Pull Your Jocks up / God Slap – The Scratch

By far the newest band here so far, The Scratch are a 4-piece acoustic act from Dublin. They were forged from from a shared love of acoustic guitar, metal and traditional Irish music, and not giving a damn what anyone thinks.  Their debut album is literally called Couldn’t Give a Rats.

Full of brilliant musicianship, offbeat themes and lots of attitude, The Scratch are part of a really interesting movement in Irish music at the moment. Musicians that take their influences from all over the globe. Musicians who see no problem with the juxtaposition of hiphop and Sean-nós, high art and pop-culture, heavy metal and trad music, politics and bawdy Irish humor . A Lazarus Soul, Junior Brother,  Lankum, Ballyboyz and the Rubber Bandits to name a few.

The Scratch won’t be for everyone and a lot of it is definitely for adult ears only (really!). I’m definitely a convert though. I only heard of them for the first time on Easter Sunday. I decided to give the album a try on Spotify, by the fourth song I was looking for tickets for their next gig.
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- Collie