Ist Ist - Interview

Ahead of the release of their debut single White Swan on Scruff Of The Neck Records tomorrow, we spoke with Andy from ist ist about the single, their unusual name, their launch show at the Night And Day on Saturday and their plans for the rest of 2016.

EXCLUSIVE REVEAL - Lunar : Showboater

Showboater is the new single from Lunar, being exclusively revealed here on Even The Stars. The Manchester four-piece are the subject of growing hype in their home town with their single launch scheduled for Academy 3 on April 9th. We spoke to front man Sam Carson about the single, the show and their plans for the rest of the year.

Puppet Rebellion - Glasgow Nice N Sleazy - 25th March 2016

The Puppet Rebellion tour hits Scotland a year on from their debut Glasgow show. Armed with a batch of new songs and some of the classics that we fell in love with a few years ago, they are once again on fire.

Vermillion Tides / Lunar / Ryan Jarvis - Manchester Castle Hotel - 27th March 2016

Easter Sunday saw a very different trio of acts take over the music room of The Castle in Manchester, starting with the acoustic songsmith Ryan Jarvis, followed by one of Manchester's rising stars in the band Lunar and topped off with the psychedelic and soulful tunes of Vermillion Tides.

Blossoms / Hidden Charms / Fronteers / Avalanche Party / Natalie McCool / The Last Spectacular / The Tapestry / Black Sheep Frederick Dickens - Stockton Calling - 26th March 2016

Stockton Calling is an annual festival held in venues around the town centre from the 1,000 capacity Arc to pub back rooms that hold less than 100. It gives the opportunity for local bands from the thriving Teesside scene to rub shoulders with nationally established bands such as Reverend And The Makers, Dutch Uncles and Blossoms – and all for a price you’d pay to watch one of those three headliners play on their own

Blossoms / Cabbage - Liverpool O2 Academy - 25th March 2016

Blossoms returned to Liverpool O2 Academy where they supported Courteeners last summer as headliners in their own right. Sold out weeks in advance, they thrilled a packed and young crowd with a mix of their run of killer singles and tracks from their recent EPs and left us anticipating their forthcoming debut album even more than ever.

The Tapestry / Cabbage - Manchester Deaf Institute - 24th March 2016

The Tapestry are old kids on the block now. One of those bands that seem to be permanently on the edge of making a breakthrough yet never quite making it, remaining one of Manchester's best kept secrets, selling out venues like the Deaf Insitute that nationally established bands leave half full. But we've never seen the place rock so hard for a band in the years we've been there and they have some new material to share with us. Support came from the insane Cabbage.

James : Glasgow HMV / BBC Quay Session - 23rd March 2016

The final day of promo duties for Girl At The End Of The World sees James on top form in their second city of Glasgow. Ever present Glaswegian James aficionado Stuart Ralston was there as the band aim to hold on to their midweek number one slot in the album chart.

DIIV / Ulrika Spacek / Aldous RH - Manchester Gorilla - 20th March 2016

Sunday night sees Gorilla transformed into a strange mix of hipster musos and some incredibly young kids all fixated by the curious musical phenomenon that is DIIV. What starts out weirdly as Zachary tries in vain to get someone to adjust the front of the projector to get their visuals set up behind them on the wall finishes in near chaos as the crowd surfers brave the heaving mosh pit as the crowd gets lost in one of the most thrilling gigs this venue has probably ever seen.

James - Manchester HMV - 21st March 2016

As part of the launch campaign for their new album Girl At The End Of The World, which is sitting very pretty at number 1 in the midweek charts, James performed a short acoustic set in Manchester HMV's before embarking on a mammoth signing session. We watched them strip back some of the more electronic elements of the new album and distill them into something quite beautiful.

Stiff Little Fingers - Manchester Ritz - 19th March 2016

Stiff Little Fingers closed their UK tour with a triumphant show at Manchester's Ritz where 1,500 devotees both old and young lost themselves for an hour and a half in a world of hazy memories of the band's halcyon punk days. Whilst the energy that drove that movement at the time might have dissipated, the love for the music clearly hasn't.

The Slow Readers Club / Delamere / October Drift - Salford St Philips - 18th March 2016

The Slow Readers Club's unstoppable rise continued with their latest sold out weeks in advance show in the splendid intimate surroundings of Salford's St Philips Church supported by two of the rising stars of the underground music scene in Delamere and October Drift. A set that mixed their two albums with a couple of old favourites brought back into the set to delighted an adoring crowd and provided a fitting send off for their own April UK dates and their May tour with James.

Track Of The Day : Cupids - Kickin' In

Kickin' In is Cupids' third single in the past six months and their best one yet. With Jake on lead vocals, it's already a big live favourite and they've captured the crowd-pleasing huge riff perfectly on the recorded version.

LIINES / Darma - Manchester Soup Kitchen - 11th March 2016

Tonight's Soup Kitchen gig was LIINES' first Manchester show since their triumphant sold-out show back in November last year. Armed with new songs and a new set of fans, they stunned another Manchester full house on Friday night supported by the effervescent rock charms of Darma.

The Coral / The Sundowners / Rory Wynne - Manchester Albert Hall - 12th March 2016

They say absence makes the heart grow fonder. After five years away The Coral have returned with Distance Inbetween, which we think is their best album yet, and a series of sold-out live shows. We caught up with them at the Albert Hall in Manchester to witness a heady mix of the old and new supported by The Sundowners and local lad Rory Wynne.

Track Of The Day : Violet Society - Nonsense

Nonsense is the debut single from Manchester's Violet Society and they've created a brilliant crossover track that shows immense promise for their first release.

Track Of The Day : Weaves - One More

One More is the lead track from Weaves' forthcoming self-titled debut album, due for release on Memphis Industries on June 17th. It's the follow-up to their self-titled EP, three one-off singles Tick, Crumble and Shithole and their cover of One Direction's Drag Me Down.

Track Of The Day : Kelly Lee Owens - 1 Of 3

One of the underground discoveries of 2014, Kelly Lee Owens is back with 1 Of 3, the first taster from her forthcoming debut solo album which she has spent a large part of 2015 recording as well as playing some rare but well-received shows in London.

Introducing - The Slow Readers Club

The Slow Readers Club have just been announced as support on the majority of dates on James' forthcoming UK tour. Regular readers of Even The Stars will know that we're massive fans of the band, but we delve a little further into their past to reveal more about them.

James - Girl At The End Of The World

Girl At The End Of The World is James' fourteenth studio album and their third full one since they reformed in 2007. For a band well into their fourth decade, it's an astonishingly upbeat vibrant record that reflects a shift in the band's creative head space. It's a record built around grooves the like you've never heard from James before and probably wouldn't expect, but they pull it off with aplomb. It's a James record alright, but not as you know them.

The Coral - Distance Inbetween

Distance Inbetween is the first album by The Coral for six years and it's possibly their finest to date. It's an album with a timeless feel to it and one whose immediacy has you hooked from the minute The Connector's looping guitar leeches into your conscience and doesn't let go until the weirdness of the instrumental outro End Credits releases you from its grasp.

Desert Mountain Tribe - Either That Or The Moon

The run of great psychedelic rock records continues with this, the debut release from London based trio Desert Mountain Tribe.

Track Of The Day : Seprona - Trap Door

Liverpool four-piece Seprona have just released their latest single Trap Door. The band describe themselves as looking "to create a sonic bridge between the mundane and the macabre, the frenzied and the trippy" and we think on this single they've succeeded in doing that.

Ryley Walker / Lee Southall / Meg Baird - Manchester Band On The Wall - 28th February 2016

The word genius is often overused and we're guilty of that sometimes. It should be reserved for unique, inimitable talents. Ryley Walker is one such example. At his Band On The Wall show on Sunday he held an audience that wasn't wholly his own captive for an hour and a quarter with songs from his forthcoming unheard third album and guitar playing, vocals and a performance that left us stunned in silence.