Hiva Oa

Hiva Oa is the Belfast-based creative endeavor of Stephen Houlihan, Christine Tubridy and ChrisMcCorry.

The sound merges dark, omnipotent bass variants with aggressive, rumbling drums and guitars to lay the cornerstone for a subdued yet contemplative vocal delivery. The band's extensively spanning musical tastes impact the diversity of the sound, swaying readily from electronic constructs to agitated noise rock and beyond.

Following the success in 2017 of EP mkII (part 1&2) and subsequent touring, Hiva Oa are currently recording their new album and with only a select number of live dates scheduled in 2018, which will give light and space to an experimental trajectory that has long been in the making. This new material will again see the collaboration of Edinburgh members Matthew Collings and Daithi McNabb.

www.hivaoa.co

Press:

'The band's songwriting carries an emotional punch, one driven home by those tender vocals.' - Clash magazine

'Hot for 2017' - Hot Press

'Ones to Watch 2017' - State Magazine

'There's something quite solitary about this...it's one of those records that sounds like it's just out of reach but at the same time it still like to be loved' - BBC 6 Music - Steve Lamacq

'New Artist of the Week' - The Irish Times

'Still sounding distinctly unique, lead track ‘A Great Height’ was a wonderfully promising return, and such expectations are raised even further thanks to the weighty brilliance of new track ‘Seskinore‘...A heavyweight, wonderfully compelling next-step.' - Gold Flake Paint

'Defies genre, intense to the point of almost being tribal' - BBC Ulster (Across The Line)

'mk2 (part 1) wholly confirms Hiva Oa as one of the country’s most compelling acts right now' - The Thin Air

"I think this is really special...this should be tied for the best record in the world this week." (A Great Height) - SOHO Radio

'Music that transports you far away to a weird and wonderful place is rare. The melodic road to somewhere beautiful and new is difficult to find these days, and it’s wonderfully refreshing when a band comes along, arms open wide, willing to take you on the journey with them.' - The Vinyl District

'Evocatively poignant, nostalgic and steeped in melancholia. An interesting and unique debut.' - Fluid Radio

'This whitewashed chorus is the sound of inner dissonance, nothing really to do with the external world of instruments or processing. This is a place of quiet disorder, of serotonin failure. Rapturous when the sharp cracks of snare drum part the ether and echoes and unbalance.' - The Muse in Music

'Hiva Oa stick to the shadows, erupting into a rolling thunder before coming to a hush once more.' - The List