (Mexican Summ...

One last post before New Year's. This one rounds up some tunes mostly from the second half of the year. It turns out there was a lot of great instrumental music in there. Plus some other material that I think fits with that. Enjoy and see you on the other side. Fixity – Hungry clouds Tortoise – The catastrophist Elias Krantz – Patchwork Pt 1 Syrinx – Aurora spinray Marielle V Jakobsons – Rising light Cavern of Anti-Matter feat. Bradford Cox – liquid gate Melt Yourself Down – Dot to dot The Comet Is Coming – Space carnival Dieterich & Barnes – Parasol gigante Alien Ensemble – Skeleton dance Kaitlyn Aurelia Smith – Arthropoda Matthew Bourne – Keighley Qluster – Glasperlenspiel Nathan Bowles – Chiaroscuro Lambchop – Flotus Iggy Pop, Tarwater & Alva Noto – As Adam early in the morning/I am he that aches with love Rothko – A young fist curled around a cinder for a wager Wymond Miles – Protection C Duncan – Nothing more Weyes Blood – Generation Why Cool...

Some notable shows coming up, reflecting much of the music on this week's show. Stars of the Lid are back in Ireland for the first time in 10 years, they play Triskel Christchurch in Cork at the weekend in what should be an epic gig. Trashcan Sinatras have announced a November gig at The Workman's Club in Dublin, it's also about 10 years for them if I'm not mistaken. One of my favourite bands, and their new album is another set of lush, swooning pop songs. windings are in Coughlan's in Cork this month on the back of a new album, A Dyjecinski is on a UK tour this month, Alien Ensemble are also across the continent in November. And there's Cool Ghouls , they were in Europe recently, but is there a better cosmic Americana (read psych pop) sound around at the moment than this? More on these pages. The Underground of Happiness uplifting pop music of every creed www.theundergroundofhappiness.blogspot.com www.facebook.com/theunderground...

There’s a gorgeous Byrdsian flow to this single from the San Francisco band’s third album, the wonderful Animal races . The vocals and guitars unfurl in unhurried fashion, culminating in some glorious steel guitar work. It chimes and rings like (probably) only a Californian band truly can and the arrangement is all the more affecting for the counterpoint against the lyrical discussion of death and mortality. It is roots music brought into contact with something very groovy. A piece of class is what it is. Animal Races by Cool Ghouls

Brigid Mae Power is on tour this week, see her at Sirius Arts Centre in Cobh at the weekend, hear her here winding a magical extended drone. A new album by The Moles , wonderful news and wonderful tunes. Angel Olsen sounding firmly in control of her own destiny and yet somehow endearingly vulnerable. August Wells , album out now in FIFA, great songs, great arrangements, say no more. More on these pages. The Underground of Happiness uplifting pop music of every creed www.theundergroundofhappiness.blogspot.com www.facebook.com/theundergroundofhappiness Twitter: UndergroundOfHappy Playlist 414 Tues Sept 13 2016 11.00am-12.00pm (repeated on Tuesdays 8.30pm) UCC 98.3FM listen live on the web at www.ucc.ie/983fm *listen back to this show here goo.gl/dKigj3 Playlist Brigid Mae Power – It’s clearing now ( playing Sirius Arts Centre, Cobh, Sept 17 ) Joe Sampson – My love August Wells – She was a question Itasca – Daylight under my wing The Moles – B...

An album I'm loving a lot lately is the new Cool Ghouls , a San Fran band with a great line in fresh-faced psych pop (find a review of the album under December 2014 posts). And Twerps are another very endearing group from Melbourne - in another age they might have been called twee pop, although they give off a bit more gusto than that tag usually implies. The new Adrian Crowley album is another superb set of songs adorned with his velvet croon. Olof Arnalds' latest is another triumph, putting the likeable back into quirky, and ageless folk music to boot. And the drifting dream music of Chloe March , another wonderful magic carpet ride. Benjamin Schoos w/ April March channels Serge & Jane , both some kind of lovelorn adult romance with heart-leaping string sections. The new Elastic Sleep single, a thundering bass and other nice things, Brother Earth & Circus Devils , two lovely psych weirdness miniatures. And Silver Apples , bringing a great bounce to pil...

There’s a great freshness about this brand of psych pop from San Francisco band Cool Ghouls . Unlike many of today’s psych purveyors, they come at it from more of a roots than a shoegaze perspective. Think Creedence Clearwater Revival, for example, a phalanx of clean, jangly but strident guitars with buzzing riffs aplenty. That’s not to say there aren’t some lovely fuzzy interludes - album opener and single ‘And it grows’ unleashes a great one just 2 minutes in, before reverting to thrilling core values. But for the most part, the swingingly insistent tunes are carried by sharp sounds and banks of glorious Byrdsian harmonies, with the fuzz pedal being reserved for extra emphasis. The wonderful ‘What a dream I had’ is the perfect example, a hazy medium pacer that produces a guitar solo with a kick like a chilli pepper. ‘Orange light’ takes on the theme, uncoiling an Eastern European-sounding riff, before wrapping it in head-bopping 60s power pop. After this blistering...