Sweet Sixteen: The Best Irish Albums Of 2008 (Part Two)

Joe Kavanagh continues his look at the sixteen best Irish albums of the last year.

Fred
Go God Go

Long held up as Ireland's number one cult band and one of the finest live acts in the country, on previous albums, Can't Stop Now I'm Being Timed and Making Music So You Don't Have To, Cork's Fred have never quite delivered on the obvious promise of their best moments. Until now.

Almost a decade into their career, Go God Go, is unquestionably their best work to date and vindication to all those fans who knew that they had it in them.

Driven by superb harmonies and arresting melodies, tracks like Skyscrapers, Fear and The Lights, show a band that has distilled its sound into a potent force capable of competing in international markets, incorporating a dizzying array of sounds that run the gambit from Mika to Arcade Fire, while still retaining the band's inherent sense of fun.

Buoyed by recent recognition that saw them named the best act at New York's CMJ Festival by the New York Post and their single chosen by Canadian iTunes as Single of the Week, this cult is ready to go above ground.

The Blizzards
The Domino Effect

Widely viewed as one of the hardest working bands in Ireland, Mullingar's own, The Blizzards exploded out of the traps in 2006 with their debut album, A Public Display of Affection, which went on to spend 22 weeks in Ireland's Top 50 Album Chart and confirmed them as the most popular new Irish band on the scene by a country mile.

The only difficulty being that the album hardly set the world alight overseas, so their sophomore effort was always going to be about expanding their horizons and, to their credit, The Blizzards have taken to the task with some aplomb.

With tracks like the driving, disco-esque, The Reason, electronic Silence Is Violence and excellent Postcards, the band has expanded their sonic palate considerably, while still retaining a whiff of their past tongue-in-cheekiness with tracks like Three Cheers For Modern Medicine. Indie pop with an edge.

Robotnik
Pleasant Square

According to the man himself, Chris Morrin was given the name Robotnik by some of his Polish colleagues, while working in an organic food market some time ago.

The word means "hard worker" and he liked it so much that he adopted it as the moniker for his latest musical project, particularly apt for a man whose travails as a musician on the Irish scene have already seen him enjoy success and praise as a member of the now-defunct Wesleyz, and as an acoustically-driven solo artist.

This latest incarnation is by far his most ambitious and most accomplished to date, as he incorporates a staggering number of influences into a sound that is distinctly his own and starkly original at times.

From well-known names like Pink Floyd and Depeche Mode to cult acts such as the Beta Band/The Aliens and Cornelius, Robotnik is a veritable smorgasbord of sounds and inspirations covering everything from space rock, to acoustic tranquility and club music.

Positively overflowing with ideas, this is an album that you should buy if you are looking for something a little different that will surf easily into your affections.

Lisa Hannigan
Sea Sew

Musician, painter and sometime actor, Lisa Hannigan is an artiste in the truest sense of the word, but her name will forever be linked with that of Damien Rice, with Hannigan's vocals providing the rays of sunshine to the latter's frequent gray skies.

Theirs was one of the most formidable partnerships in Irish music history but ultimately one that ended in some ignominy when Rice announced tersely on his website that their relationship had "run its creative course", shortly after the release of his album 9 Crimes and, assuming that he was the creative force in their relationship, many wondered as to where Hannigan would turn next.

On the evidence of this debut, it transpires that she is an impressive songwriter in her own right, a leading light in the neo-folk movement whose frequently exquisite arrangements are given poignancy and purpose as they are gently teased out by no more than an acoustic guitar, violin, cello and piano.

Despite the quality of her songwriting skills, however, it is Hannigan's ethereal voice that remains her ultimate weapon, as she often injects more emotion into a single phrase than most could countenance on an entire song.

A beautiful record that serves as the perfect coming out party for a talent in her own right.

So Cow
I'm Siding with my Captors

Galwegian, one man gang, Brian Kelly, took his unusual moniker from an incident that occurred in a classroom during his time spent teaching English out in South Korea and he likes to refer to this album as his "second-and-a-half" album, coming in the wake of last year's These Truly Are The End Times and 2005's That's It, Christmas Is Cancelled (of which he recently said: "If it was a dog, it would have been a stray knocked down by a lorry on a motorway.")

Already spitting out albums at a frantic pace, he is on record as saying that he will release an album every year until he dies, and he has already impressed the likes of Deerhoof, who were so taken by his cover of one of their tracks that they posted it on their MySpace site.

Although he will undoubtedly evolve immeasurably through his career, this particular snapshot finds him straddling musical ground that has been occupied by everyone from They Might Be Giants to Pixes and Pavement, with his unerring knack for a melody matched by his innate ability to produce clever lyrical quips.

His particular brand of garage, surf rock with a touch of Merseybeat is sure to play well with American audiences and if his recent live set is anything to go by, his is truly a case of quality meeting quantity.

Reader's Wives
Reader's Wives

As Ireland's "dark prince of pop", Niall James Holohan has been one of the most prolific independent artists that the island has ever produced, rapidly releasing album after album, but virtually all of his previous work has always stayed roughly within the singer-songwriter, lo-fi format.

Now he makes his debut with a full band, but fans of his will be thrilled to know that he has lost none of the beguiling charm that typified his earlier records.

The sheer range of influences on this album makes it incredibly difficult to pigeonhole, as he readily leaps between genres from the Beatles and Screaming Jay Hawkins to reggae and indie rock, sometimes all in the same song.

With titles like Cavan Cola, Sexually Attracted To Myself and Advertising Heroin, it is tempting to pass this off as some quirky flight of fancy, but while it is undoubtedly eccentric, one need only listen to the quality or the arrangements, wonderful harmonies and infectious melodies to realize that this is an act in full earnest.

Niall James Holohan is undoubtedly one of the most talented songwriters on the island and certainly one of the most unique.

Giveamanakick
Welcome to the Cusp

As Steveamanakick and Giveamanakeith, Limerick duo Stephen Ryan and Keith Lawler have been thrilling audiences over the past several years with their brand of high-octane speed rock, which, coupled with an explosive live show, has won them a bona fide global following on the underground scene.

Their previous efforts, Is It Okay To Be Loud, Jesus? and We Are The Way Forward, are surely among the high water marks of Irish hardcore music and sufficiently impressive to secure them support slots with the likes of Yeah Yeah Yeahs, Dinosaur Jr. and Deftones.

Their third long player is certainly their most accomplished to date, adding a more mature, melodic approach to their songwriting, where tracks adopt unusual and more challenging structures that only add more strings to their bow and take nothing away from the intoxicating energy that has been their hallmark.

Referencing celebrity culture, pop culture and the cult of youth, among other things, tracks unfurl offering surprises along the way, adding texture and variety that is positively remarkable for a two-piece.

Republic Of Loose
Vol IV: Johnny Pyro and the Dance of Evil

When an institution as venerable as the Guardian describes you as "the Irish Outkast", you know that you must be doing something right and, to all intents in purposes, the description is entirely accurate in certain terms.

Ireland's zaniest exponent of soul driven dance/funk/rock are also one of the island's most unique acts and certainly not some simple knock-off of an American idea.

Theirs is a furrow of their own making, inspired by their own quirkiness, but while their sound is similar to the Atlanta outfit, it is their propensity for scattering several superb singles in amongst albums that also contain tracks that leave you wondering what the hell they were thinking when it came time to making the final track listing.

How else to describe leaving the appalling I.I.R.I.S.H. alongside such magnificent tracks as I Like Music, The Steady Song and The Ritual.

Coming in at 16 tracks, it's not as if they were stuck for some filler and it just cheapens the experience.

Like director Nicholas Ray's quote about every man having within them the seeds to their own destruction, it seems that ROL need to release these lesser tracks and add crudities to obvious singles in some act of catharsis, and to be honest, if that's what floats their boat then I'm all for it if it means they keep putting out such amazing moments in between.