Alt-Country from the UK and Ireland

rpirl

Earlier on in the year I was working on a playlist and thought I might share it here

Alt-Country is obviously a well-established genre in the US, but this playlist is / was an attempt to bring together all the best examples of it from this side of the pond

The playlist is in chronological order, with UK and Ireland both having about a dozen acts each, but there's a fairly clear divide – the UK acts got the ball rolling in the 1990s and the 2000s, and then a lot of Irish bands emerged during the 2010s decade. Not very many of these bands / artists would've got much notice at the time, probably because there were always other styles of music that the media / press would've been more focused on.

I'll put the playlist below and maybe then add a few posts about some of the more interesting / notable inclusions

https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLklCB2KO5em_EOGDdHVSpbLsVFQa6KLX2

rpirl

Hey folks, so this is 'Disc 1', the UK part

Gary Hall & The Stormkeepers – 'The More I Get' (1991)

The Rockingbirds – 'Gradually Learning' (1992)

Delta – 'All My Life' (1994)

The Good Sons – 'Help Me To Find' (1995)

Beth Orton – 'She Cries Your Name' (1996)

Grand Drive – 'A Ladder To The Stars' (2000)

Lincoln – 'Little Mistakes' (2001)

Richard Hawley – 'Baby You're My Light' (2001)

Goldrush – 'Landscape' (2002)

Endrick Brothers – 'Queen of the Summer' (2005)

Cherry Ghost – '4 a.m.' (2007)

StringerBessant – 'Self Is Here' (2010)

rpirl

Irish bands and artists

The Calvinists – 'Anchor' (2010)

Lyre Dyce – 'Grace and Honesty' (2011)

Paul Creane & The Changing Band – 'Name Like Water' (2011)

The Man Whom – 'Sing Till There's No Songs Left' (2011)

John Blek & The Rats – 'Calling Out My Name' (2013)

LowMountain – 'Write To Me' (2013)

Hidden Highways – 'The World Began With A Waltz' (2013)

The Midnight Union Band – 'Just A Scar' (2014)

The Hard Ground – 'Pucker' (2015)

The Mining Co. – 'Country Heart' (2016)

Anna Mitchell – 'Dog Track' (2017)

Randolf & The Crokers – 'Home' (2017)

rpirl

Summery tune called 'Springboard'… discovered this in recent months, the band were kind of a continuation of The Rockingbirds after they had split up

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cJKpaxTi_Jk

Choochtown

Loving the Brown Horse album. Great Alt-Country vibes!

rpirl

There's a few that might need adding in but here's the first Irish one that I've picked up from the new decade

WeKin - 'Cold Place' (2021)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_3JzlB4ODkE

rpirl

Bray Vista

This band put out a few releases during the 2000s. The material is fairly good / solid, but they might as well be from the US — sound 100% like an American group.

'The River That Knows'

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0crwKnB3xEM