FONTAINES D.C.
4AD Club, Diksmuide, Belgium – 19 April 2019
These Irish young gunslingers wil end up in many end-of-the-year-2022
album lists with their third formidable longplayer Skinty Fia.
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(All pics by Turn Up The Volume)
(photo by Turn Up The Volume!)
Learning from The Beach Boys…
Irish rock team FONTAINES D.C.
knock firmly at the door of global fame
after 3 excellent albums.
Last weekend they hit the stage at the 2022 edition of
the Reading/Leeds Festival in the UK.
The coolest moment of the show was when the band invited
a young fan, who was in front of the stage holding up a sign
asking to join the band on stage, to play guitar on their speedy
stunner Boys In The Better Land. The kid will feel like a boy in
the better land forever.
Here’s his audacious performance.
F-a-n-t-a-s-t-i-c!
FONTAINES D.C. Facebook – Instagram
For your eyes
With their sublime third LP Skinty Fia rising Irish stars FONTAINES D.C.
went straight to the top of the UK’s album charts last April and will be in
lots of best-albums-of-2022 lists, including mine.
To keep the momentum going they just shared a video for
one of the album’s singles, the moody Roman Holiday reverie.
Roll the tape here…
SKINTY FIA
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FONTAINES D.C.: Facebook
Works faster than caffeine
Rising Irish stars FONTAINES D.C. are all over the place after releasing
their sublime third LP Skinty Fia recently, that went straight to the top
of the UK Albums Chart.
To celebrate the victory they played a set of songs on American television
network CBS. I picked one of my early Fontaines favorites, Liberty Belle
Holy macaroni…
FONTAINES D.C: Facebook
(photo by Turn Up The Volume)
The answers are blowing in the wind, my friend…
22 April 2022
Band: FONTAINES D.C.
Who: Irish post-punk team
Albums: Drogel (2019) and A Hero’s Death (2020)
New album: SKINTY FIA – 3rd LP
Release: 22 April via Partisan Records
The Guardian (British newspaper) says: “Their third album comes wrapped in a sleeve featuring a nervous-looking deer in the hallway of a home, its title derives from a Gaelic expression of exasperation, and it variously picks at topics of addiction, relationships and
the notion of Irishness as viewed through the lens of the Irish diaspora… Skinty Fia feels more measured and reflective. It boasts few examples of their punky full-pelt approach. Its default rhythmic setting is slow; its guitars feel echoey and cavernous – even shoegaze-y on churning closer Nabokov – rather than urgent and in your face… They boldly embrace a state of confusion.” Score: 4/5.
Turn Up The Volume: After their unbridled introduction to the world with their five-star debut LP, the Fontaines slowed down for a couple of songs on their 2nd full length, and
on the new one the overall atmosphere – musically and lyrically – is moony, mellow and pensive with frontman Grian Chatten becoming a modern-day crooner who touches sensitive hearts, especially Irish ones as this album is about their Irish past/present/future identity in and outside (they never have been away for so long, for some many times) of their beloved country. It takes time to get used to their new approach. But I’m sure it will be worth it in the end.
Singles/clips: Skinty Fia / Roman Holiday / I Love You / Jackie Down The Line
– SKINTY FIA –
– ROMAN HOLIDAY –
– I LOVE YOU –
– JACKIE DOWN THE LINE –
Stream full LP here on Spotify
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FONTAINES D.C.: Facebook
(photo by Turn Up The Volume – 8 April 2022 – Antwerp, Belgium)
On stage
11 April 2022
Band: FONTAINES D.C.
Who: Fast rising Irish post-punk-rock collective
Where: Trix venue in Antwerp, Belgium
When: 8 April 2022
Ten days ago London‘s ruthless upstarts SHAME played a hot/lukewarm/hot
show in this very same venue where Irish heroes FONTAINES D.C. attracted
1100 fans, enough for a sell-out gig, last Thursday.
After about 20 minutes the high and lows of Shame‘s performance popped up
in my mind. Very familiar with the ups and downs of the Dublin bohemians.
HIGHS
– They played 8 of their thunderous jackhammers (including Chequeless Restless,
Hurricane Laughter (brilliant), Too Real and Boys In The Better Land.)
– Probably because of performing for larger crowds frontman/songwriter Grian Chatten communicates much more than before with the audience, not that this is so important, but the enthusiastic way he did it worked infectiously.
– Yes they’re Irish but they’re part of the British post-punk rebirth along with young mavericks like Shame, Idles, Black Midi, Black Country New Road, Crows and Squid.
LOWS
– As I said they made the venue explode with 8 thunderous jackhammers,
but the 9 slow to mid-tempo songs (great on record) took out the heat of
the moment too often.
– I saw Fontaines going berserk three times over the past 4 years in small clubs
(max 200 cap.), 40-minute gigs (10 instead of 17 songs), buzzing every single second.
The more famous a band gets the longer their shows get. Mostly, not a good thing.
The singles from their upcoming third LP Skinty Fia (out 22 April)…
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FONTAINES D.C.: Instagram – Facebook
(photos by Turn Up The Volume)
New striking strokes
31 March 2022
Artist: KAE TEMPEST
Who: Versatile British rap artist
from London with 4 albums so far
New album: THE LINE IS A CURVE
New single: I SAW THE LIGHT
Follow up to lead single No Prizes.
Kae: “So glad that true poet of our age Grian Chatten joined me”.
TUTV: Cool. Tempest and Chatten sound like a perfect
fit for this speedy spoken word rap bash. Magnetic!
Lyrics
Beginning with an ending in mind, I took a minute
Saw too much. Ahead of my time
Came away laughing, blushed
Carton crushed
Everything was unfastened. Rush
In the stifling air of a thin little moment
Rush
Can’t keep my focus
My skin’s your skin
Vivid as a memory fading by the minute
Screaming your name like I was afraid you’d be in it
You’re truth to me. Clutching at straws. Don’t know you
Never even met you
I put my pen down and started to drift
I stopped living
Stared at the grass at the edge of the cliff
I saw women
Heart is a yellowing brick
Dead set on a wish that can never exist
A transition
I want to be is but I’m isn’t
Ambition kicks me awake and says, dress
I was looking for the door
All I found was your flesh, your flesh, your blessed dismembered hands are sand
I’m stranded
I want to be thrown against the wall
By a tall cold dickhead
With a morse-code accent
That I can’t look at
Without starting something I’ll regret
Everything’s beautiful
I digress
I saw light in the buildings at night
I saw light in the windows as I passed them by
On the river. On the ledge. On the bridge
On the side of your face at the bar
It went dark. I saw light
I saw light in the buildings at night
I saw light in the windows as I passed them by
On the river. On the bridge. On the ledge
On the side of your face at the bar
It went dark. I saw light
Tapped out a few laughs on the summer’s grass
And in all the sky’s many merry blues
I read one thousand words
Of pretty good news
And now heliotropes around your light gather
And they chatter and chatter and they chatter
Make insipid remarks about things that matter
‘Till they don’t anymore
‘Till they don’t weigh a crumb
Until the caring in you is surely done
Until dead is every one of us floating about
Between good bookie odds and 2 for 1 on stout
So live it all out
In lust of a stage
Where you were busy trying to trap the heart on the page
Having scenes arranged into your bones
And happily arranging yourself to be alone
Believing happiness to be a train that just doesn’t stop for you
A pain but a friend that doesn’t pretend
A pain but a friend that doesn’t pretend
A pain but a friend that doesn’t pretend
I saw light in the buildings at night
I saw light in the windows as I passed them by
On the river. On the bridge. On the ledge
On the side of your face at the bar
It went dark. I saw light
I saw light in the buildings at night
I saw light in the windows as I passed them by
On the river. On the bridge. On the ledge
On the side of your face at the bar
It went dark. I saw light…
KAE TEMPEST: Facebook – Instagram
