Dundalk’s Nix Moon played such an impressive set at the main stage of Vantastival that I had to go see them again in the bar later that day. They are the quintessential festival band; baggy trousers, flowing hair and beards, and a dedicated bongo player. The five piece play from a broad palette of genres and rhythms. Their debut EP is out next month and I caught up with Joycey, Fahy and Gavin from the band as they were soaking up the atmosphere at the festival.

MG: We're here at Vantastival with Nix Moon. Who have we got here?

Fahy - We've got Fahy. I'm the acoustic guitar player and one of the singers.

Gavin - I'm Gavin and I'm the percussionist and the court jester.

Joycey - I'm Joycey. I'm guitar, bouzouki and voice.

MG: How long have you been together?

J: Me and Fahy started writing music together in college.

F: Joycey wears the trousers.

J: Sometimes, unless I want to wear a skirt. Me and Gavin used to jam when we were 15 or 16 and then he went away travelling the world for a couple of years. Left me, broke my heart.

G: And then I came back and we opened up like a clam out of the sea. A musical clam. Straight out of the depths.

F: Gavin’s brain never quite came back from travelling. He's here in body with us.

G: The hands still work.

F: The band came together about a year and a half ago. We were writing tunes in college and when Gavin came back from travelling we started playing together.

G: I used to play in another band with two of the boys called The Beached Whales so we got them in too.

J: And now we're in love since.

MG: You have a bongo player.

F: That's Gavin.

MG: Ok, the bongos, the world traveller, this all makes sense.

G: I’ve no shoes on, I'm obviously the bongo player.

MG: You look every inch the festival band! You've an EP coming out?

J: First of July launching in The Spirit Store, Dundalk.

G: It's a three track EP called Soul Traffic.

J: We recorded it with Peter Baldwin up in Ravensdale. The studio is pure class.

F: Real ‘70s.

G: In a cabin.

J: Even the scenery around it. It's etched into the mountain and you're looking up at the whole bay. An amazing building. An amazing sound.

F: An amazing dude.

G: Handsome too.

J: That's why I booked him. I just get lost in his eyes, “Another take, Peter?”

MG: Describe your sound for us. There's loads going on there.

F: Eastern-psychedelic-folk-jazz with a hint of prog, and a bit of reggae.

G: Ambient dribblement.

F: It's fusion. And we don't really stick to a genre. We try and spread it out.

G: My mother, the only bands she likes are B.B. King and Alice in Chains and she says there's something there for everyone. Even if you don't like the band, there's a song you'll like. We play enough that everyone loves it.

MG: My mother is like that too, she loves Leonard Cohen and Smashing Pumpkins.

G: Leonard Cohen, worst singer ever. Great poet, no voice.

F: Tom Waits as well, I suppose you love his voice.

G: Scour! Great music, great words, great lines, muck voice.

J: You're the bongo player, you can’t be commenting on anybody.

F: We studied music, you're out.

J: Growing up, my oul’ fella was mad into everything. There's a big Eastern influence there. He went to Turkey eight or ten years ago to record an album there. It was meant to be a concept album joining the East and the Western influences.

F: My mother was in a folk band called The Limelighters. They played Christy Moore songs and stuff. What's your background, Gavin?

G: What is my background? Heavy metal. Heavy fucking metal. Give me a bit of Pantera or Metallica any day. None of this Middle Eastern shite.

F: You love it.

G: I do. With all my heart. I wish I had two hearts so I could give one to the band and the other to Pantera. You know Tom Petty And The Heartbreakers’ greatest hits? I know every lyric of that album. We were driving to France when I was about six. We left all the tapes on the back window and every tape melted apart from Tom Petty And The Heartbreakers’ greatest hits. So I know every word from every song. See if ‘American Girl’ comes on I'm throwing the radio out of the window.

MG: You're all locals?

J: Fahy and them are from Monaghan, I’m from Swords originally but we all met in Dundalk. There's a class original music scene in Dundalk.

F: Around The Spirit Store.

J: When we have the launch there I think, as a band, we want it to be a sensory experience as well as a musical experience. We'll have some backdrops and visuals, a few art pieces.

F: Gavin’s making one out of willow.

MG: You have a good stage presence too.

G: I think that's what makes us a good band. We're five musicians and five best friends. We love just being with each other even without playing tunes. We love being in the same room, having the craic and being stupid.

MG: Is this your first time playing Vantastival?

F: We played last year.

J: We've been here every year for the past three or four, when it was in Dundalk. It's gonna be a good year for us. We played here and next week we're at B.A.R.E. In The Woods and then we're playing at Knockanstockan. And I'd like to think we're going to play Electric Picnic as well. We were there last year in the Bog Cottage.

G: We were shit. Well, not shit, but we weren't as deadly as we are now.

MG: Why are you called Nix Moon?

J: Nix is the moon of Pluto and we thought we were being spacey bastards. It also turns out that Nix is the Greek goddess of darkness and light.

MG: Any other business?

J: Come to the launch in The Spirit Store on July 1st. Check us out on Facebook and Bandcamp.

G: The songs on Bandcamp are a year old now but still deadly.

Black Svan formed in 2009 in Drogheda. They are a five piece heavy metal band whose sound is heavily influenced by American rock and metal bands like Pantera, Alice in Chains, Soil and Disturbed. In 2010 they toured Europe with Fozzy and Stuck Mojo and their debut album, 16 Minutes was released in 2014. That went straight to No. 2 in the Irish Metal Charts. It was only beaten to the top spot by Slipknot. Lead singer Keith Caffrey spoke to Musos’ Guide before their Main Stage show at Vantastival last Friday.

MG: What's brings you to Vantastival?

KC: We've played at pretty much every Vantastival that there’s been. Ever since it started out we’ve been on the bill.

MG: Are you local to the area?

KC: We're Drogheda based. We used to travel out to Dundalk. We grew up playing The Spirit Store in Dundalk and places like that. We have a lot of connections there. Our guitar player, Jagger, lives in Dundalk at the moment. The Vantastival gig was always one that we did and it’s great to have it here in Drogheda close to home.

MG: Your album came out in October '14 and it's really good.

KC: Yeah, 16 Minutes. It took a long time to do. It was hard work. We're self funded, like every metal band on the planet. A lot of hard graft went into it and we're happy with the finished product. We had a good team working with us. The producer was Jacob Hansen, who produced Volbeat's albums. He has a really good sound. We like the Volbeat sound. It good and clean but still aggressive. We really like the sound.

MG: How did you end up touring with Fozzy and Stuck Mojo?

KC: So the European tour, the way it came about, Jagger and myself growing up were massive wrestling fans. Jericho, The Rock, Stone Cold, anyone who was a teenager during those years was a wrestling fan. That continued on into our early twenties. Fozzy was coming over and Jagger was a member of, or in fact was, the Irish street team for Fozzy. He got in contact with Anne in the UK street team. One thing lead to another. They heard our music and they really liked it.

Originally the bill for Belfast was filled but they liked us and stuck us on the bill for Belfast and Dublin. We thought that this was awesome. So we did Belfast, we did Dublin, and we got a call a few days later saying a slot has become available on the European tour and we were like “Absolutely!”. Next thing you know we were flying into Paris and doing the tour and we did the whole tour. And as soon as that one finished up we got the Mojo one. Some of the guys in Fozzy cross over to Mojo. They were starting another one so they said “You might as well come with us as well”. We ended up doing both tours.

MG: This was long before you had an album out or anything.

KC: We were only together since 2009 so this was a year into our existence. We've supported the likes of Diamond Head as well which was a big honour, in The Spirit Store. We did the Academy with Kerbdog. Kerbdog are awesome, really sound as well. We've had some cool things happen.

The blurb for Jericho’s autobiography says “One of the top ten WWE wrestlers, Fozzy gets praise from Kerrang, and his church bake sales are second to none'.

He just never stops. To get an acknowledgement on one of their albums was awesome as well, in the “Thank you” part, we get credited there, that was cool. A nice homage to the tour we did together.

MG: You've said before that you learned so much from that tour.

KC: Yeah, you learn the keys to setting up and getting offstage quickly. That comes from knowing you have your slot and you can’t fuck around. You have to be on point. Like any support band you get a line check and that line check is crucial. You want to sound your best and you're not going to get a soundcheck like Fozzy are going to get. You have to get on, get set up, and be as professional as you can and get off as quick as you can. Metal For The Masses is quite good for that as well. You have half an hour to really shine.

MG: What are you up to at the moment?

KC: We're writing at the moment. We have three or four songs that we've nailed down. We are deciding what to do. A lot of bands seem to be going the EP route at the moment. So we'll see. We’re open to it. It's a bit secretive right now.

MG: So you won't be playing them tonight?

KC: We've got one new song for tonight.

MG: You're off to Kerry tomorrow.

KC: Yeah, K-Fest. In Killorglin somewhere. About half an hour from Kerry in the wrong direction. We've got the Unleashed Festival in Dublin as well, in On The Rox. Serious line up there. We've got The Spirit Store with Words That Burn. We team up and play a lot of shows together. They're from Dundalk. Their album is coming out this week so look out for that. We're going to Hellfest. We've got an interview set up with our label because they’re French. They have a stand set up, M & O Records. We’re going to have an interview there and our merch will be available there.

MG: Any other craic?

KC: The album is there, it's on Spotify and we just put in on Reverbnation too, so it's free to listen to. We'd like people to listen to it and if they like it, come see us, buy the album. We've a full 12 page booklet. We like the old school, physical thing as well. We'd like to do a new video. That's something we're working on.

MG: I'm surprised you aren't more well known. It's a very accessible sound.

KC: Yeah, it’s a niche market anywhere you go. Maybe more so in Ireland. It's hard to get that extra lift to get you where you need to go. You need money behind you when it comes to touring and that. We all work full time and this is our passion. We just give 100 percent. And keep moving forward.

16 Minutes is available from amazon & iTunes.

The family friendly festival Doune The Rabbit Hole is back for its seventh edition this year and taking place at the Cardross Estate, Port of Menteith, Stirlingshire from Friday August 19th to Sunday 21st 2016.

This fantastic independent Scottish music festival started in 2010 at a site near the town of Doune, followed by a move to Duncarron Fort in 2012 to finally settle at its current location at the Cardross Estate. Since its inaugural day in 2010, the festival has celebrated the very best of Scotland’s independent/DIY art scene, with the addition of a few outstanding international guests.

Over 100 acts are set to descend upon the Port of Menteith this August including the likes of MØGEN, Admiral Fallow, Treacherous Orchestra, Cate Le Bon, Emma Pollock and Colonel Mustard And The Dijon 5, who blasted the stage of Liverpool Sound City 2015.

Doune The Rabbit Hole is a unique festival. Unlike festivals such a T In The Park and Glastonbury where they’ll cram in 80,000 plus people into their site, Doune has a capacity of around 1000 but this means you’re likely to meet people that you will see again throughout the weekend and make some lasting friends.

Jamie Murray, Director of Doune The Rabbit Hole Community Interest Group, said: “There is a real sense of community-spirit at Doune The Rabbit Hole and I guarantee you make friends for life.

“It is pretty rare to find an event that embraces a family-friendly culture whilst celebrating some amazing music from all genres.

“Where else would you see everyone, from toddlers to pensioners soaking up a festival atmosphere?”

Aiming to make you feel at home, organisers encourage you to bring the kids along. Under 12s get in free and there’s loads for them to do in the kid’s area with workshops and more and there’s even a family camping zone as well.

Tickets for the weekend are priced at £98 for adults and £58 for 13-15 year olds. If you can’t make it for the ‘hole’ three days, there are day tickets available. You can check these out at the festival website here.

If you aren’t able to make you own way to the festival, the hop on the Doune Bus from Stirling and Glasgow, or make you way to Stirling from Edinburgh and Perth as the organisers have subsidised the Stirling buses and timed them to train arrivals at Stirling train station. You can get more information on the website.

Paul Bush OBE, VisitScotland’s Director of Events, said: “We are delighted to support Doune the Rabbit Hole in 2016 and are confident event organisers have, once again, secured a line-up that will draw attendees from all over Scotland.”

Originally published in The Clyde Insider.

Continuing our build-up to Best Kept Secret Festival we spoke with Utrecht-based musician Thijs Kuijken, who plays under the moniker of I Am Oak. Following on from his debut album in 2010, he has released almost an album a year ever since, along with numerous singles, EPs, and a split mini-album with The Black Atlantic. In 2011, I Am Oak won the prestigious 3VOOR12 Best Album Award for Oasem.

2012 was a busy year; after playing at South by Southwest in Austin, I Am Oak performed three shows at The Great Escape Festival in Brighton and were selected as Band of the Day. That year also saw the release of Nowhere Or Tammensaari. It was the band's first album to be released in the UK and Ireland, via Heist or Hit Records. I am Oak’s latest album, Our Blood, was released in February and can be streamed/ downloaded here.

MG: Your new album has come out. How was the recording process?

TK: I started a couple years ago recording demo versions of new songs on the acoustic guitar and synth. I intended to flesh them out a bit over time and then bring them in to rehearsal with the band so we could make them into finished songs together. Over time however, I was putting more and more time and effort into these demos and actually lifting them up to their final versions by myself. This happened quite gradually. A lot of the album’s content ended up revolving around the passing of my father and it felt only natural to fully dive into this one by myself, because it was such a personal journey, so I ended up doing all of it. I worked at home and took all the free time I had for it, to work on it. Slowly arranging everything to where I wanted it to be. We then later, as a band, found a way to translate these recordings to suitable live versions. Having the songs remain pliable and organic that way and letting them change a little bit over time is an important aspect of making music, I think.

MG: Comparisons have been drawn between you and Jose Gonzalez as well as Sufjan Stevens. Are you happy with those?

TK: I’d like to think that I Am Oak has something to offer in its own right. I don’t mind these particular comparisons that much though. I guess people need a frame of reference when they are introduced to something they don’t know yet. I Am Oak evolved a little bit over the years and I don’t know how accurate these references still are, but there might still be some resonance with those acts in its essence.

MG: You played Best Kept Secret in 2014. That must have been a great way to start the day in that beautiful setting. Will you have a similar slot this time round?

TK: Yes, it was! We played pretty early in the day, I guess we were the opener for the day. We were a bit worried that no one would be awake and up for it yet, haha, but it turned out to be an amazing show with a packed tent! I think this time around we’re playing a bit later in the day, hope that works out well too!

MG: You sound like you could be an Irish band. You're not well known here yet but I think you could do well here. Will you be doing some Irish shows in the future?

TK: Haha, an Irish band? I’ve never thought of I Am Oak sounding Irish, I don’t know what that means, but I’m guessing it’s a good thing! We’ve never played in Ireland before and we don’t have anything planned there yet, but it would be lovely to play some shows there in the future, it’s a beautiful country! 

MG: You played The Great Escape in Brighton in 2012 and were selected as Band of the Day. How did that come about?

TK: Cool! I don’t remember that actually! So, I have no idea how that came about, someone in the organization must have liked us! The Great Escape is a great festival. There’s one particular show that sticks out and which is still a fond memory. It was our show at the Unitarian Church, where both the sound and location were amazing. It’s really nice that they provide this kind of platform for unknown bands to have a chance to be seen by lots of people interested in music.

MG: You're a prolific writer. You've done five albums since 2010 and some other projects too. Are you constantly writing? And can you keep up that pace?

TK: The reason I’ve made so many albums and EP’s over the years is that I simply love doing it. I love playing live too, but the best thing about making music might just be creating stuff, I think. It’s such a wonderful thing to create something that wasn’t there before. That gives me so much pleasure.

The writing usually comes in waves, sometimes I’m coming up with new ideas every day and sometimes there’s a period of time in which I’m barely able to write anything. I’ve been very busy with releases and playing a lot of shows the last couple months, so I haven’t had much time to really sit down to gather ideas and write songs, which sucks, because I miss it. Maybe I need to start planning in writing days or something, which is something I’ve never had to do in the past.

MG: Who has been the biggest influence on you musically?

TK: That’s always a difficult question, because there are a lot of different bands in all sorts of different genres that I’ve enjoyed over the years that have left a mark on me in a certain way.

I’m always dropping the same names when I’m interviewed about this, but I always forget to mention Songs: Ohia / Magnolia Electric Co. I was listening to a Magnolia Electric Co. record the other day and I was thinking about how deeply that music resonates with me and how much of it has seeped into my music. Sometimes you don’t realize how important some bands have been to you until you listen to them again after not having listened to them for a while.

MG: Is music a full time occupation for you? Or is that the long term plan?

TK: Yes, it is a full time thing for me, and has been for a while now. I’m busy with I Am Oak and other music projects every day. I’m very grateful that it’s possible for me to do this full time right now and I hope to be able to do this for many, many years to come.

MG: A lot of your songs are short, under three minutes. Is that something you aim for?

TK: It’s something that just happens. I guess I try to make everything as to-the-point as possible. I tend to let the songs be as long (or short) as they need to be and cut away everything that seems unnecessary to me. Sometimes the songs want to be a little bit longer. On the latest album, Our Blood, there are a few songs that are longer than on most I Am Oak albums before that one. The track ‘Your Blood’ almost reaches the seven-minute mark. I was actually aiming for a long song with that one. I don’t know if this is a trend that’s developing in my songwriting, but I’m definitely open for longer songs. We play a live version of the song ‘Palpable’ that evolved into a 10-minute song over time.