I went along to see Butterfly Explosion in The Roisin Dubh in Galway last Thursday night. Despite the imminent arrival of exam time The Roisin had a good crowd in and Evil Harrisons from Dundalk did a good job of warming up the crowd before the Butterflies Exploded.

I'd seen Butterfly Explosion a couple of times in 2005 in Dublin while they were still in their embryonic phase gig-wise. Their performances since, three in New York, two at SXSW in Texas and the Thursday previous to this one in London have obviously stood them in good stead. They ripped through their set with considerable gusto.

The opener was Car Park, a crunching post-rock instrumental which is my personal favourite of their songs so far. The guitar therein wails as intensely as a Banshee with a fork stuck in her eye. They followed this up with the also yet to be released Next Year which is undoubtedly their most accessible song to date, it's a slice of boy/girl vocal pop bliss, backed up by propulsive drums and searing guitar which brands itself on your brain from the first listen.

The middle of the set was made up of some of their earlier tracks, including impressive performances of Chemistry, Vision and Sophia. They rounded off the set in fine style with what may be one of their most distinctive tracks, Score (listen on myspace), which builds and builds along a gorgeous synth line into a delirious frenzy.

The sizeable crowd lapped it up and gave Butterfly Explosion a very enthusiastic welcome to The West, hopefully they'll return soon.

You can catch Butterfly Explosion at the IMRO Showcase in The Sugar Club, tomorrow night Thursday 4th May. Easily recommended.

tags:butterfly explosion new irish music

Published by Paul.