Eoin Boylan
Having tried and failed at the creative side of music, I quickly found that analysing and criticising other people’s attempts was much more rewarding. I’ve always been the guy who takes over the ipod at parties, simultaneously searching for new music and filling any eardrums in the vacinity to what I think they should be listening to. Being given the opportunity to subject the internet to my rants (usually about awesome Northern Irish bands) and general music obsessiveness has been amazing so far, and long may it continue!
As for the boring details, I’m from Belfast, in my 20s, and can normally be found hoaking* around charity shops, pestering DJs and talking far too much about music to anyone who will listen. Currently a wage slave, because for some reason being a grown-up means we need to actually pay for things, but am saving to go back to uni and learn how sound works, as being a drop-out is no fun anymore. I love the heavy, the emotive and the drawn-out, variation-on-a-theme music that usually comes with most modern genres with the word “post” at the start. Send me new music and I will pay for it in words (and money, if I like it!).
*Yes, hoaking IS a word. Google it.
Articles by Eoin Boylan
You Make Business A Pleasure by Irish band HumanShield showcases a much more cohesive and controlled form of song writing, displaying a band growing into their sound and starting to figure out their primary direction.
Is this Punk? Maybe. Is it Hardcore? I’m not sure, but through the twists an turns from skull-pounding riffs through jump-around Punk mentalness to straight up fist-pumping head bangers, this is an album in no way lacking in energy.
Newcomers to this three-piece will never believe in a million years that two guitars can be so god damned heavy, while veterans will lap up the bludgeoning, almost concrete solidness of this unrelenting aural barrage.
A distant war-horn, a call to arms which almost feels like a decoy, as the listener is greeted by the sonic equivalent of sneaking up behind them and bludgeoning their face with the nearest heavy, preferably jagged, object. A gradually intensifying whi …
It’s been a hell of a long time since I’ve heard any new metal that has genuinely excited me, so even before the play button is hit, preconceptions of any brand-spanking disc will inevitably arise. Normally pessimism, and assumption that there will be …
Big Bill Shakespeare went on a lot about names. “A Rose by any other name would smell as sweet” sticks with me from school ‘til now, and for the most part it’s true, but one ponders sometimes whether the Bard’s famous quote can be applied totally to mu …
On a cold October night in Belfast, Echoes and Dust have been invited to swap words with Johnny McGinley, guitarist and vocalist of Northern Ireland’s newest rising stars in the alt-metal scene, Droids. The Derry quartet have been together for just ove …
If you haven’t come across Droids yet, it’s highly likely that you will soon. Hailing from Derry, the riff-loving quartet are barely past the fetal stage of band-life, having been together a little over a year, yet have managed to gig their asses off ( …
San Francisco psychedelic wizards Assemble Head In Sunburst Sound return with their fourth release, however fans of their long, drawn out, variation-on-a-theme type psychedelia, might be found wanting on what feels like a venture into more traditional …
You may be slowly noticing just how many great records have been trickling out of Ireland in the past few years, and with an in-flux of awesome bands, that trickle is set to become a tsunami. The newest to emerge is the second EP from Belfast boys Stil …
I’ve got to admit, I was giddy as a schoolgirl at the possibility of reviewing Sucioperro’s latest bombastic blast-fest, confident that Scotland’s most criminally under-exposed noise-makers would surely knock my socks off yet again. And guess what…? Th …
Electronic music nowadays has more sub-genres and re-classifications than any other form, with bedroom producers constantly pushing the boundaries with seemingly limitless possibilities. Sometimes these releases are bland and same-y, and sometimes they …
Julian Corrie, aka Glasgow electronica wizard Miaoux Miaoux, has always been recognised for the post-rock influence present in his material, taken from the likes of fellow Weegies Mogwai, giving it a larger, more expansive sound. For the most part, de …
Manchester’s instrumental jam(ish)-band three piece Dead Sea Apes have been making waves with their prog/desert rock stylings since their inception in 2009. Released in conjunction with the excellent Astral House, Dead Sea Apes’ first full length sees …
I tend to rant a lot about genre classification (see: anything I’ve ever written) and how needless it is most of the time. Thus, when I saw that Sheffield’s inFictions classified themselves as ‘post-progressive’ I got a little worried about the content …
Anticipation and expectation reign supreme in the Speakeasy this evening, the crowd restless but positive, aware that they’re in for a treat tonight. And boy, are they right. San Francisco’s Deafheaven are first to creep onto the stage, their reverb la …
Genres are a constantly changing. It seems like every week there’s a new pseudo-math-rock-hipster-beat-poet-dynamic-pop band kicking around throwing yet another adjective into the hyphenated melting pot. It’s gotten to the stage where you aren’t cool u …
Torche have always been quite an anomaly in the rock scene, managing to throw fuzz-laden stoner grooves, off-tempo time changes and soaring melodies into the mix and come out with music that rides the perfect cusp between accessibility and mayhem. Thei …
