The Redneck Manifesto: The How review – Stellar return from Dublin instrumentalists

The Redneck Manifesto celebrate 20 years of instrumental existence with a headline show in Vicar Street on Friday,. In a delicious twist, they are also throwing a launch party for The How, their sixth album and first in eight years.

The Redneck Manifesto have been a fluid collective over the last two decades, allowing members to come and go, move countries and participate in different projects. Perhaps the most notable is Richie Egan’s band Jape, who are the only act to win the Choice Music Prize twice.

The Redneck Manifesto were always the best of a slew of Irish post-rock instrumental bands, which at one point became a little predictable and frequently underwhelming.

The band say The How is "the sound of six people listening and finding the space in which to speak without interrupting". It is a fine achievement, the sound of a band audibly comfortable in their own skin, making The How by far the most accomplished album from The Redneck Manifesto yet.

Recorded in Attica Audio, in Co Donegal, with David and Karl Odlum, and erstwhile Villager and Soak collaborator Tommy McLaughlin, The How sounds beautiful. It is all the better and brighter for mixing at Black Box Studios and a mastering finish by Steve Fallone (The War on Drugs, David Byrne) at Sterling Sound in New York.

Anniversaries aren’t typically supposed to yield new fruit of this quality, so hats off, and happy birthday to the one and only Redneck sextet.