Ireland gig guide: Olivia Rodrigo, Kacey Musgraves and all of this week's biggest concerts
Irish music fans are spoilt for choice when it comes to gigs this week, with a slew of high-profile concerts taking place around the country over the coming days.
Global pop superstar Olivia Rodrigo is set to perform two shows at Dublin's 3Arena next week, while country-pop star Kacey Musgraves will also play two gigs across the city at the 3Olympia.
Live Collision Festival
Project Arts Centre, Dublin - Friday & Saturday, various prices
Live Collision International Festival is a genuinely progressive live art celebration that pushes the boundaries of multiple disciplines.
Over three days, the Project Arts Centre features a range of groundbreaking music performances, theatre, workshops and installations.
LCIF2024 highlights diverse voices in contemporary culture with Malik Nashad Sharpe presenting his horror-infused solo Goner, and Ebun Sodipo premiering Vitoria: Buraco, a theatrical piece about an enslaved African trans woman in 17th century Lisbon.
Maïa Nunes collaborates with Diana Bamimeke for a special screening of Lake Burst, while Farah Elle’s Fatima blends North African melodies with Irish musical traditions.
BLACKMAGICRAWR offers a fusion of African futurism and sensual pop, and Harun Morrison leads an Environmental Justice Questions Workshop, shining a light on pressing societal issues. The festival also features DJ sets and public artwork, topping off a vibrant, innovative weekender.
Olivia Rodrigo
3Arena, Dublin - Tuesday & Wednesday, SOLD OUT
With Taylor Swift and Beyonce neck and neck as the two lead characters in global pop culture, Olivia Rodrigo is dominating all other younger pop acts.
Taylor is even facing some heat this week from Olivia fans, who claim her song imgonnagetyouback rips off Olivia’s 2021 song Get Him Back!
But to prove the terminally online Swifties are even deeper into the Stan culture rabbit hole, they’re convinced that Taylor’s song Clara Bow, from her new album The Tortured Poets Department, is about the young singer, as the name Clara Bow rhymes with… Olivia Rodrigo.
Olivia Rodrigo performs onstage for the kick off of GUTS World Tour at Acrisure Arena on February 23, 2024 in Palm Springs, California
(Image: Christopher Polk/Billboard via Getty Images)
All this lunacy just highlights the level of Rodrigo in pop culture at the minute. Three years on from her viral debut single Drivers License, she’s up there.
The former High School Musical star released Drivers License to instant mania when she was just 17.
The uplifting piano-led ballad went six times platinum and was No1 in many countries, and became a defining song of the early decade.
Her debut album SOUR was also a huge hit, of course, a Grammy winner fuelled by energetic pop, power ballads and catchy bubblegum punk.
Her 2023 album GUTS upped the punk guitars, but it’s more Busted and Avril Lavigne than Dead Kennedys.
Vampire is set to be another one of her songs that passes the one billion mark. And even if you just pass a radio at any part of the day, you might hear it.
Rodrigo was one of No Doubt’s big surprise guests at Coachella last weekend, so there’s a genuine feeling of Gwen Stefani passing the torch, but there won’t be too many older heads at the 3Arena for this one.
Tickets to both Dublin gigs ae sold but there are a handful of resale tickets available for Wednesday's show on Ticketmaster.
Perc
The Cellar, Dublin - Friday, €16.95
For years, Perc was leading the charges in the outer reaches of uncompromising techno — all razzled electronics, seismic industrial kicks and warped ghost in the machine vocal nightmares.
But in the last few years the techno arms race has turned extremity into the norm — either in the form of troll-y trance or Eurodance cheese at festivals, or ultra-BPM industrial gabber with every single atom of Detroit soul squeezed out of it.
Perc has recalibrated a bit on his new album The Cut Off, where nosebleed techno is offset by lighter shades.
There’s still plenty of headbutt industrial 4/4s on the likes of Cold Snap and Static, but there’s an eerie dark ambient choral thread through a few tracks.
He’s also thrown a few jokey track titles like Milk Snatcher’s Return, Full Goblin and Imperial Leather — and you might need a lie down with the iconic 1980s da soap after a few hours in Perc’s techno tractor beam.
Tickets for Friday's gig ae available here.
Kacey Musgraves
3Olympia, Dublin - Sunday & Monday, SOLD OUT
We love an international star who leans into the craic when they tour Ireland.
Cue a world of glee when country-pop star Kasey Musgraves went gung-ho girls on tour on a trip to Galway — sharing Guinness pint pics and shots of the Nut Hot Chinese takeaway on her quest for a spice bag.
The Texas singer has been recording since she was a teen in the early 2000s, and got her first break in 2007 on the reality show Nashville Star.
Since then she’s become an outsider in the country scene — deemed too leftfield and depressing for typical mainstream country radio, while attracting a diverse fan base and a string of Grammy wins and nominations.
Kacey Musgraves
She’s also won over crossover crowds with her joyous live shows — notably at Glastonbury and supporting Adele.
With all the country music discourse centred around Beyonce at the minute, Musgraves is probably too straight pop-centric to cause a ripple there, but this show will be a big inclusive celebration.
A small number of resale tickets to Musgraves' Dublin gigs are aviable on Ticketmaster.
Nemzzz
Academy Green Room, Dublin - Tuesday, SOLD OUT
This one’s already sold out, so chances are that Nemzzz could’ve been booked upstairs in the Academy rather than the little basement green room.
It’s an over-14s gig too, so don’t underestimate the power of Ireland’s ever-growing hip-hop scene.
Manchester drill MC Nemzzz has been a big breakout star of the last few years. Drake may be a terminal puke with his carefully-crafted morto online beefs, but he’s got a good eye for shining a light on emerging UK grime and drill stars.
Nemzzz’s new debut mixtape DO NOT DISTURB also features big hip-hop names like Lil Tachty and Headie One, who are still outshined by the young MC, whose soulful beats and introspective rhymes are a breath of fresh Mancunian air.
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