ADRIAN CROWLEY + BOA MORTE + BURD EARLY (USA) WHELANS,SUNDAY 12TH DECEMBER. Adrian Crowley & Boa Morte Live Double-Headline Dates Dublin -based Adrian Crowley and Cork band Boa Morte have garnered much critical praise in the UK and Irish press for their recorded works of elegantly downbeat minimal folk (see reviews below). Both have albums available in the UK and US on significant independent labels based in these territories and as a result both acts have a following that extends country-wide and beyond. Their musical output inhabits the same twilight netherworld as Bonnie Price Billy with seductive haunting orchestrations and organic production. If you lik that sort of thing, this is a unique opportunity to see two of Irelands finest playing double headline gigs in Cork and Dublin. Dates: The Lobby Cork on Saturday 11th December (doors at 9pm, Tickets €10) and in Whelans, Dublin on Sunday 12th December. BOA MORTE: The first Boa Morte album ("Soon it will come time to face the world outside") was released in the UK and Ireland on Scottish independent label Shoeshine Records (Laura Cantrell, Paul Burch, Jason Ringenberg) to widespread critical acclaim (see below). The band have just finished the recording and mastering of their second album ("All this we must consider") and the album will be released on Shoeshine Records in Spring 2005. Recent gigs have included the Irish dates of Teenage Fanclub’s world tour, playing the Opera House in Cork with Calexico and headlining a series of theatre gigs in the Everyman Theatre, Cork. Over the past year Boa Morte have also clocked up a number of plays on the highly regarded BBC Radio 1 show of the late John Peel. This is what UNCUT and MOJO had to say about the first BOA MORTE album: UNCUT **** (4/5 stars) - "Cork quartet in spellbinding debut. Occasionally a record comes along that's so intimate and immediate you want to disconect the phone, get under the duvet and forget the outside world. Soon It Will Come...is one of those records, and the more you play it the more seductive it sounds. Singer Paul Ruxton has a distinctive and elegant voice with a soft Irish accent, but it's the sparse instrumentation, haunting orchestrations and organic production that makes this such a rewarding and memorable debut." MOJO - "By the time you've got the full measure of their sombre elegance, the band are confirmed masters, not slaves, of the idiom. Bare-boned thrums like Unfortunate Leader or Burn, a single phrase like "Oh, tired eyes, they hold their water", are ultimately priceless." IRISH TIMES **** (4/5) - "Distilling pure gold from ennui and pathos and creating a gorgeously arranged, intelligent and spacious collection of Americana melancholy, 'Soon it will come.' wraps around you and tilts your head to the stars. Like SMOG or OLDHAM or any great purveyors of rural lament, it offers warm solace through the perpetual tumbling movement of the seasons." AMERICANA-UK.COM - "Evocative from the word go of both folk icons such as NICK DRAKE and lo-fi highflyers like LOW, the music is redolent with hints of the kind of amazing ear for songwriting that both MARK LINKOUS and DAVID BERMAN have in their quieter moments." DUBFLY - Album of the Month ***** (5/5) - "I'm listening to this Boa Morte album at the moment and it does things to you. It's simultaneously life-affirming and heart-wrenching; easily-grasped yet possessing infinite layers of complex melodic emotions. Sometimes 100 words is too little to accurately pin down such a great work. Lamentably this is one of those times" DROWNEDINSOUND.COM **** (4/5) - "What impresses is the way the band don’t seem to be doing much, but end up with swaying, melancholic gems that are so much more than the sum of their parts." ADRIAN CROWLEY Adrian Crowley recently released his third album 'A Northern Country', the follow up to 2001's 'When you are here you are family', recorded by the legendary Steve Albini.'A Northern Country', recorded at home in Dublin, sees a release in the USA on the New York based independent 'Ba Da Bing Records', a UK/Europe relese on the Leeds based label Misplaced Music and an Irish release on Catchygogo records.In the past year and a half Crowley has toured in the USA, UK and recently toured Ireland as a guest to James Yorkston and The Athletes. REVIEWS OF 'A NORTHERN COUNTRY' If there were any justice in the world, Crowley's time would be right now, for this music is comsummately, overwhelmingly and blindingly gorgeous'-9/10 HOT PRESS 'the beautiful third full length from Irish musician Crowley is a stunning wintery wonder. 11 slow burning epics with inspired arrangements, there's elements of nick drake, red house painters, low and appendix out in here. poetic, ...this is a lovely album' -ROUGH TRADE 'the most brooding moment of shadow filled pop this side of Black Heart Procession. Quite personal and quite simply perfect' LOSING TODAY (USA) 'A Northern Country . . really hits deep in the heart. After all isn¹t that what music is meant to be about?' ECLECTIC HONEY 'Like Low and his chum Will Oldham, Adrian allows his songs the space to breathe,to be able to grow and develop at a unhurried pace. This growth is precipitated by a sorrowful vocal that on occasion, such as LP opener One Hundred Words For Snow', is startling and bleak but uncommonly warming amidst the downbeat orchestration ' VANITY PROJECT (UK) 'The songs are so lovingly crafted and his voice is so emotive you can't help but fall in love with it while you're crying into your pre-bedtime Horlicks' NORMAN RECORDS (UK) 'Languid and melancholy songs, sparsely but beautifully accompanied (strings in particular really add atmospheric colour) - lies somewhere between Greg Weeks and Smog.' BOA MELODY BAR (UK) REVIEWS OF 'WHEN YOU ARE HERE YOU ARE FAMILY' 'a beautifully rendered collection of melancholia' Alternative Press USA) 'The melancholic subdued sounds that characterise this record class themselves beautifully amongst Crowley's lovingly crafted songs and Steve Albini's production to make this album a diamond in the rough' 10/12 Hot Press 'powerful and affecting, a major talent may be in our midst'**** The Irish Times 'leading with the sublime 'Tall Ships' Adrian Crowley's second album is sweetly melancholic, sadly wise and entirely wonderful, imbued with a romantic poetic vision'- Event Guide, 'a would be offspring of Chan Marshall and Bill Callahan' Matamore (Belgium) 'Adrian Crowley transcends the limitations of his chosen genre thanks to a captivating voice and a light touch' THE NEW YORKER magazine. BURD EARLY With a sound weaned on the roots of americana while still being adept in the means of the modern, Burd Early's songs are reflective, but with a sharp aim on the surrounding terrain, often comedic and prophetic in the same breath. His intimate and arresting vocals will seduce even the most jaded listeners. PRESS QUOTES "Like Robert Frost’s woods, James Angelos’ Burd Early solo project is lovely, dark and deep. With its brooding guitars, pedal steel, haunting effects and often inscrutable lyrics, it’s a great place to visit …" -Magnet "In all fairness, Early has taken a considerable step forward with , placing himself somewhere between Songs: Ohia, Damien Jurado, and M. Ward in the early running for the best indie singer-songwriter release of the year." -Delusions of Adequacy "very intimate, earthy, and oh so pretty" -Aquarius Records "Stripped of colorful phrases and maudlin subplots, Magnet Mountain, is an under-the-radar folk album from a new voice that deserves to be heard…" -Splendid e-zine