Nialler9

It’s a big episode. As it always is when it comes to an artist like Kendrick Lamar.Mr Morale & The Big Steppers, Lamar’s fifth album, the Compton rapper’s first album in five years, is out almost a week now and Niall and Andrea spend an hour and 40 minutes discussing this cerebral, personal, conceptual album in depth.The album is a therapy session and a morality play, seeking breakthroughs, with Kendrick sharing confessions while also speaking on the culture wars, his saviour complex and his sex addiction.It’s the same album that explores racial, generational, and centrally, family trauma, while giving space to Kodak Black, who has pleaded guilty to sexual assault of a minor, the same topic that Kendrick unpacks here trying to break the “generational curse” while also exploring his acceptance of trans members of his family.His wife, Whitney Alford is central to the album, as is the work of German self-help author Eckhart Toll, while guests are limited but include Beth Gibbons of Portishead, Sampha Ghostface Killah, Amanda Reifer, Taylor Paige, Sam Dew and Tanna Leone.It’s Kendrick with the N95 mask off.Let’s dive in:

It’s the monthly roundup of albums and songs we love with Andrea and Niall on with the new music recommender episode.This month we’re discussing albums from Billy Woods, Let’s Eat Grandma, Martian Subculture, Girlpool and Faye Webster and songs from Pusha T, Ailbhe Reddy, Two Shell, Soccer Mommy, SOAK, New Jackson and Robocobra Quartet’s toxic wellness anthem.

You may have heard of the term Indie Sleaze lately. A term newly coined to describe a nostalgic trend of post-Y2K era of culture and aesthetics of indie music that crossed cities and continents.Niall and Andrea are talking indie-rock, blog house, nu-rave, electro-clash and the alternative scene of the years of 2004 to 2012 that gave us the Yeah Yeah Yeahs, Crystal Castles, CSS, Uffie, MGMT, New Young Pony Club, MIA, Hipster Runoff, Mashups, The Cobrasnake’s hedonistic flash photography, Dublin clubs like Antics and spawned an Indie Sleaze instagram account.So how are Gen Z co-opting the vibe of the era and is the Indie Sleaze trend just a Tik-Tok-enabled churn in nostalgia economy?Plus, Louise McSharry, host of the new topical news podcast Catch Up, drops in to talk about her experiences of indie, electro and alternative of that time, the fashion and the tunes she still loves, and why she wants to start a club night in the era’s honour.https://nialler9.com/nialler9-podcast-indie-sleaze-with-louise-mcsharry/ 

This week, we’re looking at an icon.Andrea  takes the lead with Niall on support to delve into the life and distinguished music career of Canadian singer-songwriter Joni Mitchell.Mitchell has been in the news recently, and recently showed solidarity with Neil Young by taking all her music off Spotify, having appeared on the Grammys this past Sunday, one of her first appearances in public since suffering a brain aneurysm in 2015.Andrea looks at her beginnings and formative experience with adoption, her seminal album 1971 Blue, her forays into jazz and her ’80s period, along with a song in the early ’90s in which she directly addressed Ireland’s shameful Magdalene Laundries.Mitchell proved herself to be a continuous counterculture artist, a musician who walked her own way and used her writing as a way to interrogate the world for herself, and others to understand.And of course, there’s discussion of songs like ‘A Case Of You’, ‘Both Sides Now’ and ‘Big Yellow Taxi’ among many others.

It’s Andrea and Niall with our monthly new music recommender episode.We are talking new albums from from Rosalia, The Weather Station, CMAT, Charlotte Adigery and Bolis Popul; and songs from Aldous Harding, Angel Olsen, Tomberlin, Amy Michelle, Spider, EFÉ, Maria Kelly with Paul Noonan and Skinner.

With many of the major Irish music festivals like Electric Picnic having revealed their lineups in recent weeks, it is time to discuss the state of gender equality on Irish music festival bills in 2022.While festivals like Primavera Sound, Ireland Music Week and Iceland Airwaves have committed to the Keychange initiative of booking a a 50/50 gender-balanced split on its festivals, many Irish events seem to be oblivious to the idea of representing women on their headliners or even aware it might be a problem.Andrea and Niall discuss the possible reasons behind the slow acceleration to more gender advocating lineups in Ireland, the defensive responses from men on the issue, the realities of booking women headliners behind the scenes and the issues around exclusivity and pay parity, why this is a systemic issue that includes the gender disparity highlighted by the Why Not Her campaign, whether Electric Picnic’s one woman in six headliners is enough, and why there might be some good news happening in the field of electronic music, courtesy of international network female:pressure’s FACTS 2022 survey.Plus Reasons to be cheerful.https://nialler9.com/podcast-why-are-music-festivals-still-booking-male-heavy-headliners/ 

A few weeks ago, Myself and Andrea took a day trip to Galway city to visit the Black Gate Cultural Centre.In 2020 both Andrea and I were big champions of Niamh Regan’s debut album Hemet which was released on Black Gate’s label, Indeed, we talked to Niamh on the show that summer, and the record went onto receive a Choice Music Prize nomination last year.Last year the Black Gate venue was streaming live concerts from its small venue space, and this week, it will debut its TV show on TG4 – called Cumasc: Seisiúin sa Black Gate, the show pairs up disparate musicians for a series of collaborative days resulting in performances in the Black Gate.There are 12 episodes of Cumasc featuring the likes of Rhiannon Giddens / Róisín Elsafty and Francesco Turrisi, Rachael Lavelle and Peter Broderick, Seamus Begley and Junior Brother, Jinx Lennon and The Mary Wallopers, Sam Amidon and Siobhán Peoples, Anna Mullarkey and David Kitt’s New Jackson and much more.Cumasc is available to watch on the TG4 player from today, before TV broadcast on February 24th.So, Black Gate – is it a label? Is it venue? Is it wine bar? Is it a recording studio?Well, it’s a bit of everything. I’ve always thought that multi-use spaces are the way forward in terms of music and entertainment venues, and when it comes with wine and a cheese board too, well, we thought we better go down to Galway and have a look for ourselves.So Andrea and I did just that, and it just happened to arrive on Black Gate’s fifth birthday.We spoke to Niamh Regan once again, talked to the director of Cumasc Mia Mullarkey, as well as her little sister, the musician Anna Mullarkey, who appeared on the show with David Kitt and wrote the theme song.And we met the people behind the Black Gate including Co-owner Peadar King to hear about how it all came together and their plans for the space, and we’ll hear a bit from one of their upcoming releases too from Rodney Owl.Let’s drop in…https://nialler9.com/nialler9-podcast-a-visit-to-black-gate-in-galway/ 

There’s been a lot of talk in Andrea and Niall‘s circles this week about the ethics of having a Spotify account in the wake of the Joe Rogan / Neil Young flareup.So we thought we’d finally get one of our old pals, Liz Pelly, a NYC writer who has written extensively about Spotify and streaming issues in recent years on to discuss the ethics, morality of the issues that people are talking about while looking at alternative models and services for streaming and Spotify.Why did it take a celebrity podcaster paid by Spotify touting misinformation for this to happen? Why wasn’t the long-held issue of small royalty payments by streaming services a greater factor?We look at whether the streaming model is actually sustainable, user-centric payment systems (supported by Deezer) vs pooling, platforms such as Resonate, Bandcamp and how public libraries might point the way forward. Plus a mention for Irish streaming service MINM.Listen:https://nialler9.com/nialler9-podcast-is-it-time-to-quit-spotify/ Episode notes / referencesMusic on this week’s show: JarjarJr – ‘Boost’ Socialized Streaming: A case for universal music access, Real Life, Liz Pelly Library Music: Public libraries offer small-scale streaming alternatives for local archiving, The Broadcast, Liz Pelly Podcast Overlords: Spotify only works for the stars, The Baffler, Liz Pelly

Anyone who has an interest in nightlife, our live music and venue economy – be it punter, DJ, promoter, musician, engineer, owner or publican should be aware that the Irish government are currently taking submissions from the public about reforming the alcohol licensing system in Ireland, until this coming Friday January 21st.The Minister for Justice, Helen McEntee seems to recognise that the law needs to be modernised and there is an Open Consultation on the Review of Alcohol Licensing available to all members of the public to have their say. This week is the final week to get engaged.To help encourage us to participate in members of the public having a say in the modernisation of the licensing law relating to the sale of alcohol, we enlisted the help of Sunil Sharpe and Robbie Kitt of The Give Us The Night Campaign, who have long campaigned for progressive change and flexibility when it comes to Ireland’s licensing laws.Ireland’s venue and event licensing is tied to its alcohol licensing, and attached to archaic laws like the 1935 Public Dancehall Act and a Licensing Law that dates back to 1833. This needs to change, along with bureaucratic systems that require Special Exemption orders of €410 for every night that a venue opens late, for example. Later opening hours are on the cards, as are the possibility of new types of licences that could be used by theatres, art galleries and cultural spaces.Sunil and Robbie tell us why participating in the Open Consultation on the Review of Alcohol Licensing is important.