The Boys Of Dungeon Lane is the name of Paul McCartney’s new album revisiting his Liverpool coming of age, due out this Friday. It’s also the name of a new interview special available to watch on Amazon Live and in the Amazon Music app as of 11 a.m. ET today, in which McCartney is interviewed by actor Paul Mescal, who is playing him in the upcoming Beatles biopics directed by Sam Mendes.
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(This is our friend Gonzo’s review of the first new album in 11 years from Pro-Pain, out now on Napalm Records.) Eleven long years have passed since we last heard from New York’s Pro-Pain. And not unlike other groove-laden crossover heroes from the early ’90s — Helmet, Merauder, and Prong come to mind first — […]
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Ireland’s Dom Martin is clearly an artistic force to be reckoned with. Immensely talented and fiercely honest, he is destined to be an international star – despite himself. It was never his intention or goal to be a household name.
In the music business, wearing your heart on your sleeve can be a detriment but Martin insists on being authentically himself and open about his feelings and motivation.
In a conversation with Blues Rock Review, he was humble and forthright when he revealed, “I’m not living to be a millionaire. I don’t need a lot to survive. As long as my kids are fed and I’ve got a roof over my head. I don’t think that’s a lot to ask. I just love to play.” He added, “Live shows are great therapy for me. It doesn’t matter where I’m playing. It could be at some dingy bar, I just love to play.”
In recent years, his career has been gaining momentum and the stages and audiences have become much larger. And comparisons to Irish legends Rory Gallagher and Gary Moore have only helped.
Those are giant, and perhaps daunting, shoes to fill as Irish music lovers voted Gallagher as Ireland’s greatest music artist in a national poll.
But Martin explained, “I never wanted the comparisons to Rory to begin with; I never tried to emulate him. But there’s a lot of people I would not want to be compared to so being compared to Rory, that’s a privilege, that’s a pleasure of mine.”
Martin definitely has his own distinct sound, especially his vocals, and he believes the comparisons are just a way to try to explain his music style to people. “It’s not all blues or rock; it’s a mix of all kinds of crazy stuff, so they kind of find it easier to say, ‘Oh, he’s like Rory Gallagher’.”
He acknowledged the influence of the Irish icon. “I would not be the guitar player or musician that I am today if it wasn’t for Rory. He’s been a massive influence on me.”
But Martin is just as quick to acknowledge his fans. “It’s not about the musicians, it’s always been about the people who go to the shows.”
Martin is often critical of himself and says that early on he felt he wasn’t ready for the kind of success that began to happen. “If I don’t feel like I played well, I kind of felt like I let everybody else down.” He continued, “I think I’m in a much better place now, to just enjoy the music life. There’s no pressure. I have no visions of grandeur.”
With the sleeve-heart clearly exposed, he said, “It is sincere music and I care an awful lot about it.”
Martin says he relied heavily on others in the recording of his first two albums but feels he hit his stride with his third album, Buried In The Hail.
“I had a much more hands-on approach in the studio. I was much more engaged in everything that was going on. I was in a much better place mentally and physically. And I had great musicians with me, which makes all the difference.”
Of major benefit to him were his cherished memories of recording in a remote room, and he said he’s looking forward to his next album because of it.
His love of soul-baring, live performances comes through clearly in his Buried Alive Live album that’s receiving incredible reviews.
At 35, Martin is thankful he survived his wild youth and has settled into a new life, focused on family and music.
He said there was a time when he was in a bad place with drinking and drugs. He’s been sober for about six years and said he just quit cold-turkey on his own and there’s no want or desire for any of that lifestyle now. “Now I just want to play music and be the best version of myself that I can be,” he shared.
Martin did enjoy a short tour in the US Midwest and was thrilled to have Buddy Guy join him on stage at Guy’s Legends venue.
And other opportunities are opening up for the young blues-rock artist. Last year he shared a show with Robin Trower and he was excited to discover he had loved some of Trower’s music long before he even knew who he was. He also just finished touring with Eric Gales and those stages were bigger than what he was accustomed to. He and his bandmates did enjoy being able to run around, using as much stage as possible.
“I loved that aspect of it. It does something to the performance, but it’s not better or worse. It’s just different. I don’t see much of a difference in any particular size of the venue.” He argued that he doesn’t see the difference between a massive stage and a small club gig, restating that he just loves to play.
Martin also recently took part in a Joe Bonamassa Blues Cruise and, at first, felt out of place but learned to enjoy the experience, and hopes to do it again soon.
As far as recognition goes, the awards are starting to pile up. Among them are UK Blues Awards including two Instrumentalist of the Year Awards, three Acoustic Artist of the Year Awards, Album of the Year, along with a European Blues Award for Best Acoustic Act, among others.
Racking up those awards in recent years, Martin says it’s not something he really thinks about and certainly didn’t set out to do, but concedes it’s something to put on your CV to help in the business. “It does look good to win the awards but I actually forget that it’s a thing.”
The bulk of the hardware supports his confession that he really loves acoustic performances. He revealed that he’s only been playing electric for six or seven years. “I love listening to electric guitar but I never wanted to be the lead. Acoustic guitar is where my heart really lies.”
But, he explained, “Forming a band was a necessity because a lot of venues wouldn’t hire a solo artist.”
“Doing the band thing is a pain in the arse. If I could never do a band gig again it would be a joy for me, but here we are,” he laughed.
When asked about his preference between performing, writing and studio work he joked that he enjoys each about 30 per cent with 10 per cent set aside for some solitude. “But to be honest, I truly love performing but my heart really lies in writing,” and then added, “I sometimes spend all night just writing and writing to the wee small hours.”
And he revealed all his writing is not necessarily for public consumption. A lot of it was poetry for his wife. “Waves of poetry would just hit her in the morning and the poor girl had to put up with me,” he confessed. “I started to feel sorry for her.”
And now with two young sons, including a newborn, he hopes his kids will pick up an instrument some day because, “It makes me so happy when I play, and I know how good it can make you feel.”
He wants that joy for them but not the headaches of the business. “I would not want them to have to be working musicians, and meet the kind of people you have to meet in this business. I would just want them to play for themselves.”
Having signed with Forty Below Records, an independent record label based in Los Angeles, California, Martin said, “I really have a good feeling about the whole thing and what’s going to happen. I’m keeping that spark going and not letting anyone diminish that.”
While he fully recognizes how difficult the music business can be, he offered other musicians heartfelt advice saying, “Don’t lose your dream. Whenever you really, really want to give up, whenever you say this is the last straw; if it doesn’t happen this time I’m done, that’s when you don’t quit. It’s like the old saying, ‘Successful people are just losers who tried one more time’.”
With unbridled enthusiasm, Martin says he would love to meet or be joined onstage by Tom Waits or Eric Johnson. “To me, that’s how you measure success; meeting someone like Tom Waits. That’s a million-dollar contract in my heart. It means so much. And I love Johnson’s music and his zen approach to life.”
He may be an enigma in the music business as he dearly enjoys solitude. But his ferocious honesty, sincerity, passion and enormous talent are powerfully magnetic to true music fans. We will be hearing a lot more from Dom Martin.
The post Dom Martin: Buried in Talent and Candor appeared first on Blues Rock Review.
Creatively speaking, returns are uneven on Drake’s surprise three-album drop. But commercially speaking, Iceman, Habibti, and Maid Of Honour are a major coup. The albums have debuted at #1, #2, and #3 respectively, making Drake the first artist to ever occupy the top three spots on the Billboard 200 concurrently.
The post Drake Becomes First Artist To Hold Top Three Albums On Billboard 200 appeared first on Stereogum.
Circle Jerks – Majestic Ventura Theater – May 23, 2026
Ventura California, is a sleepy coastal town about an hour north of Los Angeles, and while most of the action typically involves tourists and the Pacific Ocean, it went off on Saturday night for night two of the Circle Jerks takeover of the Majestic Ventura Theater. I knew something was up when it took me twenty-five minutes to find a parking space in a downtown area that is usually devoid of cars at night. I wondered if all of the people responsible for the limited parking were going to the show, and the answer was a resounding yes – the Majestic Ventura Theater was as full as I’ve ever seen it and completely sold out for the second night in a row.
I arrived early to pick up my photo pass and get situated in the pit up front, where I took a minute and talked to security to get a sense of what to expect. The guy’s eyes grew a little wide when I asked, and I was told that night one of the Circle Jerks was off the hook, and the audience was wild throughout, with near-constant crowd surfers. The air inside the 1920s era 1200 capacity theater was already stale, stagnant, and hot, with a smell not dissimilar to a high school football locker room at the end of a long season – as if the previous night’s frenzied show was still hanging in the air. I was sweating before the first band hit the stage.
The pioneering Circle Jerks formed in Hermosa Beach California in 1979, and it’s amazing that almost 50 years later, the hardcore punk scene they helped create is still thriving. They are an institution, with nothing but respect from their fans and peers, and the reason was obvious from the moment they took the stage and the lights came up. They aren’t a band to rest on their laurels, they’re a touring machine – already having played 28 dates this year – yet when I walked up to the theater, there wasn’t a luxurious tour bus waiting outside, but a Pensky cube truck. These guys are punk to the core, and all that the punk ethos embodies.
The previous night’s show must have been wild, because when Gorilla Biscuits were about to take the stage, security kicked the photographers out of the pit, stating that it wasn’t safe for us to be there. Begrudgingly, we shot their set with telephoto lenses from the theater floor. When it was time to take our spots in the pit for Circle Jerks, security again told us it still wasn’t safe due to the amount of crowd surfers. I decided to test that theory, and went to the other end of the pit and asked the security guy on that side. He was about to let us into the pit when his supervisor was called. I pleaded my case to him, and after some back and forth, all seven of us got the go-ahead to shoot the customary first three songs from the pit – in photography as in life, it often pays to look for another angle if the answer given isn’t to your liking.
That said, by the time our three songs were up, the pit was becoming like a warzone with incoming crowd surfers, and I’m sure security was glad to be rid of us and have more room to operate. The crowd was bonkers, with the short, fast, and furious songs exploding from the speakers in rapid-fire succession, fueling the crowd in the pit, and gliding surfers through the air atop the hands of others. The majority of their set was from their inaugural album, Group Sex, with 10 tracks. These guys know how to put on a show, and the audience responded with an exhausting frenzy of motion and mayhem. The evening felt like a blur, between the ferocity of the set, the short length of songs, the three great opening bands, and the heat inside the theater – before you knew it, the show was over, but not soon to be forgotten.
Circle Jerks is:
Setlist:
1) Deny Everything
2) Letterbomb
3) In Your Eyes
4) Back Against the Wall
5) Behind the Door
6) I Just Want Some Skank
7) Beverly Hills
8) When the Shit Hits the Fan
9) Under the Gun
10) Coup d'état
11) Moral Majority
12) Don't Care
13) Live Fast Die Young
14) Wild in the Streets
15) I, I & I
16) Beat Me Senseless
17) World Up My Ass
18) Wasted
19) Revenge
20) Nervous Breakdown
21) What's Your Problem
22) Question Authority
The Gorilla Biscuits are a legendary hardcore punk band from Queens New York. They’ve been around since the mid-80s, and have used the resulting forty years to come up with a no-frills formula that works – great songs, huge energy, and care taken to nurture a rabid fanbase.
As previously mentioned, photographers weren’t allowed in the photo pit for their set based on the previous night’s sold-out show – security was concerned with our safety due to the amount of crowd surfers and the occasional stage diver. I’ve had the threat of not being allowed to shoot in the pit before, but never was it actually enforced – this was a first. It was quickly obvious why security had made the request – people were flying everywhere.
Vocalist Anthony Civorelli spent a good portion of the night standing on the back step of the barricade amongst the fans, leaning into their midst to sing, while also throwing his microphone into the throng for some lucky fan to sing the lyrics back to him. This was a top-tier band, and they put on an amazing show.
Gorilla Biscuits is:
7 Seconds were formed in Reno in 1980, and brought everything they had to their tight forty-five-minute set. It was great to photograph them and watch how happy their music made people in the audience – this evening was a true celebration of great music, and their inclusiveness made it okay for everyone in the audience to participate in whatever form worked for them.
7 Seconds is:
Cosmic Joke is an LA-based hardcore punk/skate punk band, and they were a great way to kickstart a fantastic four-band night of hardcore madness. They played an incredible thirty-minute set that got the people going and set the mood for the remainder of the evening.
Cosmic Joke is:
Brooks Robinson is an LA-based concert photographer, and 30+ year freelance camera operator for film, television, and music videos. He has photographed some of the largest film/TV projects in history, and hundreds of music videos in MTV's heyday.
Thanks for reading!
(Our contributor Zoltar is back with us again, this time presenting his interview with José Pablo, vocalist and bassist of the Costa Rican death metal band Candarian, whose debut album was released in April of this year.) Two out four members of CANDARIAN already play in Chile, eat your heart out? If you’re a classic […]
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