Songlines #214 is out now! In an exclusive interview, cover stars @kneecap32 reflect on being the centre of multiple media storms this year and @rin_cobby hears how their upcoming album is a push to refocus attention on what they stand for: promoting the Irish language and fighting colonial injustice.
“In Ireland, for a long time, there’s been a lot of embarrassment around the language and our relationship with it, so I hope this now brings it away from there. I can see it now with the young people coming up. They don’t care as much about being shit at Irish; they’re having fun with it. The aura around Irish learning has been serious for so long.”
Find out more about their story and what we’ve got going on in our end-of-year special issue over on the site! 🙌
For my first piece in The Guardian I got to talk about my two true loves: music and women and nb football ⚽️
Thanks so much to everyone who spoke to me including @mezthehun , @amirahgoodwin , @lucy_cait and @algreenwood0
It was so much fun to put together and I’m feeling v gassed that I got to make my debut alongside my @brockwellbulletsfc 💚
Read the whole piece on the site - link in bio 🥰
Singing in Occitan, an endangered language of southern France, Lila Fraysse and Caroline Dufau craft something raw and rhythmic, blending polyphonic vocals, tambourins à corde, and body percussion into a potent combination that redefines French folk.
Across a decade as @cocanha , they’ve collaborated on projects like Brasiliano with @lucassanttana and with @los_sara_fontan and @tartarelena on 4132314. Now, they push further with Flame Folclòre, produced by @raulrefree (known for work with @rosalia.vt ), shaping a version of folk that supports their fight for language reclamation and pushes back against rising far-right narratives in France.
“So, this album was a way of saying that actually, we can defend progressive ideas with folklore. Conservative people don’t have a monopoly.”
Cocanha plays Songlines Encounters at @kingsplacelondon on May 29th.
Written by @rin_cobby
Does the idea of spending Valentine’s Day alone fill you with dread?
Well, we’ve picked the perfect sonic balm: 10 revenge cuts that really wound deep. From taunting clapbacks by @brennenleigh , to the haunted rancheras of Chavela Vargas, these songs prove love isn’t all flowers and chocolate; sometimes it’s much darker.
Read the full list over on the site. What did we miss out? ✍️ by @rin_cobby
@rin_cobby mourns the death of the youth club with @_emmalwarren_ , whose new book, ‘Up the Youth Club’, examines the now jeopardised role these venues have played in fostering musical talent, and why their disappearance threatens the future of UK music culture.
Read more on the site! 🙌
@rin_cobby reports from an Irish boozer at @shambalafest , @sibin_beag - a no holds barred venue acting as a meeting place between tradition and innovation.
Read all about this unique venue and the minds behind it over on the site! 🇮🇪
📸 @rin_cobby
@rin_cobby reports from this year’s Glastonbury Festival, where programmers are working to integrate diverse global voices into the line-up.
Read about how they do this over on the site!
The Shamstep pioneers @47soul formed over a decade ago by four members of the Palestinian diaspora. Since Israel’s ongoing siege of Gaza escalated in 2023, their message has come into sharper focus. @rin_cobby speaks to the group.
Find out more about our latest cover stars over on the site. 🇵🇸
Last spring, I got to travel to Tokyo on behalf of @songlinesmagazine to discover what some of the city’s record shops had to offer in terms of musical obscurities...and I got to hear some incredible hidden gems.
Thank you to everyone who took the time to play me your favourite tracks, there’s still so much to explore in Tokyo both musically and beyond, and I can’t wait to come back!
The piece (and some of my shots) are now live on the site, go check out some of these stores and the amazing tracks I got to learn about.
“For crate-diggers, it doesn’t really get better than Tokyo. With areas like Shibuya once known as the ‘Mecca of record shops’, the plethora of places to buy music stands as proof alone of the vinyl’s resurgence. And while vinyl sales still aren’t at their pre-90s levels, I had no problem whatsoever sourcing locations to uncover for this piece. What struck me as I wandered around the city’s narrow streets, however, wasn’t just the number of shops, but how specialised they were. Each visit felt like I was discovering the owner’s personal collection, with some shops dedicated to just one genre, or just one era from that genre – something so at odds with the largely generalised nature of stores in London. With that in mind, I wanted to capitalise on the wealth of expertise around me and ask each owner what the most obscure record in their collection was. What ensued involved much Google Translate, but nevertheless yielded pretty special results..”
