Home Truths - 'Sup Magazine Belfast Takeover

This blog was and is supposed to be primarily centered around the Melbourne music scene, with diversions further afield as I see fit/to fill in the blanks. However, I want to take the liberty of bringing attention to a week-long feature in 'Sup Magazine focusing on the small but vibrant underground music scene in my former home of Belfast. Belfast, for such a small and parochial city has for the last 5-10 years produced some of the most striking, visceral and original bands I have come across. And in the last few years, elements that have been bubbling on the surface seem to have erupted and an actual exuberant scene of diverse but like-minded acts have come together to create, what seems to me thousands of miles away, the most interesting period for Belfast esoterics in a long, long time. I guess they were all just waiting for me to leave.

It may be that the attention lavished on my small but lovable former home and the people interviewed are dear friends of mine, is what makes these articles interesting to me. But hopefully if you are a Melbournian reader, you will get a kick out of this rare insight into the underground workings of a formerly-troubled city.

Part 1 focuses on the uber-cool lo-fi surf two-piece Girls Names and Part 2 on DIY gig collective Ordinary Days, whose head Dude, Mark Reid, gets top marks for surmising Belfast's scene - 'Luckily, not too many people in Belfast have the pretence of being hip so we can just get on with partying.'
Melbourne hipsters take note.