The Sun broke new ground recently when Claire Tully appeared as the newspaper's first Irish topless model. As it turns out she's also planning to do a PhD at Oxford.
TERRY EAGLETON, English professor at Oxford University, has just published The Truth About The Irish. But is it fact or fiction?
NIALL STANAGE investigates. Pics: Cathal Dawson.
Staying true to their post OK Computer resolution to minimise touring to a bare but intimate handful, Oxford’s most revered sons have chosen to play one single English date in 2001...
In 1994 Radiohead were unliked and unlikely Oxford outcasts (Radiohead? Crazyhead? Birdland?) who’d scored a flukey hit stateside with ‘Creep’. A year later they were the indie nerd’s answer to Oasis as the best band to come out of the UK since The Smiths.
They’ve got a killer dress-sense but there’s more to Mr. Hudson And The Library than spiffing threads. For one thing, they’re surely one of the first hip-hop acts fronted by an Oxford graduate.
If you were to look up the meaning of the word weld in the Oxford English Dictionary you'd find: *Weld v. unite (pieces of esp. heated metal etc.) into solid mass by hammering or pressure*. There's more of course, but that basically wraps it up.
It also wraps up Neil Young ... Crazy Horses' new double live album. A merciless wall of noise, Weld is all about guitars. Very loud guitars. It's also about chaos, albeit chaos in perfect motion, chaos in full flights, majestic, marauding - Weld in chaos, in control.
Semiotics: a branch of linguistics concerned with signs and symbols - Oxford Concise Dictionary
"Sex is largely a matter of semiotics, a language of signs which the body learns, the artful projection of an artful self.
Pornography, n, explicit description or exhibition of sexual activity in literature, films, etc., intended to stimulate erotic rather than aesthetic feelings; literature containing this.
Oxford English Dictionary
Belfast-based novelist Jo Baker has once again become the subject of much attention in literary circles with the publication of her powerful and compelling second novel The Mermaid’s Child.
The most brilliantly outspoken mind in rock’n’roll, or just a mouthy Sheffielder who says mean things about Johnny Borrell? As the second REVEREND AND THE MAKERS album hits the shelves, Celina Murphy chases down the ever-intriguing Jon McClure.
Why do so many people hate manchester united? stuart clark thumbs through two new books which suggest that there s more to ABUism than just plain envy.
THERE S NOTHING I enjoy more after leaving Hot Press than to go home, loosen my cravat and indulge in a good nutty shag. However, it is increasingly the practice of the working classes and newly-moneyed to pour scorn on such manly pursuits. The days of a public school education automatically earning one respect are, it appears, at an end. The landscape would be unbearably bleak were it not for The Chap, a new gentleman s quarterly which has become quite the rage in polite society.
Dublin art-rockers Rollers/Sparkers are currently earning critical garlands for their debut EP, Geography For The Leaving erudite band member, John McMahon, here holds forth on the local music scene and forsaking academia for rock’n’roll.
The biggest obstacle to Belfast becoming the European City Of Culture may be the reluctance of its own people to accept that it deserves the title. Colin Carberry reports
“I had travelled with celebrities before, but I had never seen anything like this. Everyone – everyone – stopped in their tracks when they caught sight of Ali . . . each pair of eyes stared at him, each mouth silently formed the word ‘Ali.’“ – Bob Greene, 1983.
Despite the continued absence of Phil 'The Power' Taylor, the Embassy World Darts Championship at Frimley Green made for essential viewing. BARRY GLENDENNING reports.
Artist Michael Landy - this year's favourite for the Turner Prize - tells Kim Porcelli about the two-week process of destroying all that you can leave behind
With a growing reputation for exuberant live shows that has seen them banned from no fewer than four London venues and rumours that they ve turned down a #1 million record deal, symposium are not your orthodox wannabes, as john walshe found out.
In the final installment of his analysis of the likely ramifications of ASBOs, The Whole Hog concludes that the measures are likely to chiefly penalise the most vulnerable members of society.
Vampire Weekend, the preppy Ivy Leaguers whose Afro-beat references indie pop, talk about instant fame, their fondness for nice trousers and class politics in America.
Based in Glasnevin and founded by producer Mark Hadfield, businessman Chris Hehir and Brian McFadden, Chilli Studios proves that home digital recording hasn't yet usurped state of the art commercial studios.
When THE JIM ROSE CIRCUS comes to town, some very strange people want in on the act. STUART CLARK met them and ended up talking about body piercings, glass eating, and the legality of public displays of female genitalia. Pics: CATHAL DAWSON.
One of the star attractions of Bud Rising, Badly Drawn Boy – AKA Damon Gough – explains his special connection with audiences in this country and his grudging regard for pop talent shows on the box words Tanya Sweeney
East Timor is a small island close to Indonesia. Invaded in 1975 by its much larger neighbour, in the intervening years almost one third of its population has been wiped out in an ongoing campaign of international terrorism and genocide. The arms being used to terrorise this small island are being supplied by Britain. Report: LIAM FAY
Mr. Hudson talks about his mentor Kanye West’s Taylor Swift meltdown, the challenges of hanging with the hip-hop elite when you’re a skinny white guy from Birmingham and why the death of Auto-Tune is greatly exaggerated.
They've ditched the tweed and taken their music in a darker direction. The Young Knives talk about Gilbert and George, the Mercurys and Thom Yorke's seaside hideaway.
We love ’em and we hate ’em but ads have a bigger impact on our lives than we might ever care to admit. Billy Scanlan hears a defence of the mart sell from award-winning ad creator Des Creedon.
In the wake of Steve Staunton’s sacking as Ireland manager, Eamon Dunphy welcomes Craig Fitzsimons into his Ranelagh home and offers some characteristically forthright views on the state of Irish football.
Imogen Murphy talks to Trinity-educated journalist Hugh Miles, author of Al Jazeera: How Arab TV News Challenged The World, a new book which takes a behind-the-scenes look at the controversial TV station – and arrives at some surprisingly positive conclusions.
Maureen Bolger's son Darren committed suicide in 2003, at the age of 16. This tragedy inspired her to create Teen-Line Ireland to assist other young people at risk.
The author and former Conservative MP on clashing with Ian Paisley, shaking hands with Gerry Adams, sex and drugs in the house of commons, what Margaret Thatcher did and didn’t know about her closest aides and why kissing and telling on John Major is justified
Going on the road with Chris Rea was a once in a lifetime opportunity for Derry blues virtuoso Paul Casey. Here he opens his tour diary to Hot Press readers.
Senate leader Donie Cassidy, a reluctant interviewee, opens up about his rivalry with Fianna Fail colleague Mary O'Rourke and reminisces about his days in the show-band business.
Hot Press crime correspondent STUART CLARK
preaches zero tolerance to MASSIVE ATTACK and in return gets the
lowdown on their new album, Bruce n Tarby-style hobnobbing with Radiohead, and why Bristol City piss all over Bristol Rovers
If it wasn't for the attentions of the gutter press, NICK HORNBY's current lifestyle would be pretty much blemish-free. His new novel, About A Boy, is racking up the sales figures with Overmars-like speed; he's just sold the film rights for it to Robert De Niro for #1.8m; and to cap it all, his beloved Arsenal are poised to do the league and cup
double. Tape: STUART CLARK. Pix: Mick Quinn
A brief encounter with Dido – author of multi-million-selling debut album No Angel and brand-newie Life For Rent – not to mention one of the nicest popstars you’re ever likely to meet.
whinging, yak-herding and masturbating over the sunday dinner are just three of the tenuously-related subjects that come up for discussion as stuart clark gets completely wireless with radiohead plankspanker from hell colin greenwood.
The most famous beards in rock 'n' roll are back with a new album that's guaranteed synthesiser-free and hotter than a Tex-Mex jalapeno pepper. As ZZ Top do a John Major and return to basics, DUSTY HILL tells STUART CLARK about the danger of eating chili-dogs, what he used to get up to under the bed-clothes as a kid and the nature of his relationship with long-horned steers.
Over the past decade or so, Will Self has remained one of the most fascinating, infuriating and downright provocative writers in contemporary literature. Now, following the publication of his typically inventive and challenging new book, Dr Mukti and other Tales of Woe, the perennially combative author gives Hot Press the low-down on the perils of psychiatry, his relationship with ultra-controversial artist Sebastian Horsley, and that memorable showdown with Paul Merton on Room 101.
EDDIE IRVINE is Ireland s leading sporting playboy. The Grand Prix driver is a multi-millionaire whose taste for the extravagant runs to owning a private jet, a yacht and around ten cars. Here, the ladies man of Formula One talks to NIALL STANAGE about sex, drink, drugs, rock n roll oh, and driving.
DAVID GRAY’s sell-out December gig at Dublin’s Point Theatre was an intense, emotional affair.
NIALL STANAGE reports on a remarkable night and offers a personal perspective on the singer-songwriter’s journey
Former London Mayor Ken Livingstone talks about toffs in politics, Tony versus Gordon and sheds light on his own intervention in the Troubles, at the height of the bloodshed.
As a long time acquaintance of Pete Doherty, Steve Cummins was looking forward to a fly-on-the-wall seat on the Babyshambles tour bus for the band’s five day jaunt around Ireland. But no-shows, court appearances and the attentions of one Johnny Headlock gave him a rather different perspective on the Doherty circus.
Jape and Lisa Hannigan may inhabit opposite ends of the musical spectrum but their careers have followed remarkably similar paths. On the road together in the UK, he talks about bagging the Choice Music Prize and she discusses her dramatic split from Damien Rice
London has long been recognised as one of the world's leading centres of entertainment and musical excitement - not to mention pleasure in all its multifarious manifestations. But when you really need it, do you know where to find it? Fay Wolftree brings you the insider's inside guide to Europe's premier rock 'n' roll metropolis.
The pen behind "My Beautiful Launderette" and "Sammy and Rosie Get Laid", HANIF KUREISHI has been treated as an outsider in his home, Britain, and as a traitor by some elements within his own race. But, he maintains, it's the job of the writer to "stir the shit" - and now he's got the fundamentalists in his sights. Interview: OLAF TYARANSEN
Billed as the publishing event of the century, Crossing The Threshold Of Hope by Pope John Paul has already netted its author an advance of $10 million and is currently topping bestseller lists the world over. LIAM FAY wades through this extra helping of papal bull and comes to the conclusion that His Holiness is now, certifiably, as crazy as a shithouse rat.
There is only one way to combat AIDS and that is to resist it - with information, education, safer sex, condoms, awareness, agitation and solidarity. We're all in this together - and we're in it for the long haul. Report: Liam Fay.
They may be about as prolific as giant pandas, but now the waiting is over. The mighty LEFTFIELD are back with their first new material in almost five years - the new album Rhythm And Stealth - and it looks set to have the same genre-redefining impact as their debut long-player Leftism. BARRY GLENDENNING talks to mainman PAUL DALEY about media critics, professional jealousy, John Lydon, banned videos and that Guinness ad.
Television s best-known wearer of colourful jumpers turned Conservative politician has reinvented himself yet again this time as a writer of credible fiction. PETER MURPHY hears the nice Tory s vice story. Pix: CATHAL DAWSON
1 guitar + 1 drum kit + 1 boy + 1 girl = The White Stripes. In other words, sweet, sweet noise meets the best brother and sister penned pop since The Carpenters. Eamon Sweeney meets Detroit's finest, who play Dublin Castle on Saturday, May 4th as part of the Heineken Green Energy Festival
When The Wind That Shakes The Barley, Ken Loach’s dramatisation of the Irish War of Independence, won the Palme D’Or at Cannes last month, it triggered a vociferously hostile response from right wing British pundits, who branded the director as a terrorist-sympathising Commie. Few of them, however, had actually seen the film.
The release of Born may confirm that hothouse flowers are back to their blooming best, but as john walshe discovers, liam, peter and fiachna have a few vinyl skeletons in the closet. Readers of a nervous disposition are advised to proceed with care.
From small-time ramshackle punk'n'Irish troubadours to 'international touring act' in the space of six incident-packed years, The Pogues have not only produced music to consistently surprise and delight - they've put it in the charts too! With the help of band members Phil Chevron and Jem Finer, Bill Graham examines The Pogues' enigma in advance of the outfit's impending Christmas single 'Yeah, Yeah, Yeah, Yeah, Yeah' (phew!) and their seasonal show at The Point Depot in Dublin.
RADIOHEAD are just about to release one of the most uncompromising and controversial records of the year in Kid A. As the band prepare for their upcoming Irish dates, mainman THOM YORKE talks about the genesis of a record that seems destined to divide rock fans for years. Not to mention Bono, Britney and Alicia Silverstone! Interview: DAVE FANNING
As the founder of Island Records Chris Blackwell can claim a unique role in the evolution of popular music. He pulls up a chair and shoots the breeze about his Jamaican heritage, his relationship with Bob Marley and taking power-lunches with U2.
The release of Born may confirm that Hothouse Flowers are back to their blooming best, but as John Walsh discovers, Liam, Peter and Fiachna have a few vinyl skeletons in the closet. Readers of a nervous disposition are advised to proceed with care.
Over the past twenty-five years, attitudes and experiences in the North’s two biggest cities, Belfast and Derry, have been markedly and vitally different. To understand why may help us to define both the opportunities for and the obstacles to peaceful change. Report: BILL GRAHAM
ave Fanning: We just played "Wild Things Run Free" (sic) and as you say yourself you are "back in the harness". Now, except for the vocals would it be a fair assumption to call the music on the new album pop with a rock steady beat?
It’s Christmas, time for some of the leading lights of the Irish musical family to return from far-flung stages and convene for a traditional evening of reflection, revelation, conversation, merriment and, well, gargle. The guests: Glen Hansard and Colm Mac Con Iomaire of The Frames, Gemma Hayes, Mundy and David Kitt.
He s the editor of Private Eye, a regular on one of television s most populAr shows and he got his big career break from Peter Cook. Notwithstanding all those bruising court battles, IAN HISLOP has more reasons than most to be cheerful. Interview: BARRY GLENDENNING.
A veteran of conflicts in Nicaragua, Somalia, Lebanon, Rwanda, Algeria and the former Yugoslavia, Lara Marlowe is currently best known to readers in Ireland for her compelling and humane reports from Baghdad for the Irish Times. On the eve of what was being billed as a potentially decisive battle for the city, she spoke to Peter Murphy by satellite phone about war and journalism, her personal circumstances and why she believes the invasion of Iraq could still end in catastrophe
His brother, John Bruton, was the leader of Fine Gael and served as Taoiseach. Now, Richard Bruton is a key member of the opposition front bench. Would he have anything different to offer if he was Minister for Finance?
In the first of a new series about life at the rock n roll coalface, musician and writer Peter Murphy recalls the night the devil wrecked all his best tunes. Confessions Of A
Rock n Roll
Survivor
From Dickie Valentine to The Darkness: Andy Darlington dusts the five decades of Christmas records and chats to Slade's Noddy Holder about his haunting ghost of Chris- singles Past.
He's been described as the 'intellectual powerhouse of Fianna Fail'. As the party goes into electoral meltdown special advisor to the Taoiseach turned Junior Minister Martin Mansergh talks about George Lee, the Government's unpopularity and the prejudices faced by a member of the Anglo-Irish community who dared go into politics.
For close to twenty years, MARTIN CAHILL led the forces of law and order a merry dance. Known as the General, he was suspected of masterminding virtually every major crime committed in Ireland – but for as long as matters, the Gardai had been unable to pin anything on him. And when he was brought to court on petty charges, he posed outside for press photographers, dropping his trousers to reveal a pair of Mickey Mouse boxer shorts. Last week, however, the game was cut brutally short when Cahill was blown away within 100 yards of his South Dublin home by an IRA hit squad. Report: NEIL McCORMICK.
An ex-con, a foe of The Krays and a man capable of such acts of violence that he once sliced off a prison guard s ear, Mad Frankie Fraser now makes quite a nice living for himself spinning yarns about his gangster years. Stuart Clark interrogates him about prison, drugs, the IRA, Arsenal and a novel theory on Veronica Guerin s murder which, Fraser insists, the Irish media haven t had the bottle to print. Mugshots: Cathal Dawson
Anti-capitalism, political fundamentalism, life after September 11 and what to tell the kid who has only two stripes on his tracksuit - the celebrated no logo author tells Hotpress about how best to beat the brand.
He may well be RTE s only living intellectual but ANDY O MAHONY, host of The Sunday Show, will long be remembered by many as the man who asked Deirdre Purcell if she ever did the bold thing with Gay Byrne. JOE JACKSON gets the self-styled closet determinist to come out of the closet. Pix: Colm Henry
On the eve of the release of Snow Patrol's epic fifth album A Hundred Million Suns, Hot Press finds out how singer Gary Lightbody gets inspiration for his songs.
With Cameron Crowe s Almost Famous putting rock hackery on the silver screen, no less, Peter Murphy wonders if Seventies rock journalism is the new rock n roll. Helping him with his enquiries: PAUL MORLEY and GREIL MARCUS
Journalist, essayist, atheist, author and, above all, agent provocateur, Christopher Hitchens has not shied away from controversy over the last 30 years. But in his new book, the writer takes on his biggest adversary to date – God.
U2 manager Paul McGuinness is among the most powerful players in the music industry. To coincide with the DVD release of U2’s classic ZOO TV Live From Sydney, he talks candidly about his relationship with the band and their controversial decision to move part of their business empire to the Netherlands in order to lower their tax burden.
Long before boomtime Ireland there was boomtown Ireland, a country where the national symbol was not a tiger but a rat. to coincide with the release of the best of the boomtown rats, Bob Geldof looks back to the tepid Irish scene of the mid-’70s from which the rats emerged, biting, snarling and laughing, to take on the establishment, Britain and, almost, the world.
Niall Stokes draws on his best-selling book Into The Heart: The Stories Behind The Songs Of U2 to offer a unique insight into the way in which some of the greatest songs in the history of popular music came into being.
The future is here. Well, somehow it always is. And, as usual, it is both familiar and strange. Nothing seems to change, but one day you turn around, it is 1995, and you are cybersurfing on the internet, summer seems to last all winter, ambient-acid-techno is bubbling away on the radio, your fax machine shows up on the Antiques Roadshow and papa’s got a brand new drug.
Three special singles made for much pre-release hype, and the remix commissions (EMF, Elastica and Medal to name but three) and soundtracks (Rancid Aliminium, Complicity and There’s Only One Jimmy Grimble) secured since then prove it’s not just the critics that have been impressed by Ian Davenport and Andy Lovegrove.
A worthy and admirable, if less than high-octane biopic of esteemed author Iris Murdoch, Iris is based on her husband's account of their relationship and her eventual struggle with the debilitating effects of Alzheimer's disease.
South by Southwest indeed. Belladonna was conceived when Lanois made a sojourn to Mexico last year, but while the music herein is undoubtedly derived from a border state of mind (the sundown mariachi elegy of ‘Agave’ being a sort of musical equivalent of Marquez’s In Evil Hour), it’s also capable of migrating through various time zones.
Fun, fun, fun! A film about 300 years in the life of a violin? It would be hard to think of a less prepossessing subject for a film - The Drying of the Paint or The Growing of the Grass might at least find a certain cult niche, but this is really putting the audience to the test.
Here's the break-down, region by region, of the results of a new HMV classical music survey. While the results show that Mozart, Beethhoven and Bach are the most pupular, they also vary by region.
Fresh from supporting Foo Fighters in the States, Supergrass roll into Dublin for a brace of low-key gigs in preparation for their Cois Fharraige headline slot.
The 69-year-old Kris Kristofferson walked onto the stage of a packed Point Depot with nobody and nothing but his gee-tar. Although advertised, there was no support on the night, but the songwriter's songwriter didn't need any.
Anyone who’s been living in Dublin for the last decade may recall the moment of shock when they heard that the scruffy kids who used to sing tunelessly outside HMV on Grafton Street now had a record deal. The 747s should inspire similar thoughts, as lead-men Ned Crowther and Oisin Leech used to hawk their wares to drunken punters under the Bewley’s clock at one in the morning every weekend.
Intially conceived as the third single release from Amnesiac, the project gloriously mutated into another 40 minute goody bag akin to the extended Airbag/How Am I Driving? package.
Magnet are right up there with Jeff Buckley and Radiohead, not least because of Johansen’s ethereal, heart-swelling vocals and its perfect coupling with orchestral strings and digitised heartbeats.
Right now, Prince is caught in the twilight zone between tributary minnow and nostalgia act, unwilling (or unable) to advance, yet refusing to plunder the back catalogue for a classic hits roadshow
"Vampire Weekend certainly have one of the best band names I’ve heard in ages, although their music unfortunately proves less exciting than one might have hoped."
Bland pop, dull mainstream rock and generic indie-schmindie are poison. But as the title of their album suggests, Foals have got the rhythmical remedy.
New Irish presenter, Laura Whitmore, was thrust into London's bright lights when she was plucked from obscurity and placed in front of the camera lens six months ago.
Luke Kelly and Brendan Behan had much in common. They were both Dubliners to the marrow, sang a lot, drank a lot and caused more social unrest merely by strolling down Grafton Street than an entire army of Irish "rockers" would achieve in a decade.
Largo is another dazzling display of Mehldau's breathtaking artistry, instantly accessible for its sheer beauty and exquisite musicianship and a daringly progressive musical odyssey with few if any peers or parallels
Supergrass are survivors and don’t we just hate them for it? This has nothing to do with their music, a blokey psychedelia informed by a flair for everyman pop, and everything to do with cosmic justice.
Born in England but of Irish descent, Lucy Gaskell got to learn first hand about the class tensions that followed the War of Independence while preparing for The Big House.
“Why is it/When a man wants a woman he is called a hunter/But when a woman wants a man she is called a predator?”
Dory Previn (‘When A Man Wants A Woman’)
Fabulous, a. celebrated in fable; unhistorical, legendary, incredible, absurd, exaggerated; (colloq.)
marvellous, from fable, a story not founded on fact.
- Concise Oxford Dictionary
Consent1 v.i. express willingness, give permission, agree, (to a thing, to do, that, or abs.); -ing adult, (esp.) homosexual. [ME f. OF consentir f. L CON- (sentire sens - feel) agree]
Oh who is that young sinner with the handcuffs on his wrist?
And what has he been after that they groan and shake their fists?
And wherefore is he wearing such a conscience-stricken air?
Oh they re taking him to prison for the colour of his hair.
GIVE the devil his due , we say. But we don t. A county Carlow priest has spoken of his fears that local teenagers are practising devil worship . Fr Edward Dowling (PP, retired) last month told church-goers in Bagenalstown to be permanently vigilant for signs of involvement in the occult by local youngsters.
On August 22nd the Sunday Independent carried a number of articles attacking Michael D. Higgins for remarks he had made in an interview in Hot Press. One of these articles was by Conor Cruise O'Brien. I want to comment on it.
America may be a conservative place in many respects – but in fact we owe our modern sense of sexual freedom to great American pioneers, from Alfred Kinsey to Annie Sprinkle…
Think you've got them all right? Or maybe you fancy a sneaky peak (you're only cheating yourself you know!). Either way, you've got the questions – we've got the answers....
