The Round Up - Slyrides, Kíla, The Radiators, John Walsh, Seafoam Green, The Legal Matters

Despite never leaving the house without my trusty Groucho Marx 'tache/glasses rig out, despite the fact that my postal address is disguised by an ever more cunning and complex series of PO boxes, and despite the fact that my phone number is known to no one, not even myself, for I routinely throw ready-to-go burner phones in the canal and I eat sim cards like corn flakes - despite all that, some people still manage to get in touch.

"Hi, Pat! Just checking in with you to see how you're getting on with my/our new single/album/E.P./NFT (no, me neither)." Yeah, yeah. Between you and me, gentle reader, 99.99% of it goes straight on the auld tyre fire out behind the servants' quarters. In an effort to clear a bit of a backlog of that .01%, here's a few things I did mean to get around to, but never did. I insist you check them all out.

Slyrydes

Every single by this crowd from Galway would take the skin off your face, and 'Boy In The Debs Suit' is no exception. The album is ready to go, apparently recorded when opportunity arose during the lockdown, and we should all be looking forward to it.

Kíla

Wolfwalkers earned another Oscar nod for Cartoon Saloon, and rightly so. You hardly need me to tell you how great Kíla are at this stage. The soundtrack is now available on lovely vinyl, and this is one my favourite bits of it.

The Radiators, When They Were From Space

I'm delighted to open any envelope that has a 10-inch, yellow vinyl copy of the first album by The Radiators From Space in it. TV Tube Heart - you can get your own here - was released back in 1977 and their first single, 'Television Screen', was, apparently, the only punk single to make the Irish top twenty. That can't be right, can it? Find this out and more when the mighty Pete Holidai and Stephen Averill converse with the equally mighty Karl Tsigdinos on Zoom tonight, doors at 7.30, show at 8. Here's 'Roxy Girl'.

John Walsh

Guitar forums can be an awful place, as hero after hero offers another blues dirge or their "take" on the solo from such and such. As an antidote to all that, step forward, young John Walsh, a fellow who decided the world of Fibre-optics engineering wasn't for him and went off instead to Andalucía to study with the masters so that he might become one of the finest Flamenco guitarists in the land. His album, Irlandalucía, is available now, and here's the title track, which is pretty damned impressive.

Seafoam Green

All right, All right, I won't start off about The Green Again, I did enough of it here, but I'm just letting you know that they're playing their forthcoming album, Martin's Garden, live on the internet tonight for €0. They're also on at eight, so you're going to have to toss a coin between them and The Radiators, or just open a couple of tabs. Any excuse to play this again.

The Legal Matters

Cormac Wright, out in Detroit, manages The Legal Matters. Cormac played guitar in Tom Dunne's first band, The End, who were on the go when the moon was still a baby. At least I know who gave him my contact details. Anyway, the band have a new album out at the end of the month, called Chapter Three, and this is a rather nice single from it called 'Light Up The Sky'.

There, that's a few things done, can I have a drink now?