The Underground of Happiness

The Convergence Festival runs in London in March and there's another fine line up this year, including the wonderful "supergroup" of The Rajasthan Express with Israeli composer/singer Shye Ben Tzur and Jonny Greenwood . Anna von Hausswolff is also on the festival bill, hopefully they find a church organ for her to achieve maximum epic. Closer to home, Rozi Plain is at Quarter Block Party in Cork this w'end, finding a great niche between folk and kosmische; Morning Veils from Cork, spinning great freaked folk. Tortoise with Georgia Hubley from Yo La Tengo on sumptuous vocals; Joanna Newsom with more great baroque flourishes; The Drink making tremendous progressive math pop. And The Apartments , making heartbreak sound so luscious and inviting. More on these pages. Feb 2 2016 w/ Rozi Plain, Morning Veils, Junun, Tortoise, Anna von Hausswolff, The Apartments ++ by The Underground Of Happiness on Mixcloud The Underground of Happiness uplifting...

Fantastic follow up to last year’s debut album Company which brings to mind John Peel’s old adage about The Fall – always the same, always different. First single ‘Roller’ calls on the same elements as found on Company – Dearbhla Minogue’s cascades of fingerpicked guitar lines, her vocals swinging between soft and full-throated but always wonderfully quixotic, shifting time signatures and a brilliantly restrained rhythm section with the odd nod to math rock. There’s also that style of songwriting which has an air of mystery but still seems to be having a laugh, all this and managing to steer clear of pretentiousness. It all comes out sounding fresh as a daisy and amounts once more to top drawer left field guitar pop.

Progressive pop is a great and neglected genre. What is it exactly? Well The Phoenix Foundation are certainly contributing, all itchy rhythms and instrument washes. As are The Drink , with cascades of guitars and banks of fantastic vocals. G Rag und Die Landlergschwister paying tribute to Moondog with stirring brass band shapes. And the man himself making small music epic and full of emotion. JR Green , a pair of gobby Scottish teenage brothers with ace tunes. HeCTA doing great things with beats and brass and Kurt Wagner's hangdog croon. And beautiful drone folk from Owensie's new album, brilliantly locating the overlap between José Gonzalez and Elliot Smith. More on the blog. Oct 20 2015 w/ The Drink,Owensie,Moondog, G Rag, JR Green, Joanna Newsom,HeCTA, De Lux++ by The Underground Of Happiness on Mixcloud The Underground of Happiness uplifting pop music of every creed www.theundergroundofhappiness.blogspot.com www.facebook.com/theundergroundof...

Latest single from an album ( Company ) that might have slipped under the radar because of its pre-Christmas release. Lead singer and songwriter/guitarist Dearbhla Minogue is Irish but her two colleagues are English, the band is London-based and to be honest this is not the sort of music you would expect to spring up in Ireland. It’s playful (too playful to flourish on this old sod, I’d maintain - she had previous links with the Popical Island people which is a broad church), gleefully flitting across genres but managing to retain a seriousness of intent through considerable musical chops. This tune is a prime example featuring dancing hi life guitars, restless time signatures (you’ll see Deerhoof referenced favourably in reviews of the band and justifiably) and an arrangement that seems to combine three or four songs mashed together. A mish-mash it isn’t though presumably because each melody is so singalong accessible. Minogue has a particularly endearing voice, capable...

Happy New Year all. First off, a bit of a glitch at the start of this wk's show so apologies, we lost a few minutes of Aldous Harding , plus my intro (which is no loss). Check the full audio for that song down the page or better yet buy her awesome s/t album. A selection of Best of 2014 tracks dominated proceedings - aswell as Aldous, we had Benjamin Schoos, Jennifer Castle, Paul Smith & Peter Brewis, Silver Apples . Check the blog (down the right hand side under posts) for a full review of 2014 in 4 parts (4th part to be added this week). Also new music from Wildbirds & Peacedrums (a bonus track from the Rhythm sessions), Katelyn Aurelia Smith (more beautiful & minimalist analogue synths), Elephant Micah (plangent folk songs) and the great new single from Astronauts (hushed psych pop). In this brand new year of love and death, let's face the music and dance. More on these pages. Jan 6 2015 w/ Best of 2014 Aldous Harding,Silver Apples,W&P,The Drink...

And so Part 2 of this end of year series. There seems to have been less up tempo electronic music on my radar this year, hence a few crop up in this mostly-guitar set. (There are some ambient and other electronic cuts to come in the final part of the round-up.) Let's not get hung up on that. Enjoy. 1. Future Islands – Seasons (Waiting on you) (4AD) With all due respect to Hozier (who owed a lot in turn to the work of Feel Good Lost, plus maybe ‘Take me to church’ was more of a 2013 thing in any case?) and Kim Kardashian’s buttocks, here was the true thing that broke the internet this year. It showed the power to light up the world of sheer chutzpah – a short, barrel-chested man who can sing his heart out all night and dances like he doesn’t give a fuck who’s watching. On paper those are not the most promising ingredients, perhaps, but Sam Herring turns them into gold, when combined with the thrumming, soaring melodies of Will Cashion and Gerrit Welmers. Funnily enough,...