News/Reviews

[pigography]

I also just found :
Track by Track by Paul Noonan:

The Ribs of a Broken Umbrella: I met an old man in a bar in New York who had come to America many years before from Poland to seek a better life. He knew that a girl from his home town had also made the journey west, and they had planned to meet in New York City. He had hoped to make her his wife, but he couldn't get in touch with her, and still carried a photograph of her in his wallet. He had lived most of his life in New York, and never married, always holding a candle.

How Your Heart is Wired was written on a piano in a music school in Rathmines, Dublin. We dressed the song in beats and sounds from little black boxes. The end section was an extended wig-out we did during one of the takes, and liked. Makes it sound more purple!

The Great Defector: Touring can do funny things to a fella…There is sometimes an unhinged exhilaration to the transience of it all - the constant newness of everything, the people you meet, the sociable hours, bad food and boozing. The song is I suppose a celebration of the madness

Blow Ins: If all time since the Big Bang was compressed into a single day, we humans would only be around for the last few seconds. I find this staggering. Our limitations as humans mean that we can't imagine what forms of life are undoubtedly to come, or how the very idea of life and existence will evolve. In short, we ain't all that.

Ameila: Amelia Earhart was the first woman to fly solo across the Atlantic, and an inspiration to many. She disappeared over the Pacific in 1937. There is much speculation about what happened. Her co-pilot was Fred Noonan….!

A Better Band: I'm often overwhelmed by the great music that is and has been. This song is like a self help tape we can listen to in our sleep - "I am a strong, confident woman...” It has 3 movements (one, two, and bowel)...so maybe dips a toe into the Sea of Prog Rock? This was the hardest tune to make work but we love playing it live.

Breastfed: Low Fat! Skimmed! Semi Skimmed! Super! 2%! 3%! I remember as a young boy on the farm going to the fridge for a glass of frothy, unpasteurised milk that had shortly before come from the cows udder... ah them were the days!

Light Catches Your Face: The simplest, everything-played-and-sung-live song on the record. One of those very satisfying recording moments. A Hamlet cigar moment, if those yokes weren't so manky.

One Stringed Harp: We wanted this to be theatrical, in a lush, timpani-and-fanfare Bacharach kind of way. Check out the "ba be ba" backing vocals in the middle 8 - still not sure about them. A 4-man (gentle) rant against being bombarded with how-to-live-your-life-and-hold-the-correct-opinions.

The Curtains are Twitching: I’m very excited about the brass on this one. I heard a New Orleans funeral march over the latter part of the song (in me head) so we found a brass section in New Orleans, sent them the tune and they sent us back the brass part...very satisfying.

[evie09]

[Colm]

Bump!

How Your Heart Is Wired is the new single according to Alison Curtis.

[Mully]

[Colm]

Bellies to headline Irish in Film Oscars party:

http://www.hotpress.com/Bell%20X1/news/ ... 66761.html

Some great videos from Eletcric Picnic up on YouTube
http://www.youtube.com/bellx1video#p/u/2/CdxbzP_Zrw8

[Nathalie]

Nice one. Soon they'll appear in the National Enquirer, mixing with the very rich and very famous...

[Colm]

Paul has a column in Day and Night in the Indo today. He hints at playing new songs at Oxegen!

[pigography]

Really?
Is his column viewable online?

[Colm]

[pigography]

North American Acoustic Tour 2010
We are happy to announce that we will be heading back to North America in October for a special Acoustic Tour.

Details are below:

North American Acoustic Tour 2010

Oct 6 Philadelphia, PA – The Tin Angel
Oct 7 New York, NY – Le Poisson Rouge
Oct 8 Cambridge, MA – The Brattle Theatre
Oct 9 Northampton, Ma – The Iron Horse Hall
Oct 11 Ann Arbor, MI – The Ark
Oct 12 Toronto, Ontario – The Drake Hotel
Oct 14 Chicago, IL –Schubas
Oct 15 Louisville, KY –Zanzibar
Oct 16 Pittsburgh, PA – Club Café
Oct 17 Vienna, VA – Jammin Java’s
Oct 20 Los Angeles, CA – Hotel Café
Oct 21 San Francisco, CA – Swedish American Hall

OH HELLS YEAAAAAAAAAAAAH!!! October suddenly seems a lot brighter!

[Melody55555]

[Mully]

Oxegen Interview with Dave & Paul

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5TAaprB8piE

[Colm]

This thread had fallen halfway down the second page, for shame!

Here are some reviews of Bloodless Coup:

http://www.state.ie/27121-album-reviews ... dless-coup
http://highbrowse.ie/music/reviews/bloodlesscoup.html
http://p1start.typepad.com/media_junkie ... -coup.html
http://wearenoise.com/index.php/2011/04 ... p-records/
http://www.shout4music.com/album-review ... 80%99.html

[VocalicPage]

I'm glad you bumped it back up! I'd never read that track-by-track discussion of Blue Lights on the Runway before. (It might get bumped back to another page when I post this.) The Ribs of a Broken Umbrella will no longer be "the scary stalker song" in my mind. Seriously, it disturbed me more than a little bit the first time I heard it.

[Colm]

Links to a few interviews here:

http://www.belfasttelegraph.co.uk/enter ... 52174.html
http://www.indielondon.co.uk/Music-Revi ... -interview
http://www.pastemagazine.com/articles/2 ... ll-x1.html

The Belfast Telegraph one quotes Paul as saying Londonderry, but I'd say they might have used a bit of artistic licence there!