***Irish band Oh Boland is back with Western Leisure. The record marks a progression in Oh Boland’s sound with the familiar garage squall tempered by Wyatt-esque psychedelics, New Wave skronk and Bakersfield country all buoying personal songs of rural inertia and the dark edges of parochial life. Western Leisure, the dynamic third record from Oh Boland, is not just an enthralling document detailing the darkened corners and unseemly characters you often hear tell of in forgotten parochial towns of the past, but it marks the beginning of an exciting chapter in the band’s story. Oh Boland’s sound has been described as having a “rare potency”, one that exists in their live shows and two records, their 2016 debut Spilt Milk which featured in Pitchfork’s “Best Underground Garage Punk Albums” of that year and its equally visceral successor, Cheap Things. Over the course of the Tuam-via-Dublin-based band’s lifespan, Oh Boland has existed in several guises and their forthcoming third record heralds a compelling new phase as the solo project of founding member, Niall Murphy. The self-produced Western Leisure (mixed and mastered by Mikey Young of Eddy Current Suppression Ring and Total Control) signifies a electrifying artistic evolution spurred by Murphy’s unwavering musical curiosity which hears him experiment with wistful Country motifs alongside Oh Boland’s synonymous noise-rock tendencies. Pressed on red vinyl.
LP $20.25
07/12/2024