The music of Cardinals has an eerie nature to it. The Irish band, the latest in a long line of recent greatness emanating from the motherland, creates the type of haunting indie rock that looms overhead like a ghost, releasing from the speakers the songs that sound like they’re playing for friends engaging in the type of life activities they’d both be talking about 15 years later.
We might be talking about Cardinals long down the line as well, and their debut self-titled EP, which dropped last month via So Young Records (hopefully name for the greatest of all Suede songs), sets a supernatural tone for the moments that shape up.
“[It’s] a collection of songs that were written when we were living and playing in Cork City,” Cardinals say. “It’s pop music at its core, personal, youthful, and, if you can see past the chaos and noise it’s extremely warm. There’s a narrative if you’ve got the heart to look for it.”
The genre-spanning, layered, and rich record is led by the eager and yearning “Twist and Turn,” a track so frightening in its familiar and comforting nature that its dense tenderness belies its lyrical nature. “[This] is a song about how writing has become a highly therapeutic practice for us all. It’s got some poppy melodies and a danceable backbeat, but the lyrics though, they’re all about grief.”
Absorb it all below.