This week’s round-up includes news on new record label signings, a label launch, folk and contemporary music releases, a protest song release, and more.

Dream-folk duo Lemoncello, comprising singer-songwriter Laura Quirke and cellist Clare Kinsella, have recently signed to Claddagh Records and have announced that their eponymous debut album will be released on 3 May. ‘Old Friend’, a single from the album, is out now with an accompanying video directed by Quirke and follows the previous single ‘Harsh Truths’. The duo perform a headline concert at Whelan’s on 15 May. 

Galway club night Ar Ais Arís have announced the launch of a new label and a five-track compilation record of Irish underground bass artists to be released on Friday 5 April. The EP includes tracks from Doubt, Plus One, Sloucho, Roo Honeychild and Luke Kiid. Ar Ais Arís hosts regular club nights in small venues in Galway city with the next event taking place at the Commercial Boat Club in Woodquay on 12 April – a collaboration with Galway Arts Centre for their Disquiet Nights series. 

Jazz guitarist Aengus Hackett has announced that his new album Aengus Hackett Trio, which features double bass player Derek Whyte and drummer Matthew Jacobson, will be released on 24 April. The 11-track album blends jazz with elements of rock and electronic music; singles ‘Jasper’, ‘Nintendo Wars’ and ‘Ximenyr’ have already been released. The album was launched in An Taibhdhearc in Galway at the weekend and the trio perform at The Cooler at The Complex in Dublin this Saturday. 

Composer Anselm McDonnell has recently released his second album Kraina, a collection of eight works for voice and ensemble, based on themes of home and displacement. Kraina, meaning borderland or frontier in old Polish, touches on ideas of searching for home, being caught between homes, or on a larger scale, the relationship we have with our home, the earth. The recording features McDonnell (electronics), Dermot Dunne (accordion), Annette Cleary (cello), Cahal Masterson (piano), Rachel Quinn (piano), Elizabeth Hilliard (soprano), Rebecca Murphy (soprano), Nicole Rourke (spoken word), Joshua Ellicott (tenor), Laura Sinnerton (viola), and Alan Smale (violin).  

Dublin composer Seán Clancy last week released a new recording, Four Sections of Music Unequally Divided. The work is a single, uninterrupted 44-minute span of music in which athletic piano playing meets analogue synthesizers and deconstructed gamelan, all performed by Clancy. Writing about the work in the liner notes, Clancy, who has recently taken up a new position in the music department of UCD, said: ‘Around the time I made this recording, whilst walking in the National Botanical Gardens in Dublin with my wife and son we came across a magnificent old tree that was in the process of being coppiced in the hope of being regenerated. I feel that tree-growing and trees in general are a nice analogy for this work. There are different textures; pattern and repetition are very important; and change is very slow.’ 

Folk singer Eoghan Ó Ceannabháin has released a new single ‘Siren Spring’, which he has written to highlight the court cases faced by pro-Palestine activists. Commenting on the new recording he said, ‘In terms of its subject matter, the song is an attempt to put some of the feelings a lot of us have had in recent months into song. So many people I know have been struggling with soaring rents or facing eviction. Many of the same people have also been out protesting against Israel’s genocide in Gaza and the Irish Government’s inaction in the face of it.’

In other release news, Rufous Nightjar, a three-part harmony trio consisting of Branwen Kavanagh, Anna Bishop and Zoé Basha, have released their debut album Songs for Three Voices, indie-folk band Kingfishr have released their new EP Shadow, and Limerick singer-songwriter Abe Soare has released a new single ‘An Muilte’.

Other new releases include Dublin indie musician Danny Carroll’s debut solo album I am the Cheese; Altarwise, the debut album from alt-folk duo Twin Headed Wolf; harpist and multi-instrumentalist Aisling Lyons’ new single ‘Sunbeam’; ‘Every Flower is a Field’ from electronic duo Houseplants; and singer-songwriter Ciara O’Neill’s ‘Mother’ – the second single from her upcoming EP Woman, due for release on 8 May.

Listen to a playlist of all recent releases below. To submit your release, email newreleases [at] journalofmusic.com.

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