Fontaines D.C. – Dopamine Chamber
The prolific and world-famous Fontaines D.C. attempted to capitalise on their commercial streak with their 5th album in under 8 years. The band seems like it is in search of a new ‘sound’. it is split between the moody ambient rock music they became famous for and a new, slightly gaudier sound palette. Perhaps trying to satisfy their old fans, we get the usual dose of lullaby’s somewhere between the pop-rock/Britpop of the 1990s and the post-punk of the 1970s (Mimesis, You Miss Me, Japan, Demolition, etc.) – weekly perfomed but immaculately produced, by James Ford. Perhaps recognising the limitation of this style, the band tries to inject more melody into the lead single, Marianne, which hardly plays to their strengths, despite the suave delivery. The subsequent single, Tongue is a pretty embarassing rap-rock fusion, that sounds about 30 years off being innovative.
The band’s musicality and poise has only modestly improved. The opener Six-Shot Morning is the most choreographed track, containing a motorik beat and dense galaxial bass and keyboards and a vocoder a la Kraftwerk, which glides and rises into depressive ecstasy – more than a bit derivative of The Horrors (who were more than a bit derivative of several other bands). The other track that stands out is the elegant, gothic alt-country duet with Rosalia, Where Is Gone?, that recalls Nick Cave’s murder ballads. You Miss Me boasts some bolero strings on the chorus but still really just sounds like a mediocre attempt at plagiarising Lana Del Rey’s Ride or the Verve’s Bittersweet Symphony. The closer, Intimate combines M83 style shoegaze pop and gothic rock, though doesn’t particularly make the most of the idea.
With such an extravagant budget, what truly stands out is the band’s lack of imagination. It is furthermore impressive that such modern equipment can produce such dated-sounding music.
Losing My Edge Rating: 5/10
Best Tracks: Where Is Gone, Six-Shot Morning
Released: 16 October, 2026
Label: XL
Gurriers — Nobody’s Coming to Save You
Dublin’s gurriers made waves with the raucous raveups of Come And See, somewhere between Gilla Band and Viagra Boys. Despite their post-punk roots, Nobody’s Coming To Save You (prod. By Mark Bowen of Idles and Loren Humphreys) adopts a bluesy and moodier sound, surprisingly indebted to the alternative rock of the 2000s. For example, the grunge-pop Nobody’s Coming to Save You sounds like Queens of the Stone Age covering Kasabian. Party Lines sounds like Franz Ferdinand, while Shades sounds like Muse but without the classical undertones. Their post-punk roots are retained only on the dissonant and fast, Today Is Not Enough, with a delivery that evokes Mark E. Smith. The visceral standout is Waiting For Fisher. However bombastic and loud, the product cannot hide that this is very ordinary and derivative commercial rock music.
Losing My Edge Rating: 4/10
Best Tracks: Waiting For Fisher
Released: September 25, 2026
Label: Play It Again Sam
Mhaol — Something Soft
Ireland’s Mhaol play mechanical noise-rock and post-punk (a la Gilla Band), galvanised by radical feminist themes. The emphasis is the tireless groove on Pursuit, where the vocals also evolve from subdued spoken-word to an expressionistic screech. I Miss My Dog boasts a mutant dance-punk rhythm (a la Chrome) and ear-piercing digital glitch. Each track varies on this general formula: the deconstructed garage-rock of You Are Temporary, But The Internet is Forever (built on the Louie Louie riff), the short and vitriolic ‘j’accuse’ against patriarchy, DM:AM, the limping headache of E8/N16, the funk-punk backdrop of Snare and the tribalistic IBS. More variety is found on Clementine, which descends into a digital hardcore nightmare. The most daring experiment is perhaps, 1-800-call-me-back, which uses dial tones as a rhythmic instrument. Coda, meanwhile, is pure post-industrial primalism.
The band is constantly finding inventive ways to induce headaches. The album is full of modern themes and also forms of a sort of reflection for a society of patriarchy and senseless digitalisation.
Losing My Edge Rating: 7/10
Best Tracks: I Miss My Dog, DM:AM, 1-800-call-me-back
Label: Merge
Released: May 16, 2025
The Scratch – Pull Like A Dog
The Scratch play a curious mix of celtic folk-rock and metal, which manages to avoid the clichés of the genre and boasts a variety of disparate influences. Pull Like a Dog marries relentless thrash-metal rhythms and guitar solos with a chorus and style that recalls the 90s hard rock revival (e.g. Janes Addiction). The Irish influence is more apparent on Pullin’ Teeth (feat. Kevin Rheault of the Dropkick Murphys) with its melodic sung passages, which nonetheless boasts a tense rhythm worthy of Fugazi, a spoken-worth rant and eventually, a polka-like dance.
The straightforward alternative rock, Gladrags, the Lankum-esque ballad Cracks and the post-grunge ballad, Spacer are less interesting, if serviceable for variety purposes. The band also indulges in their usual distorted jigs on Roses n Poses and Horsefly. The album ends up dedicating far too much to to the minimal ballads, which increase the range but expose the weaknesses of the band, even if the sullen requiem I Hope All Is Forgiven is justified by genuine pathos.
Losing My Edge Rating: 6/10
Best Tracks: Pull Like A Dog, Pullin’ Teeth
Released: March 13, 2026
Label: Sony Music UK
Gilla Band – Pugnello
Dublin’s Gilla Band – now recognised as one of the era’s most important noise-rock bands – shifted back to perhaps their most experimental album yet. It is their most digital album yet and the culmination of the arc began with The Talkies in 2019 (ostensibly, their comeback album) and continued on Post-Ryan in 2022, which employed far more electronic arrangements. Faulkner’s rhythmic propulsion is no longer the protagonist, relegated to predominantly programming. This is fully Kiely’s album and his absurdist tirades and eccentric vocalisations reach true extremities. This leads to the album’s biggest flaw: it feels contrived and self-aware compared to the past, as if Kiely was only imitating rather than experiencing a breakdown.
The album opens on The Angelus, which is a frantic recitation over digital static and breakbeats to complement Kiely’s ranting, before slowing into a psychotic industrial exorcism. Placeholder is one of their classic ‘pow-wow’ dances. Then, the song abruptly switches to a mix of tribal bass warbling and alien vocal effects. Kiely’s recitation on Alogia is comparably calm before the track combusts in industrial bluster, as the lyrical exorcism escalates. The short Three Hands Clapping contains a strange flickering beat and an icy drone, backed by an atmosphere of swarming post-industrial mutations (a la Suicide). Thematically, these songs often explore a schizophrenic state of mind through an absurdist meta-commentary.
The second half contains more regular fare for the group, opening with Jacobsons, with a minimalist atmosphere, a techno beat that gradually grows in volume and Kiely imitating Mark E Smith (despite the chaotic screams at the end). Giraffe is also relatively cohesive with its steady Pere-Ubu-ian beat that breaks into an industrial techno ritual in the second half. Another spectacular highlight is the weird alien dance The Megazord, spliced with industrial scraping, groaning noises and notably, Kiely even singing on-beat with proper momentum. The rhythm evolves into a gypsy gallop in the second half (perhaps Faulkner’s cleverest trick of the album). Crisp Pop concocts a beat out of quasi-flamenco handclapping and marries it to a Neuian repetition. Meanwhile, Computer Sadness and closer, At The Gallop bury Kiely in a pointless wall of mechanical noise.
This music no longer belongs to the spirit of the Pere Ubu ‘modern dance’ that permeated the early albums and singles but to the industrial nightmares of Throbbing Gristle. Overall, it remains innovative but only occasionally revelatory.
Best Tracks: Placeholder, Alogia, The Megazord
Losing My Edge Rating: 7/10
Label: Rough Trade
Released: 25 September, 2026
No time to review:
*stars indicate reccomended tracks
Cmat – God’s Country: 4/10
Some Images of Paradise – i expect the same of u: 5/10
Just Mustard – WE WERE JUST HERE: 6/10 (Endless Deathless*, WE WERE JUST HERE*)
Mary Wallopers – Paddywhackery: 4/10