This live episode was recorded over two nights in June in The Big Romance on Parnell Street in front of an attentive live audience (and some people overheard on the recording from the main bar) I'm sure why it took me 18 editions of the Listen Closely live listening parties for me to think about recording them and putting them out on the Patreon feed but I finally had the idea last month. And sure, when we had two sold out parties of people coming to hear some chat and a full-volume listen in Th...
Jul 08, 2025•42 min•Season 5Ep. 292
The Best of the Month episode is now Patreon-only . Public subscribers get the first 25 minutes or so of the episode as a free preview. Members get to hear the whole episode on Patreon as part of a €5 a month subscription so come join us! Andrea is taking the summer off the podcast and listening parties, so this month's special guest is Eoin Murray, the music writer behind the Irish Substack monthly newsletter Anois Os Ard which digs up Irish music of the underground and experimental variety. Eo...
Jul 03, 2025•26 min•Season 5Ep. 291
We’re not here for a long time, but we are here for a smooooooooooth time. Grab your linen shirt and deck shoes as we will be taking to the gentle seas for some smooth sailing, daiquiri in hand, and with love on our mind, we are heading to the private island of Yacht Rock. You can be a passenger on this ship. Yacht Rock is the subgenre of music largely made by West Coast American artists The Doobie Brothers, Michael McDonald, Kenny Loggins, Christopher Cross and their ilk with some of the best s...
Jun 26, 2025•1 hr 8 min•Season 5Ep. 290
The Best of the Month episode is now Patreon-only . Public subscribers get the first 20 minutes or so of the episode as a free preview. Members get to hear the whole episode on Patreon as part of a €5 a month subscription so come join us! It's the return of our monthly Patreon episode , but this time with a special guest. Andrea is taking the summer off the podcast and listening parties, so I asked Mo Cultivation's Bekah Molony to join me in enthusing about our favourite music of the past month....
Jun 08, 2025•25 min•Season 5Ep. 289
Today's episode is a discussion with writer and journalist Una Mullally about artist boycotts, solidarity, Palestine, Israel, protest, cancellation, capitalism and the music industry. We talk about how Israel's genocide of the Palestinian people has become a flashpoint of awareness about how modern music festivals work, specifically how private equity which invests in Israel operates in the live music industry. We chat about why Kneecap's recent actions have drawn so much ire and anger in the US...
May 29, 2025•1 hr 9 min•Season 5Ep. 288
K.Dot's first masterpiece album is a coming-of-age story with Kendrick navigating life in Compton, resisting peer pressure, destructive behaviour and trying to stay righteous in a corrupted world. Ahead of our listening party at the Big Romance , Andrea takes us on the Hero's Journey of Kendrick Lamar's breakthrough 2012 second album good kid, m.A.A.d city. Subtitled A Short Film, this cinematic rap masterpiece was a huge mainstream success, and crowned Kendrick as the voice of modern hip-hop (D...
May 23, 2025•1 hr 4 min•Season 5Ep. 287
The avant-electronic and experimental Irish music festival Open Ear returns to Sherkin Island on the June Bank Holiday weekend. Open Ear is known for its preoccupation with illuminating music operating on the fringes, and the remote island setting of Sherkin Island off the coast of Baltimore in West Cork reflects this outsider ethos. The varied programme is drawn from electronic, techno, experimental folk and trad, jazz EBM, bass music and art rock, and this year features the likes of Irish tech...
May 14, 2025•52 min•Season 5Ep. 286
Our monthly Patreon episode in which Andrea Cleary and Niall share our favourite music of the past month. The Best of the Month episode is now Patreon-only . Public subscribers get the first 20 minutes or so of the episode as a free preview. Members get to hear the whole episode on Patreon for a €5 a month so come join us! This month, we are discussing new albums from Torres and Julien Baker, Daughter Of Swords, Bon Iver, Maria Somerville and songs from The Hives, Turnstile, mischa and the bear,...
May 02, 2025•20 min•Ep. 285
The Irish-Palestinian singer and filmmaker speaks about embracing her Arabic heritage in her music, and the resurgence of interest in keening and Irish folklore. The Irish-Palestinian artist Róisín El Cherif has spent 18 months advocating for the people of Palestine, speaking out on the injustice and genocide in Gaza. El Cherif has begun singing in Arabic on stage, noting the connections between Irish and Arabic folk music and culture. It's best encapsulated in the Róisín El Cherif live show, wh...
Apr 24, 2025•50 min•Season 5Ep. 284
It’s DILLA TIME This month's special is about Jay Dee aka J Dilla, a Detroit hip-hop producer’s whose work is so prolific and influential his MPC sampler is in the Smithsonian. Dilla worked with hip-hop and R&B greats - Q-Tip, A Tribe Called Quest, Busta Rhymes, The Roots, The Pharcyde, D'Angelo, Common, Madlib and made his own signature rhythm that others copied - he used a sampler like no one had before. Through his unique methods of playing with layered timing, rhythmic expectation, polyr...
Apr 17, 2025•1 hr 13 min•Season 5Ep. 283
Our monthly episode in which Andrea Cleary and Niall share our favourite music of the past month. The Best of the Month episode is now Patreon-only. Public subscribers get the first 15 minutes or so of the episode as a free preview. Members get to hear the whole episode on their member feeds or on Patreon direct. Discussing music from Lonnie Holley, Bon Iver, Adebisi Shank, Chappell Roan, Avalon Emerson, Niamh Bury, Brighde Chaimbeul, Selena Gomez & Benny Blanco, Paddy Hanna, MJ Lenderman an...
Apr 04, 2025•21 min
Jamal Sul has been making Irish Arabic electronic music as Moving Still since 2016. His productions link his Arabic heritage, with his love of synthesizers, dance music and buzzy bangers. Moving Still’s music is unique in how it brings together styles of music from the SWANA region (Southwest Asia and North Africa) with European and American club genres like Italo, electro, acid, breakbeats, house and more. Jamal's project has been in the ascendancy with releases on Cooking with Palms Trax, Oran...
Mar 28, 2025•1 hr 17 min•Season 5Ep. 281
Would you identify an AI song if you pressed play on one? Colm Cahalane and Niall explore what's happening in AI and music now, with an example drawn from the Irish music scene in recent months. Echoing the early Wild Wild West streaming era that we discussed last week with Liz Pelly that gave rise to Spotify's dominance , our chat this week with Colm Cahalane of Irish music Substack blog Fourth Best / Cork label Hausu finds parallels with what's happening with AI and music right now. AI is brea...
Mar 21, 2025•1 hr 12 min•Season 5Ep. 280
The music and cultural critic Liz Pelly's new book Mood Machine: The Rise of Spotify and the Cost of the Perfect Playlist is a deep dive into Spotify's often contentious position in music today. Liz has been a philosophising on issues brought about by the streaming era's cultural impact for about 10 years now so the book collates a lot of work, thoughts, research and investigative reporting on Spotify and the way it operates. We talk to Liz about the Swedish streaming giant's outsized influence ...
Mar 13, 2025•1 hr 5 min•Season 5Ep. 279
Our monthly episode in which Nialler and Andrea Cleary talk about their favourite music of the month. The Best of the Month episode is now Patreon-only . Public subscribers get the first 20-25 minutes or so of the episode as a free preview. Members get to hear the whole episode on their member feeds or on Patreon direct. Discussing new albums from Oklou, Horsegirl, Maria Kelly, Puma Blue and songs from Djo, Car Seat Headrest, Deep Thrills and breaking news - nepobaby Lola Kirke. We also chat abo...
Mar 07, 2025•27 min•Season 5Ep. 278
The composer and producer, and multi-instrumentalist Ólafur Arnalds met the Cork singer-songwriter Eoin French aka Talos after he ran a marathon in Iceland. A friendship was struck, that quickly developed into a musical partnership, as seen at Sounds From A Safe Harbour in Cork in 2023, when the festival director Mary Hickson put the pair together for a collaboration. Now six months after Eoin's death , Arnalds and French's family, friends and collaborators have been celebrating the artist's cre...
Feb 28, 2025•34 min•Season 5Ep. 277
Niall and Andrea are running our mouths over what's been happening in mainstream music to this year. Episode #276 is a grab bag of topics and events in music so far from Kendrick Lamar's Superbowl Half-Time Show, the Grammys to the music highlights of 50 years of Saturday Night Live. We talk about Doechii's live performance at the Grammys, Robyn and David Byrne performing together and Lauryn Hill and Wyclef coming back together on stage at Radio City Music Hall to perform some Fugees and Lauryn ...
Feb 22, 2025•1 hr 29 min•Season 5Ep. 276
Episode 275 is an interview with Kittser about his electronic project New Jackson. It may have felt like a side project when it debuted with The Night Mail EP in 2011, but over the last 14 years, the New Jackson releases have been so consistent across a multitude of EPs on Permanent Vacation, Hivern, All City, Maeve and more, with last year's second album Oops!... Pop softened the lines into a more techno pop songwriting style. Ahead of the New Jackson live show in Dublin on Saturday March 28th ...
Feb 13, 2025•1 hr 7 min•Season 5Ep. 275
The Best of the Month episode is now Patreon-only . Public subscribers get the first 25 minutes or so of the episode as a free preview. Members get to hear the whole episode on their member feeds or on Patreon direct. Welcome back. Kicking off season 5 of the Nialler9 Podcast with the return of our regular series in which Nialler and Andrea Cleary share their favourite music of the month. Discussing new albums from The Weather Station, MIKE, Pink Siifu, FKA Twigs among others; and songs from Luc...
Feb 07, 2025•27 min•Season 5Ep. 274
Our final podcast of the year is the fifth annual Nialler9 Podcast Awards. Niall and Andrea hand out gongs in categories: Best live TV and web video performances, sax solo of the year, the Andre 3000 award for best guest verse, best film soundtrack, song featured in a TV show, duds of the year, the heroes and villains of 2024 (Irish artists at SXSW, Drake, Spotify and more), best rap beat, trend of the year, the award for best music with annoying vocalist (hi Geordie Greep), sample, disappointme...
Dec 29, 2024•1 hr 47 min•Season 4Ep. 273
Episode 272, the second of our Best of 2024 trilogy of podcasts is all about the albums of the year. Andrea and Niall share a selection of their favourite albums of the year. Featuring discussion and reasons for best albums from Charli XCX, Jessica Pratt, Mabe Fratti, MJ Lenderman, Adrienne Lenker, Cindy Lee, Bricknasty, Father John Misty and Curtisy. Show notes: Support Nialler9 on Patreon, get event discounts, playlists, ad-free episodes and join our Discord community Songs played on the Niall...
Dec 16, 2024•1 hr 36 min•Season 4Ep. 272
Episode 271 kicks off our Best of 2024 trilogy of podcasts with a look at the songs that defined our year. Andrea and Niall pick a selection box of their songs of the year and talk about them. Featuring songs from Charli XCX, MJ Lenderman, Waxahatchee, Burial, Baby Rose, Laura Marling, Beyoncé, Kendrick Lamar, Fontaines D.C., Róis and more. Show notes: Support Nialler9 on Patreon, get event discounts, playlists, ad-free episodes and join our Discord community Songs played on the Nialler9 Podcast...
Dec 12, 2024•1 hr 18 min•Season 4Ep. 271
The Best of the Month episode is now Patreon-only . Public subscribers get the first 25 minutes or so. Episode 270 is partly a review of our favourite music of the month, and partly a chat about what's happening with Kendrick (new album) and Drake (lawsuits lol) in November. Andrea tells us why Drake is suing UMG, the label both him and Kendrick are on, and why he is also suing the label for defamation for things said in a rap beef with Lamar (you couldn't make it up) . Then we review Kendrick's...
Nov 29, 2024•28 min•Season 4Ep. 270
Podcast 269 is all about the 23rd edition of Other Voices in Dingle and some of the acts playing the Jameson Music Trail from November 29th to December 1st. The Jameson Music Trail will present 100 live sets from dozens of Irish artists we love, with many acts playing twice in the town’s 16 venues, including a Jameson Connects stage at The Dingle Bridge House for the first time. For this episode, I spoke to Kerry musician and OV regular Junior Brother about playing in Dingle, recording his soon-...
Nov 21, 2024•1 hr 14 min•Season 4Ep. 269
Earlier this year, the Tallaght rapper Curtisy released the debut album What Was The Question? one of the finest Irish rap albums, nay, Irish albums of the year. With a Deluxe version of the album out now, I spoke to Gavin Curtis aka Curtisy about starting out rapping in 2021 and meeting Ahmed, With Love and making their first song 'Men On A Mission' in 2022 with Rory Sweeney. Curtisy has a prolific output, and we discuss his many collaborators (Ahmed, With Love makes a brief appearance too), va...
Nov 13, 2024•50 min•Season 4Ep. 268
Episode 267 with Andrea and Niall sharing their favourite music of the month. [Patreon Preview] In this episode, Nialler and Andrea kick off the chat with Halloween experiences, Andrea stays up for the Trump show, and advocates for leaving Twitter you guys. Then we highlight our favourite tracks and albums from October, including new albums from Irish artists like Fionn Regan (O Avalanche), Silverbacks (Easy Being A Winner), Deathbed Convert (Inverse Field Vol. 1) and Olive Hatake (Boys Need Lov...
Nov 07, 2024•23 min•Season 4Ep. 267
Tyler, The Creator dropped his seventh studio album Chromakopia on Monday morning after only announcing the album a matter of days before release. As one of the most compelling album artists in rap, and an artist who is on a great run of records including Flower Boy (2017), Igor (2019), Call Me If You Get Lost (2021), how does Chromakopia stack up? With Tyler bigger than ever and selling out two 3Arena Dublin shows this week, I take a deep dive into the record with self-confessed Tyler Stan Max ...
Nov 01, 2024•1 hr 2 min•Season 4Ep. 266
Niall chats to Ray O'Donohue, the recently appointed Night-Time Economy Advisor for Dublin City. What is a night mayor? A night czar? A night-time economy advisor? Well, my perception of what it entails is someone who advocates and advises local city council policy and decision-making on what is required in order to make the city more liveable at night, more culturally rich, safer, and to be the glue between various communities like venue owners, promoters, night time economy workers and those w...
Oct 17, 2024•44 min•Season 4Ep. 265
The Scottish duo's 1998 debut album is the subject of this month's Listen Closely listening party and podcast. Boards Of Canada's debut album Music Has The Right To Children on Warp Records/SKAM is a modern classic, a highly evocative collection of music, operating like a fading childhood memory, a creeping nostalgic collage of analogue electronic music, samples from public service broadcasting programming, with inspirations from to hip-hop beats, ambient techno and psychedelia. Join Niall and A...
Oct 11, 2024•1 hr 10 min•Season 4Ep. 264
From now on, the Best of the Month episode is Patreon-only . Public subscribers get the first 25 minutes or so. Patreon members get to hear the whole episode on their member feeds or on Patreon direct. Episode 263 comes at us fast with Niall Byrne and Andrea Cleary's monthly music recommendations. Chatting Indie Sleaze, a reason to be cheerful with the return of Adebisi Shank and a chat about club culture post-pandemic. Then we highlight new albums from Floating Points ( this is the Jamie xx Sub...
Oct 02, 2024•34 min•Season 4Ep. 263
