Photo Credit: Peter Eason Daniels
2024 turned out to be the biggest year yet for Galway, Ireland band NewDad, with the release of their debut album MADRA at the beginning of the year followed by a tour and numerous festival dates. Vocalist Julie Dawson even had time to release a debut solo album in that time. Earlier this year the band saw the departure of bassist Cara Joshi and now, down to three official members in Julie Dawson (vocals & guitar), Sean O’Dowd (lead guitar) and Fiachra Parslow (drums), they release their brand new EP Safe.
Entertainer kicks off the latest effort, featuring a good mix of Dawson’s vocals and some hooky guitar riffs. Surprisingly there is ample synth involved in this one, a slight move away from the shoegaze/dreamy indie sound of the album, but hey it works really well. Title track Safe is next up, a more breezy, dreamy track while Puzzle shows off Dawson’s standout vocals working delightfully against O’Dowd’s guitar work.
Be Kind is a gentle end to proceedings and is played in an acoustic style with some added violin towards the end, making it very soft on the ears. ?The four-track EP comes to an end far too soon for our liking – we were surprised that their single Under My Skin didn’t make it onto the tracklist. However this is a great EP from a very exciting band.
There aren’t many tour dates for NewDad over the summer, but we have a sneaky feeling that a tour announcement is on the horizon … we hope so anyway.
8/10
Standout Tracks: Entertainer, Safe
For Fans Of: Softcult, TTSSFU, Lime Garden
Written by: Alan Brown
