Ultan’s single, "The Tempest," erupts not so much into the room as it does through the floorboards, dragging with it the scent of wet wool and imminent confrontation. This Dublin solo musician, a cartographer of past agonies, presents an energetic rock piece that feels less like a song about history and more like a fragment of it, throbbing and urgent. The main riff careers...

There is a strange gravity to those who seem entirely unbothered by the weight of expectation. They move through rooms with a careless grace, leaving a trail of minor disruptions that somehow only add to their charm. It is a phenomenon well documented in the annals of pop culture, from the brooding rebels of mid-century cinema to the unkempt guitarists of the early two-thousands indie sleaze...