Soulless, heartless, deafeningly loud, and polluted throughout by a hideous neo-Goth soundtrack, Queen Of The Damned is visibly aimed at the sad-and-morbid Marilyn Manson fringe of teenage tossers
Delving into myriad genres, The Good, The Bad & The Queen have created an album that is more texture than tune led, unsettling, almost unsure of its footing and yet hugely rewarding.
How Katie Jane Garside left Daisy Chainsaw, got lost in nature and found her way back to music with a new attitude and a new name queen adrenna. By Colm O'Hare
He's shot U2 and Madonna and numerous nudes, formulated an "aesthetic of the dick", published the perfect magazine and, most recently, hit the headlines for endeavouring to make the Queen of England look "really fresh". He's Rankin Waddell, co-founder of Dazed And Confused and probably the most renowned fashion, music and pop culture snapper on the planet
THE ADVENTURES OF PRISCILLA, QUEEN OF THE DESERT (Directed by Stephen Elliot. Starring Terence Stamp, Hugo Weaving, Guy Pearce, Bill Hunter, Sarah Chadwick)
The 12th annual Miss Alternative Ireland competition took place last week at Dublin’s Olympia Theatre. A host of entrants – of all genders! – came to see who would follow in the shoestraps of last year’s winner Miss Heidi Konnt. The judging panel included Anna Nolan, Brendan Courtney and Mick Wilson and they gave the crown to Funtime Gustavo – who here tells how she came, saw and truly conquered. Photos by Cathal Dawson
She spent years struggling with bit-parts and support roles. But now Naomi Watts is a Hollywood player, in the same league as her friend Nicole Kidman.
Debbi Peterson of '80s pop act The Bangles talks about supporting Queen at Slane, surviving an embarrassing moment on the David Letterman show and drumming with Spinal Tap
Neil Young is God, the Riot Grrrls are a cod and Hot Press is the greatest music magazine in the Northern hemisphere. So says Monica Queen of ‘hard alternative country rock band’ thrum. Interview: Patrick Brennan.
He may be trained to kill, but recently James Blunt has been seducing vast swathes of the population with his poignant love songs. Lured to the Hot Press Chat Room, he tells all about his number one album, the Queen, being shot at in Kosovo and lesbian swim parties.
Former Smiths drummer Mike Joyce talks about playing Dublin back in the day with Morrissey and co, his hugely impressive list of musical collaborations, and the joys of life behind the kit.
A chick-flick with attitude, a delicious comedy that’s become a phenomenon in the States, and a journey into the hellish world of teen girl bullying – there are plenty of good reasons why Mean Girls is one of the movies of the year.
Scandinavian alterna queen Stina Nordenstam is determined to keep the hype to a minimum and let her music do the talking – and so far the plan is paying off in spades.
Hear this man carelessly and distractedly humming to himself, in the bathroom mirror: “And if a double-decker bus/crashes into us/To die by your side/ Such a heavenly way to die/ And if a ten-ton truck/Kills the both of us/To die by your side/ The pleasure and privilege is mine.”
There’s a moment in this decidedly odd, nay Heller-esque drama, when eccentric violinist Ismael (Amalric) bemoans the quality of his dreams to his Jungian therapist, annoyed that the ladders witnessed during his slumbers are merely the result of his subconscious working in a cheap allusion to the Yeats’ poem The Circus Animals' Desertion. “It’s tragic dreaming about translation problems,” he sighs.
With her superb new album Kelly’s Heroes, SANDY KELLY has established herself as Ireland’s undisputed Queen of Country Music. She has also consolidated her status as an international star of the highest calibre. Report: COLM O’HARE
One of the funniest comedy sketches I ever saw concerned the timelessly naff quality of Queen’s sartorial sensibilities. It was on an Armstrong And Miller show about four years ago, and was set in the year 2040. A guide was taking a group of tourists around a stately home, which was putatively an exact replica of Freddie Mercury’s real life abode. The titular comedians were paid actors playing – for “educational purposes”, understand – Brian May and the late singer, with Ben Miller’s skin-tight leather costume being an especially funny tribute to Mercury’s near-heroically outrageous fashion sense.
The Queen of Zydeco, Boris Bob Dylan Grebenshikov and an erstwhile Rolling Stone were among the unlikely collaborators on ANTHONY THISTLETHWAITE S latest opus, Crawfish & Caviar. COLM O HARE hears more.
Dave Grohl looks back on 20 years of playing music and talks about the birth of his daughter, the trapped Beaconsfield Miners and why Neil Young is his hero.
Ian Hunter, the former voice of MOTT THE HOOPLE, is back with a 38-track Greatest Hits & Rarities double-CD, plus an all-new album, From The Knees Of My Heart, to follow later this year. Now, from where past and present collide, he explains how he once broke into Elvis Presley s Gracelands, how he produced hits for Billy Idol and what it was like to tour with Queen as your support act. He even finds time to tell tales about Marc Bolan, Mick Ronson, and, incidentally, Mott The Hoople too Andy Darlington listens in.
Manic Street Preachers have turned the guitars down, but not the bile. A slimline James Dean Bradfield tells a pleasantly plump Stuart Clark why John F. Kennedy, Billy Connolly and Jesus Christ Superstar are in league with Satan. Or words to that effect.
He’s jammed with Bob Dylan, partied with Keith Moon, sued The Byrds, traded spiky tops with Rod Stewart, had close encounters with Presleys Reg and Elvis and played "name that key" with John Lee Hooker, but arguably the best moment in his life was when he was named small breeder of the year. RON WOOD, the man who would be the queen mum of rock 'n' roll, tells a mean tale.
Words: STUART CLARK. Pictures ROGER WOOLMAN
We asked the members of hotpress.com to submit questions for Korn’s kilt-wearing frontman Jonathan Davis and then locked him in a room with just a spotlight and a tape recorder
Has Madonna become the immaterial girl? Or will the Re-invention tour re-establish her as the foremost female icon on the planet? On the eve of her first ever Irish appearance at Slane, Peter Murphy takes a look at the strange twist the Queen of Pop’s career has taken – and how she is now fighting back, for all she’s worth.
With her stinging one-liners and droll, deadpan delivery, JO BRAND has established herself as the Queen of British comedy. In the run up to her Dublin appearance, she talks about men, booze, cakes and Gary Bushell to LIAM FAY, and explains why she would eventually like to become an MP.
Republic Of Loose are one of the most exciting bands to emerge from Ireland during the last decade with one of the most charismatic lead singers ever to bestride a stage in the country.
Jinx Lennon is a true original, a rock'n'roll outsider whose music throbs to the pulse of rural Ireland. Here he talks about attending cocktail parties with David Norris and explains why Dundalk just might be the strangest town in Ireland.
On the occasion of the Queen of England's golden jubilee, the Sex Pistols re-release God Save the Queen, probably the most controversial record of all time. Why thank you, says her Maj, doubtlessly: exactly what we wanted
Glasgow on the morning of the release of Deacon Blue's second album, "When The World Knows Your Name", is bathed in sunshine boasting a skyline view of the drive from the airport that is in sharp contrast to the image entrenched on the cover of the band's debut album "Raintown". Bright and sharp, the morning reflects the initial impressions of the new record, the bustle of the first rush-hour of the day reflecting the urgency of the opening tracks, "Queen Of The New Year'', "Wages Day" and "Real Gone Kid".
The historical environs of the Tower Of London were a fitting setting for a live performance of what Damon Albarn called “a song cycle that’s also a mystery play about London”.
From Nikki Blonsky’s bravura opening number, the delightfully subversive ‘Good Morning, Baltimore’, Adam Shankman’s musical extravaganza simply never lets up.
The Queen of re-invention is at it again, and this time it’s all about dance music. Co-produced and co-written by Stuart ‘Les Rhythmes Digital’ Price, this album is a creative leap into ‘future disco’ that captures the thrill of the iconic superstar’s earlier hits.
Snax’s Prince-lite is always welcome around these parts, even if ‘Honeymoon’s Over’ – a jerky, jacking, electro-funk rant designed to bring out your finger-wagging inner queen – is a tad irritating. Maybe that’s the point. Konrad Black’s creeping minimal/electro-house remix sits uncomfortably with the vocal.
The Blizzards' rollercoaster shows no sign of losing momentum. This little number is destined to become one of the tracks of the (late) summer. The boys from Mullingar have taken Weezer’s power pop formula, added a dash of Scissor Sisters glam and a pinch of Queen bombast. The result? An instantly catchy tune that will keep their fans sated (just about) until their debut album arrives in the autumn.
The problem facing The Darkness now is surely that, with the element of surprise has gone, the catsuits, falsetto vocals and silly videos are going to have to take second place to the music. Problem? What problem? Yes, you might never again experience the jaw-dropping sensation of hearing ‘Growing On Me’ for the first time but ‘One Way Ticket’ is a solid enough next step, blessed with an obviously bigger budget, the understated touch of Queen producer Roy Thomas Baker and, as they so eloquantloy put it, a big, fuck off rock chorus.
The label which brought us The White Stripes, Electric Six and The Avalanches now treats us to this visionary marriage of melodramatic funk and Queen-like mock operatics.
Apparently, Mika is playing this year’s Oxegen. If he’s to make an impact there, he’ll need to pick up some stage tips. Maybe he should stop listening to Queen and start watching them instead.
Look, these guys are set to be cool this year, so you’ll have to like them, OK? It’s Daft Punk, Chic, New Order, Kraftwerk, Depeche Mode… you know the du jour drill. Except, instead of the usual deadpan ice queen vocals you’d expect from such a venture, there’s a pop heart beating at the core of this record.
The Amy Winehouse camp claim that media reports about her health are “overblown”, and that she has no plans to pull any of her live appearances, which include Oxegen in July.
AS YOU all know by now, the fucking Queen of England and her desperately sad family are experiencing difficult times, due to being completely out to lunch since the 17th century or thereabouts. As you will no doubt see in a minute, this can create particular problems around Christmas time.
It takes an artist of supreme confidence to record an entire album of cover versions. Maria Doyle Kennedy has courage in spades, and Skullcover is a subtly seductive record.
All the trademark Eltonisms are here: the tasty piano fills, the unmistakeable voice, the catchy melodies and lyrics of substance rather than mere frivolity. It could restore him to his rightful position as pop’s queen of tarts.
Is there any other artist in the history of pop music who has used the words “I”, “Me”, “My”, “Mine” with such regularity? No wonder one UK critic was recently moved to describe Alanis Morissette as “the Queen of self-absorption”.
I may be a sucker for girls in drag – hell, I’ll curtsey before Garbo’s Queen Christina anytime – but even my weakness for gender-bending femmes couldn’t inspire much hope for Connie and Carla.
He certainly couldn't be accused of mellowing over the years as solid, guitar driven numbers like 'The Queen of Indecision', 'Liberty Hall' and 'The Ghost of Christmas Past' are delivered with no little passion
In the kingdom of the bards, Kristin Hersh is queen. Taken as a whole, her back catalogue represents one of the most individual bodies of work of the past 20 years. From the crazed manic-depressive clouds which stalked the early Throwing Muses records to the relative serenity of the acoustic solo outings, Hips And Makers and Strange Angels, Hersh's work is stamped with her own idiosyncratic imprimatur.
The received music industry wisdom that Dublin crowds are a soft touch for touring artists got another boost here tonight, as funk/R’n’B queen Kelis came rolling into town in support of her Tasty album
The great and the good where out in force for a rockin' night with live performances by The Flaws, Talulah Does The Hula and Vengeance And The Panther Queen
CARTER USM: "Post Historic Monsters" (Chrysalis)
THERE'S SOMETHING absurdly English and resolutely dependable about Carter USM which always makes me think of them as the indie equivalent to the Queen Mum (God bless 'er).
What an average week for Irish rock. Shane MacGowan in marriage rumours, Brian McFadden explains why he refused to squirt all over Kerry and Bono gets it from the Queen.
I’m dandering down the Strand Road the other night wondering whether Jacky is on in Mullen’s and, if he is, whether the chances of him advancing me another sub to see me through to the weekend are good, bad or indifferent to the circumstances I find myself in following the inexplicable failure of Queen’s Consul to do the business at Southwell, when who do I encounter but three citizens by the names of Robbo Terry, Barricade Joe and Rosemount Tom and all of them with expressions upon their faces suggesting that they are anticipating this very evening an occasion of passionate joy.
From the goodtime vibes of Hot Chip to the full-on sonic assault of Primal Scream, this year's Electric Picnic was even more fab than its predecessors.
Her novels have charmed millions of readers around the world, but in Ireland she remains best known as the Taoseach's daughter. As her third book is published, Cecelia Ahern talks about success, politics and how her parents' separation coloured her thoughts on love and marriage.
She’s been a regular festival goer since she first attended Féile at the age of 14. Gemma Hayes waxes lyrical on the joys of those sprawling, big days out
LAURYN HILL s debut album, The Miseducation Of Lauryn Hill was the fastest selling album ever by a female artist in the United States. What s more it s just garnered her five Grammy Awards, confirming her status as one of American music s most important new icons. OLAF TYARANSEN went to London to hear the singer talk frankly about success, motherhood, the future of The Fugees and her father-in-law, Bob Marley.
COLM O HARE catches up with MARY BLACK, as the singer helicopters her way around the country and talks about her new album, the song writing of Ron Sexsmith and unfair criticism. Pics: PETER MATHEWS.
Roll out the Union Jack and strike up the first verse of Rule Britannia. Al Murray is bringing his pub landlord character back to Dublin. Looking forward to the gig, Murray talks about stripping to his boxers in front of Dita Von Teese and hanging out with Phil Collins and Alex James (while remaining fully clothed).
The National Ploughing Championships are an Irish Institution. mud, beer, wellies, farmerettes, mud, singing priests, yodelling farmhands, mud, tractors and more mud - all human life is here. Lucky sod Jimmy Lacey spent a day amid the furrows. Pix: Cathal Dawson
Fresh from the success of ‘Shrooms, in which she has a leading role, Lindsey Haun shoots the breeze about music, film and growing up as the daughter of a soft-rock legend.
Hot Press celebrates Irish Language Week with a series of features in both English and Irish, as well as interviews with prominent Irish-speaking personalities. Stay tuned for regular updates.
Her international upbringing in Switzerland, Germany and the US influenced her creative tendencies and cultural outlook. “You need to be constantly curious and informed of what is going on in the world”
An overnight sensation after ten years and a theatrical star with no special love of the theatre, Martin McDonagh is a playwright with his eyes set firmly on the big screen.
Interview: Olaf Tyaransen.
With a huge world-wide No.1 album to their credit, Green Day are among the hottest bands on planet earth right now. Their visit to The Point in Dublin was widely anticipated. But would they live up to the promise? Hot Press’ teenage rock aficionado Rolo Black went along to find out…
An overnight sensation after ten years and a theatrical star with no special love of the theatre, Martin McDonagh is a playwright with his eyes set firmly on the big screen.
Interview: Olaf Tyaransen.
He s the man behind Reservoir Prods , a load of Premiership goals and a woozy Robbie Williams. But most he s behind pop songs with big fuck-off choruses , a passion PHIL WOOLSEY extends with his new band NINEBAR
Forget Rod, Emu and gottles of geer david strassman s ventriloquism is the missing link between rock n roll and Bill Hicks. barry glendenning meets the
puppet master. Pix: cathal dawson.
From their earliest days in Gothenburg, WEST OF EDEN have fused Celtic and Scandinavian influences to come up with a unique sound. SIOBHAN LONG met them.
Former British soldier BERNARD O MAHONEY served in Northern Ireland during the H-Block Hunger Strike. Now, he has written a book about the reality of army life for a typical squaddie a reality where ideas of decency, fairness and the rule of law were often left behind. Words: NIALL STANAGE. Pictures: PETER MATTHEWS
After what seemed like an eternity of enduring processed boy/girl band hell, 2003 was the year that pop became exciting again. Finally, we got a long hot summer soundtracked by Beyoncé (song of the year – hands down), 50 Cent’s awesome ‘In Da Club’ and even a band from my own ‘hood whose debut album was the feelgood hit of the season.
In 1996, Liam Fay wrote the definitive a to z of weird sexual practices for Hotpress. We raid the archive to present a selection from that much larger work
Throughout the pioneering events of Band Aid, Live Aid and Live 8, Bob Geldof has repeatedly achieved the impossible, twisting the arms and consciences of self-absorbed rock stars to get them to think beyond their egos and stimulating recalcitrant politicians and a jaded media into doing things that are not really difficult at all but thinking makes them so.
Norman Jay may have been accused of pandering to the establishment when he accepted an MBE – but he’s still fired by a love of the underground, and a desire to change things.
He’s the joker in the Irish music pack, a working class hero who has at once conquered and subverted the mainstream. For his first album in six years JERRY FISH and his MUDBUG CLUB have also roped in some top-tier collaborators including rockabilly queen Imelda May and Carol Keogh.
She came to our attention with a disturbingly convincing turn as a bondage queen. Now Emma De Caunes joins an ensemble cast for a whimsical deconstruction of the Hollywood musical.
Scratch the skin of any Irish chick-lit queen and you’ll find a history of depression, alcoholism, low self-esteem and late blooming – especially if that novelist’s name is Marian Keyes. One of this country’s biggest selling fiction writers, Keyes talks about how she freed herself from poverty-stricken theocratic 1980s Ireland, took a leap of faith and found her voice in print. Not to mention M&M withdrawal, Cecelia Ahern, neo feminism and Anthony Kiedis. Interview: Tanya Sweeney. Photography: Cathal Dawson.
Having come to prominence as a pancaked drag queen in Cowboys And Angels, actor Allen Leech gets to massage canine testicles in Paddy Breathnach’s new film.
Catherine Hardwicke won the Sundance best director award for Thirteen, her controversial and unflinching depiction of teen queen sex, drugs, shoplifting and self-harming. Moviehouse meets the director and co-star Holly Hunter.
From Prince through playboy and baywatch to her current position as queen of the cameo, carmen electra has never been shy about making the most of her assets. But all in the best possible taste, of course, she assures tara brady
Don’t let her steal your heart away!
sheryl crow: Hot Press Readers’ Love Of The Year and Bob Dylan’s favourite singer-songwriter is the hottest new star in rock'n'roll. Helena Mulkerns charts the singular rise of Kennet, Missouri’s most celebrated slacker country queen.
Queen of catharsis as the leader of Throwing Muses, Kristin Hersh raised a few eyebrows with her debut solo album Hips And Makers, a sublimely private collection which made it all the way to the Top 10. Here she explains her approach to songwriting, the emotional extremes she suffers and what it’s like working with The Sexiest Man Alive to NIALL CRUMLISH.
The Smiths: the band who helped re-write the book of guitar rock, the indie darlings who became mainstream legends, the dream of a group which gave the world the unique reality of Morrissey. guitarist Johnny Marr recalls the thrilling heyday of Manchester’s finest.
Could the legal status of E soon change? In the third part of Hot Press continuing investigation into drugs, STUART CLARK reports on the clubbers pill of choice.
Joe Jackson sneaks a peek at Wayne Studer’s new book Rock On The Wild Side, which gender-bends its way through three decades of gay imagery in rock music from Jimi Hendrix’ first kiss to George Michael’s shuttlecock.
Emerging Scottish indie band The Emperor’s New Clothes insist they are not the emperor’s new clothes, as some cynical rock journalists have recently claimed. The Glasgow quintet are one of the new wave of Scottish bands currently hogging the rock limelight.
Having departed from Suede in acrimonious circumstances a decade ago, Bernard Butler is now back working with his artistic soul mate, Brett Anderson, this time in The Tears. And as Anderson tells Ed Power, the duo feel their best work is still ahead of them.
Having been dogged for years by sectarianism, Northern Irish sport has finally found a team that everyone can support. Colin Carberry reports on the phenomenal rise of the ice hockeying Belfast Giants
Genital warts, cherry popping, male pattern baldness, archery and kate moss… it's access and, indeed, excess all areas as hotpress readers subject darkness mainman Justin Hawkins to a thorough probing.
Comfortably ensconsed in his favourite Indian buffet restaurant, Electric 6 frontman Dick Valentine chats to Steve Cummins about the band’s new opus Señor Smoke, time travel, OJ Simpson and Michael Jackson’s impending trial.
Gavin Friday’s been a Virgin Prune and a glam cabaret torch singer, he’s done Brecht and Weill, and most recently stole the show at Hal Willner’s Leonard Cohen tribute concert Came So Far For Beauty.
Having befriended Joe Strummer before the Clash man’s untimely death, artists such as Adam Duritz, Ryan Adams and Shane MacGowan are also now lining up to give kudos to New York singer-songwriter Jesse Malin.
Following in the footsteps of Green Day and Good Charlotte Blink 182 are the latest punk outfit to massively expand their remit and radically alter their direction on their eponymous new album.
The debut solo album from Moloko singer Roisin Murphy embraces the avant-garde end of dance music. But it's still a great pop record. Interview by Peter Murphy.
With a hit Colin Farrell movie to his name, Martin McDonagh mulls over his early rejections at the hand of the Abbey, his "rivalry" with Conor McPherson and his run-in with Sean Connery.
It sounds like a car-crash waiting to happen – a Southern California garage band channelling psychedelic Cambodian pop. In fact, DENGUE FEVER are one of the most beguiling new acts to pop up on the radar recently.
Irony-deficient Nordic rockers Turbonegro are one of the world’s most credible hardcore acts, with a fanlist that includes Queens Of The Stone Age and Therapy?
She may be very sensitive about babies and young people and her ideal bloke might have to be respectful, responsible and Christian – but that don’t mean Kelly Rowland doesn’t want to be bootylicious.
Will Leahy is a busy man. He works full-time as a solicitor. In his spare time, meanwhile, he moves to RTE’s Limerick studios to broadcast his daily programme to the nation.
This fortnight s postbag brings another serious dilemma from an unsigned Irish band. Last year they recorded a demo and it aroused some record company interest.
catherine doherty clambers aboard the Heineken RollErcoaster and joins Revelino, The Nude, Mesner, and Abbaesque for a crazy white-knuckle ride into deepest Munster.
Evan Dando may have very mixed memories of his days with the Lemonheads and hanging out with Kurt and Courtney but with the dark stuff consigned to the past, he’s much happier where he is today.
So they say. And so too was David, who slew Goliath in the bible. In fact, there is ample reason to believe that key characters involved in two pillars of the DUP’s view of the world would be deeply offended at recent remarks by Ian Paisley Jnr in Hot Press.
MAZZY STAR are still going strong, but HOPE SANDOVAL has also got a side project up and running. She tells NICK KELLY all about
HOPE SANDOVAL AND THE WARM INVENTIONS and her collaborations with everyone from The Chemical Brothers to Bert Jansch
STUART CLARK checks out the inside story of L!VE TV, perhaps the daftest tabloid telly station in the world (ever), and wonders how Irish television might follow suit.
Currently ensconced in a recording studio in the wilds of Magherafelt, Edwin McFee sits down with General Fiasco to talk about ambition, Snow Patrol and the fickle finger of fate.
Currently ensconced in a recording studio in the wilds of Magherafelt, Edwin McFee sits down with General Fiasco to talk about ambition, Snow Patrol and the fickle finger of fate.
Harder, faster, louder... Motorhead have been rocking the planet for the past 26 years. As they prepare to do battle again at the Xtreme festival, Lemmy answers your questions. Warts and all
Kevin Rowland, whose Dexy's Midnight Runner's album Don't Stand Me Down has just been re-released in a radically new version tells Stephen Robinson "Never say never" when asked about a possible Dexy's reunion
East Glasgow quartet Glasvegas have nothing to do with the TG4 show. They're the anthemic band discovered by Alan McGee in the same venue he found Oasis.
YOU WON'T GET STRONG ODDS ON THESE
ROMANTIC PAIRINGS HITTING IT OFF IN 1995 BUT THE BOOKIES HAVEN'T RECKONED WITH Hot Press RESIDENT CUPID PROTEGé LIAM FAY DONNING HIS CLERICAL GARB ONCE AGAIN.
Can you see the Forrest for the Gump? Can you explain the cultural phenomenon of Steven Seagal in English plain enough for Seagal himself to understand? Did you recognise any of the actors hiding beneath moustaches in Wyatt Earp, Tombstone and Gettysburg? Are you ready for the fourth annual X-mas rated Blow Up Movie Quiz?
Oh, well, give it a go anyway. Now we separate the movie buffs from the people who have got something more interesting to do than spend all day hanging around cinemas and reading Hot Press. Answers can be found on page 99 but anyone caught peeking will have to live with the knowledge that they are a dirty, rotten, good for nothing, low down cheat. Good luck. And remember, this quiz is just like a box of chocolates . . . you’ll feel sick when you’ve finished.
Kells three-piece Turn are on the crest of a wave, and are about to unleash their rather spiffing debut LP, Antisocial, on an unsuspecting world. John Walshe reports. Suit shoot: Myles Claffey
Wank, bollocks, Chris Evans. These are dirty words.
Pop isn t.
STUART CLARK refrains from ruining their career for long enough to discover whether
IN UTOPIA have got what it takes to become Ireland s next three minute heroes.
Pix: Cathal Dawson.
It's been 33 years since Belfast girl Ruby Murray topped the UK charts with 'Softly Softly'. Since then, the female singers from the North have rarely scored internationally. Dana last hit the top 50 in '79. Newry stomper Clodagh Rodgers wowed Eurovision in '71 with her hot pants and a rendition of the oompah crowd-pleaser 'Jack In The Box'. And, er, that's about
THIS ISSUE'S missive reaches you from my fever-wracked sick bed. The doctor pleaded, the nurse begged, my lover entreated, but I refused to just lie there, terrible though my sufferings be, when there was a column to be written. There are some things intrinsically more important than mere physical well-being. Duty is one of them.
RAY D’ARCY is currently one of the hottest young presenters on RTE Television, featuring in both the madcap context of The Den and the more, ah, serious environment of Blackboard Jungle. He talks to JACKIE HAYDEN.
WHAT IS the connection between The X Files, massive drinking bouts, Man United fans and top ten hits? CATATONIA, that s what. The Welsh guitar popsters are currently nestling in the upper reaches of the charts with their hit Mulder And Scully , and JOHN WALSHE talks to vocalist CERYS MATTHEWS about their meteoric rise to the top.
Five years after the collapse of The Irish Press Group, CON HOULIHAN suffered a fall of his own. Here, he reflects on broken hips, broken dreams and the road to recovery. Interview: SIOBHAN LONG
Unlike most Hollywood remakes, the new version of Hairspray succeeds in being as deliciously camp as the John Waters original. One of its young stars, Amanda Bynes, talks to Tara Brady about the joys of getting hot and sweaty with John Travolta.
Kill Bill is widely seen as a vehicle for director Quentin Tarrantino to express his deep-seated fascination with his favourite leading lady, Uma Thurman. But the character of The Bride – the super-deadly vixen played by Thurman in Kill Bill – is based on the blood-thirsty heroines of a bevy of B-Movies with which modern cinema’s most deadly talent is obsessed. So, as Kill Bill 2 hits the screens, we ask who are these foxy ladies, and what makes them such ruthless killers?
The indie director's female lead of choice (I Shot Any Warhol, The Addiction), Lili Taylor is perfectly cast as a Liquored Up Fuck Machine in Bent Hamer's screen adaption of Charles Bukowski's classic Factotum.
Rising abuse of prescription drugs, often mixed with alcohol, has introduced a deadly new dimension to Northern Ireland's drug problem. Helen Toland reports
Or how a short-term model, aspiring novelist and Indie kitten became a sophisti-cat and lived to twitch her tale. Peter Murphy meets the multi-layered Sophie Ellis Bextor
The Shamcocks did! Well, it is if you’re one of eighteen women – lesbians all – who’ve decided that it’s time to throw off the shackles and bring a new form of alternative entertainment to the highways and byways of Ireland. Prime mover Jude Cosgrove talks to Danielle Brigham.
dEUS are winning over more and more fans with their idiosyncratic, guitar-based songs. NICK KELLY met lynchpin TOM BARMAN to talk about love, loss and famous Belgians. Pics: CATHAL DAWSON.
They were one of the superstars of grunge, a band that did more than perhaps any other – even Nirvana – to bring underground rock and roll to the mainstream. But they lost their way with fan-alienating experimental records and a long-running feud with Ticketmaster. Now Pearl Jam have shrugged off the cobwebs and are back rocking like legends. Ahead of the release of their best album in years they talk about the long-road to rejuvenation, lessons gleaned from Neil Young and their place in the greater scheme of things.
Billy Bragg’s larynx, sexual politics, and Jilly Cooper paperbacks. What’s it all about? NICK KELLY finds out when he beams himself up to the planet DUBSTAR.
With their Eurovision adventure as a focal point, it may have been a strange and unusual year for Dervish – but they've bounced back with a superb new album.
Credited with being a pioneer in the field of confessional singer-songwriting, it is only now, at the age of 55, that JONI MITCHELL is able to talk openly about the private trauma behind the songs on such classic albums as Blue. On the occasion of the release of a new album Both Sides Now, that sees her revisit some former glories, the legendary Mitchell takes JOE JACKSON on a journey through her personal, and professional history.
This is part one of an exclusive two-part interview
LA, Joshua Tree, Alabama, New Orleans . . . Kristin Hersh verbally back-packs her way around the most significant places in her life and career thus far.
Interview: Nick Kelly.
After the release of HSM3, choreographer and director Kenny Ortega tells us why the restrictive family values parameters only inspire him to be more creative.
Sometimes it's hard to be a woman, especially when it involves piling on layers of latex, strapping on corsets, and getting to grips with false eyelashes. And yet, whether it's Kurt Cobain donning a scruffy frock, Robin Williams in full matronly guise for Mrs Doubtfire, or the 6'7 Ru Paul co-presenting The Brits, transvestism seems to have acquired a stronger multi-media allure than ever before. Andy Darlington examines the portrayal of TVs in cinema and the arts, and considers the sexual and social implications of the ancient art of cross-dressing.
She may be one of the biggest r&b stars on the planet, but that doesn’t mean MARY J/ BLIGE is happy with her lot. in one of her frankest
intervews yet, she tells HELEN TOLAND why she’s been given a bad rap
The winds of change have been blowing through Northern Ireland in 1998, with the endorsement of the Belfast Agreement and the establishment of the Assembly. But that only made it more likely that extreme loyalists would portray the march to Drumcree church near Portadown, and the July 12th parades, as an opportunity for Protestants and Orangemen to make a final stand. It was surely shaping up for a season of discontent – until the Quinn brothers were murdered in a loyalist sectarian petrol bomb attack on their home. By Niall Stanage. Photos: Peter Matthews.
Having a right royal laugh at monarchies is all very well in what we loosley describe as the free west, but Olaf Tyransen is alarmed to find it's no laughing matter in Thailand
A homework essay written by Beatle Paul McCartney when he was 10 has just been found, having been lying in Liverpool's Central Library for more than five decades.
At the end of another eventful year, Andrea Corr takes time out to reflect on life, death, love, health, music and her role, off-stage and on, in the family that plays together. Interview: Niall Stokes
Action movie sweetheart and FHM-proclaimed second sexiest woman on the planet Jessica Biel gives us the lowdown on upcoming period rom-com Easy Virtue... and nothing else.
the jon spencer blues explosion
are the hippest, baddest,
sleaziest, sweatiest, sexiest, sickest, noisiest,
in-your-face-est rock n roll
act to come out of America
for a loooooong time.
colm o hare joined them on the road to Manchester.
JACKIE HAYDEN meets a man who claims that the Lost Ark of the Covenant is buried on the Hill of Tara. Oh yes, JOHN HILL also says that he s the reincarnation of the prophet Elijah
Painter, sculptor, composer and, of course, the all-action hero who got everyone kung-fu fighting. Tailor made for a part in Kill Bill, renaissance man David Carradine discusses his eventful life and times.
Despite predictable criticism from certain quarters, Sarah McLachlan’s vision of “a celebration of women in music” has made the touring Lilith Fair one of the hottest tickets in rock in 1998. Tim Perry reports.
Over the past decade in ‘The Hot Press Political Interview’ the subject of Northern Ireland has, not surprisingly, surfaced time and time again. What follows is but a small selection of these quotes, specifically those that look to the future rather than to the past.
Did the MANIC STREET PREACHERS really say that travellers are parasites and express the hope
that Michael Stipe dies of AIDS? STUART CLARK hears the band's side of the story.
PHIL COULTER is far from the muzak-producing bore of caricature. Here, he talks to JOE JACKSON about family tragedy, northern politics, drink binges, having songs covered by Elvis and his experiences working with stars like Van Morrison, Siniad O Connor and Luke Kelly. Portraits: MYLES CLAFFEY
You know that your pop star interviewee is confident about the quality of his splendid new album, when he's happy to talk about everyone else under the sun. So it is with Pet Shop Boy Neil Tennant as he gives the thumbs up or down to Eminem, Liza Minelli, Kylie Minogue, So Solid Crew, Boy George and Westlife. Keeping score: Stuart Clark
She's never been one to pull her punches but even by her standards, Mary Coughlan's latest album is a rollercoaster. Here, she talks about a life of love, loss, pain and redemption.
Discovered that there is life after Brett-pop, that is. nick kelly gets the lowdown from "the bloke who left Suede", Bernard Butler, whose mightily impressive solo debut People Move On, has just been released.
From the tragic death of Cliff the fish to turning Madonna down, praise from Nick Hornby and fanmail from Bono, Badly Drawn Boy ’s life is certainly bewildering.
and that’s before you consider his hellenic aspirations…
Er, perhaps not, but after 25 years of waxing, back-combing and tottering around on six-inch heels, Mr. Pussy has certainly earned the right to call himself ‘Ireland’s Most Misleading Lady’. LIAM FAY gets a lesson in cross-dressing from the man who’s stripped Bono to the waist, offered solace to Charlie Haughey and stuck a hairy appendage under Ringo Starr’s nose. PIX: Colm Henry
Where other bands moan about the music industry or spend small fortunes bringing their stage designs to life, Stereophonics like to keep it nice and simple. Or at least as nice and simple as it gets when you tour with U2, get advice from Prince Charles and see Slipknot with their masks off
Two major London newspapers recently ran large advertisements which contained the most extraordinary injunctions to world leaders - and proposed the direst of consequences should they fail to comply. Under the dramatic headline World News Flash, it was confidently predicted that the world would end on July 25th 1994.But will it? And who is behind this incredible attempt to save us all from imminent extinction? LIAM FAY reports
Japanese tin whistlers, Harlem Gospel singers, Indian mandolin players . . . De Dannan have traded scales and tales with them all. Dermot Stokes catches up with Frankie Gavin and Alec Finn and is entranced as the Michael Palins of pan-cultural playing share excerpts from their ongoing odyssey.
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.
When Alan McLoughlin scored in Belfast on November 17th he not only set the entire country off on an orgiastic rampage but allayed the fears of a pair of filmmakers who’d gambled heavily on Ireland’s qualification of USA ’94. So, it’s happy endings all round as Robert Walpole and Paddy Breathnach of Treasure Films release our official World Cup video The Road To America and detail the trials, tribulations and traumas of the venture to a suitably impressed George Byrne.
As Secretary of State for Northern Ireland, MO MOWLAM M.P. has one of the toughest, most thankless jobs in British and Irish politics. The task facing her is an unenviable one: to bring together the two extremes of both traditions, however briefly, for the purposes of all-party talks. In this exclusive interview, she talks about the difficult journey to date, and the immense challenges which lie ahead of her. Our man who went to Mo:
JOE JACKSON.
Pix: COLM HENRY.
When Richard O' Brien put Dr. Frank' N' Furter into fishnets just over 20 years ago, few could have predicted the cult that would grow up around the Rocky Horror Show. Fay Wolftree genderbenders her way through a history of Transylvanian transvestism.
There s very little torture involved in making a record until it s released and then the audience gets to suffer. PETER MURPHY meets the one and only LYDIA LUNCH.
After an undoubtedly slack 2003, 2004 was the year in which TV comedy once again came into its own. In addition to to further series from Monkey Dust, Peep Show, Little Britain, 15 Storeys High and Curb Your Enthusiasm, there were also excellent new shows in the shape of The Smoking Room, The Mighty Boosh, Nighty Night and Catterick. In particular, the forum for alternative humour provided by BBC3 and BBC4 continued to provide an invaluable creative outlet for the oddballs, misfits and mavericks of British comedy.
Melissa Auf Der Maur, the former Hole and Smashing Pumpkins bassist, on working with Courtney Love and Billy Corgan, and finding her own space in the male locker room. Interview by Peter Murphy.
You might think that the Crash Test Dummies are a strange bunch now but you should have seen them four years ago! Dan Roberts and Mitch Dorge tell Stuart Clark how a big-haired Winnipeg bar band with a penchant for the Clancy Brothers have managed to hit the big time. Pix: Cathal Dawson
Over 2,000 Northern Irish women leave the province every year to have abortions elsewhere usually in England. STUART BAILIE examines the many anomalies in the law on this subject, and talks to some of the people fighting to change it.
He has warts on his face, chemical paste in his blood, viagra in his dick and a heart full of rock 'n' roll. "There are occasions when I do preach temperance," Lemmy tells a startled STUART CLARK Woooooargh! Photography: SIMON ROCHE
Confronted by an autobiography with a dual narrator, Joe Jackson asks the real Ray Davies to stand up and testify on homosexuality, marriage, groupies, the essence of Kinkdom – and the true story of Lola.
The Miss Ireland competition is in its 45th year. Liam Fay went along to the Burlington Hotel final to come to (metaphorical) grips with the assets of Miss Irish Sun Newspaper, among others.
He found the experience deeply embarrassing. Pix: Colm Henry.
Attending the infamously repressed St Peter’s College in Wexford gave a young Colm Tóibín an insight into ‘70s Ireland’s twisted attitudes to sexuality.
Masturbating for charity – it was a new one on us. So whose idea was it? What was the purpose? Who would turn up? And what would happen in real life, when the doors to the Wank-a-thon were finally declared open? There was only one way to get the real SP on what promised to be one of the most bizarre events ever mounted in London. Send for our man Tyaransen: he wouldn’t make his excuses and leave! Or would he?
Martin McCann, lead singer of Sack has been ‘out’ for a number of years now. Here he talks about his homosexuality and its impact on his music. Interview: George Byrne.
The second day of the Music Show brought together James Bond composer David Arnold, Enya producer Nicky Ryan, Christy Moore, Sharon Corr and... The Blizzards
Bum, bottom and crevice may be dirty words but pop certainly isn't as Stuart Clark discovers when he enters the fluffy pink bunny rabbit world of the Lightning Seeds.
Intrigued by the ridicule and bad press being generated by London s Millennium Dome, BARRY GLENDENNING pays a visit to Greenwich and discovers why Tony Blair is having trouble sustaining his massive erection.
The outrageous diaries of the late Carry On star KENNETH WILLIAMS, are now in the bookshops - often unsavoury, irascible, candid and scurrilous, but seldom boring. Williams dishes the dirt on Tony Hancock, Joe Orton, Stanley Baxter, Barbara Windsor, and on his own tortured homosexuality. ANDREW DARLINGTON reports.
Best known as the author of the modern noir classic LA Confidential, JAMES ELLROY is back in the spotlight with his new book The Cold 6000, a factional encounter with late 20th century America.
Here, the straight-talking Ellroy tells why JFK was second-rate and J. Edgar Hoover a fiend, why Bill Clinton is a horrible human being and George W. Bush not as bad as we think, and why Martin Luther King was the greatest American man of the last century
Words: DANNY ILEGEMS
ANOTHER YEAR is upon us. You probably noticed. New Years don’t creep in quietly, they descend with a thud that leaves your head ringing for days (It’s called a hangover – Ed).
After his celebrated band the blades failed to make a breakthrough in the 1980s, PAUL CLEARY more or less turned his back on music for 15 years. But now unexpectedly, he’s back with a terrific solo album crooked town and more than a few tales to tell.
Interview: LIAM MACKEY
She started as a model, carving out a successful career and living the celebrity lifestyle in the full glare of the cameras. With a well publicised stint on reality TV in LA behind her, she is now one of the hottest properties in British television.
They’ll never win any prizes for speaking the Queen’s English but, with a number one album under their belts, mop-topped Dundee rockers The View aren’t too bothered.
In a Hot Press exclusive brian kennedy is interviewed by his friend Pat McCABE. On the agenda: Belfast, religion, Joni Mitchell, The Beatles and the current state of popular music. Pics: Cathal Dawson
To some, he’s the last true socialist left in Ireland. In a forthright interview Michael D. Higgins reflects on Bono's knighthood, expresses his horror at America’s conduct in the Middle East and explains why the PDs are bad for Ireland
To some, he’s the last true socialist left in Ireland. In a forthright interview Michael D. Higgins reflects on Bono's knighthood, and explains why the PDs are bad for Ireland.
In the second and final part of our exclusive interview, JONI MITCHELL tells her story from the ground-breaking Blue to the present day.
Having grown increasingly disenchanted with a music biz providing junk food for juveniles it took the classic songs of Billie Holiday and Etta James to restore her faith and give her own career a new lease of old life. Once a romantic always a romantic, she tells JOE JACKSON
In the second and final part of our exclusive interview, JONI MITCHELL tells her story from the ground-breaking Blue to the present day.
Having grown increasingly disenchanted with a music biz providing junk food for juveniles it took the classic songs of Billie Holiday and Etta James to restore her faith and give her own career a new lease of old life. Once a romantic always a romantic, she tells JOE JACKSON
In the second and final part of our exclusive interview, JONI MITCHELL tells her story from the ground-breaking Blue to the present day.
Having grown increasingly disenchanted with a music biz providing junk food for juveniles it took the classic songs of Billie Holiday and Etta James to restore her faith and give her own career a new lease of old life. Once a romantic always a romantic, she tells JOE JACKSON
In the second and final part of our exclusive interview, JONI MITCHELL tells her story from the ground-breaking Blue to the present day.
Having grown increasingly disenchanted with a music biz providing junk food for juveniles it took the classic songs of Billie Holiday and Etta James to restore her faith and give her own career a new lease of old life. Once a romantic always a romantic, she tells JOE JACKSON
Heineken/Hot Press Awards presenter ULRIKA JONSSON offers her thoughts on fame, comedy, motherhood, relationships, loyalty and the media A? as well as a very final word on Stan Collymore. Interview: BARRY GLENDENNING.
The ace bass in the STONE ROSES and PRIMAL SCREAM, MANI is the living embodiment of the concept of largin it . In Ireland to dee-jay and hang out, he sinks a few beers and offers his uniquely colourful thoughts on music, Man U, drugs, Thatcher, Reagan, Blair and Bill Clinton s blow-jobs. Interview: EAMON SWEENEY.
He's the Hollywood enfant terrible who refuses to mellow with age. In a rare interview, John Waters talks about the aesthetics of trash, and looks back on his career.
Saturday, July 13th, 1985 will go down in history as Live Aid Day, the extraordinary culmination of Bob Geldof's attempts to mobilise the international music industry behind urgently-needed famine relief in Africa. Among the stellar cast performing for 72,000 people at Wembley Stadium, London are U2, a band determined to rise to the occasion. Report: Neil McCormick
The mainman in Tenacious D and scene-stealer in High Fidelity, Jack Black is now at the heart of a box-office phenomenon in School of Rock. But who does he really want to be – Laurence Olivier or Ronnie James Dio? Tara Brady asks the tough questions.
“All men are bastards” Country star trisha yearwood firmly believed – until she met the one who would become her husband. Here, she talks to Joe Jackson about how her marriage to Robert Reynolds of The Mavericks has changed the way she looks at the opposite sex. She also discusses her rivalry with LeAnn Rimes, and the darker side of the Nashville country ’n’ western scene.
Pix: Cathal Dawson
As the CEO of YouTube, Chad Hurley has been lauded and criticised for the video-sharing site's content in almost equal measure. Paul Nolan speaks with one of the world's richest men.
Having released his debut album to little recognition at home in Ireland. Perry Blake's career unexpectedly gathered momentum in continental Europe. Whilst he remains little more than a cult figure in his native land. These days in France it's all deification by La Monde, movie soundtracks and policy debate with the Culture Minister. "Part of me is thinking, oh fuck I hope it doesn't do a David Gray" Perry Blake.
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.
Determined to establish a firm identity for their second album, A House forsook exotic locations and took themselves off to Inishbofin to record I Want Too Much, musically and emotionally their starkest statement to date. Bill Graham met up with them to discuss their new-found assertiveness and discovered a band with a single-minded approach to the music industry and its numerous pitfalls
How did Brandon Flowers, Ronnie Vannucci, Dave Keuning and Mark Stoermer go from the Las Vegas dive bar circuit to selling four million copies of their debut album, Hot Fuss? On the eve of the band's highly-anticipated Oxegen 2005 appearance, Stuart Clark talks to the people involved in the making of The Killers.
He was soccer s hardest man. Now he s in the process of becoming a genuine Hollywood star. Here VINNIE JONES talks to STUART CLARK about being mates with Madonna and Brad Pitt, his years with the Crazy Gang, and why he dislikes Johnny Giles
Despite being peerless at his chosen profession, CHRIS MORRIS has been sacked from more jobs than most people will have in a lifetime. He announced the death of Michael Heseltine on live radio, was responsible for a debate about non-existent drugs in the House of Commons and once screamed Christ s fat cock! at Cliff Richard during an interview. BARRY GLENDENNING examines the career of the broadcaster commonly regarded as Britain s foremost media satirist.
The actor, director, novelist and husband of Uma Thurman on the thrill of being a non-specialist and the challenge presented by "the greatest adventure you can have" - being in love
Although arguably the outstanding female country artist of her generation, Emmylou Harris has always distanced herself from the Nashville
mainstream. From early recordings with Gram Parsons and Bob Dylan through to her most recent Daniel Lanois-produced album Wrecking Ball, her work has been characterised by a maverick spirit and real fire in the belly.
PETER MURPHY caught up with her in Dublin.
STUART CLARK meets man-of-the-moment NORMAN COOK (aka FATBOY SLIM). On the agenda - tabloid intrusion, drugs, his love affair with Zoe Ball, and The Housemartins.
A former drug dealer, he’s been shot at nine times and lived to tell the tale, emerging as one of the most controversial and uncompromising figures in rap. But there's more to 50 Cent than the popular legend suggests. For a start, there’s a new commercial edge to the music, as his US and Irish number one album The Massacre demonstrates. Plus, as one of the new faces of Reebok’s ‘I Am What I Am’ campaign, he’s taken to the role of cultural icon with considerable zest. Oh, and besides, he’s a bit of a wow with the ladies.
Is football hooliganism really the new rock ’n’ roll and should little boys be wearing Boot’s No.7 blusher? Stuart Clark fears for the moral wellbeing of the nation’s youth as Manic Street Preachers wage holy war against MTV, Take That, Kate Moss and poor old Gerry Ryan.
Pix: Cathal Dawson.
phish
are a bone-fide American underground phenomenon who have gone overground in a very big way. Word of mouth rather than record company hype, initially made their reputation Stateside and now they can boast of chart success,
mega-audience attendance and their very own devoted following of Phisheads. But is Europe ready for the 90s equivalent of The Grateful Dead extended jams, waccy baccy, patented ice-cream flavours and all?
peter murphy
investigates.
Darina Allen, eat your heart out. New York chef ANTHONY BOURDAIN has done it all, from chopping out lines to chopping off fingertips, along the way dealing with the Mafia, Madonna, a dead man in a freezer and the palpitating heart of a cobra. STUART CLARK hears about cooking as rock'n'roll. CATHAL DAWSON serves up the pictures
IAN STRACHAN was jailed for blackmailing a member of the Royal Family over allegations of a sex and drugs ‘scandal’. But a media blackout ensured that little of the substance of the case was reported.
Over the hills and far away, Chumbawamba come out to play! They get knocked down. But they get up again. They get dropped by Indie One Little Indian, and then get signed up by Capitalist major EMI. Then the Tub-Thumpers Anonymous go on to score the most unlikely hit single of 1997. So what now for Alice Nutter and her chums? ANDY DARLINGTON reports.
Over the hills and far away, Chumbawamba come out to play! They get knocked down. But they get up again. They get dropped by Indie One Little Indian, and then get signed up by Capitalist major EMI. Then the Tub-Thumpers Anonymous go on to score the most unlikely hit single of 1997. So what now for Alice Nutter and her chums? ANDY DARLINGTON reports.
MORE PEOPLE SMOKE IT IN THE UK THAN GO TO CHURCH, THE AMERICAN LAW JUDGES ADMIT THAT IT'S THE SAFEST THERAPEUTICALLY ACTIVE SUBSTANCE KNOWN TO MAN BUT STILL THE WAR AGAINST CANNABIS RAGES ON. OLAF TYARANSEN EXAMINES THE VESTED INTERESTS WHICH STAND IN THE WAY OF ITS LEGALISATION.
Yes, you've read that headline somewhere before! But referendum on the Belfast Agreement gets into full swing in the North. Diary: NIALL STANAGE. Pix: peter matthews
Yes, you've read that headline somewhere before! But referendum on the Belfast Agreement gets into full swing in the North. Diary: NIALL STANAGE. Pix: peter matthews
His career was almost over before it began. But hard work - and a surprise hit - have turned Edmund 'Mundy' Enright into one of Ireland's most widely adored stars. Here he reflects on some of the high points of what has been an amazing journey, during the course of which he has rubbed shoulders with some of the greats.
Promoter Jim Aiken, who passed away recently, was a hugely important and universally admired figure in the Irish music scene. Here, leading industry representatives pay tribute. (free content)
Fashion designer, punk Svengali, musical maverick, filmmaker and occasional pervertor of justice. MALCOLM McLAREN has been all of these things – and more – in a rollercoaster career that's seen him become a hero to some and an unscrupulous villain to others. STUART CLARK tools up at Ron & Reggie's Gangland Surplus Store for a showdown with the man who manufactured cash from chaos! Scene-of-the-crime photographer: COLM HENRY.
The glitz and glamour is but the tip of the iceberg a lot of blood, sweat and tears has also gone into making THE CORRS the huge success they are. And it s not just about the music either the tricky business they call show has to be negotiated too. NIALL STOKES gets the inside story from the captain of the ship, manager JOHN HUGHES, with supporting testimony from some of the crew.
A special report on the arts in Northern Ireland which is alive and rocking with the whole gamut of cultural activity. Here James Elliott and Margaret F. Grundy give the lowdown on the province’s artistic and creative hub.
Well, so would you be if you had to wear all that hideous make-up. Barry Glendenning meets FRANK KELLY, the long-established actor and comedian who now finds himself in the curious position of being best-known for shouting 'Feck!', 'Drink!', 'Girls!' and 'Arse!' fr. Jack hackett, this is your other life . . .
Black & White Pix: CATHAL DAWSON
With their new album, Gotta Go There To Come Back, in the bag, Stereophonics have chosen a very special gig at the Heineken Green Energy extravaganza in Dublin, to make their return to the stage. No wonder the boys are feeling bullish! Chris Martin, Ronnie Wood, Fran Healy, Rod Stewart, Noel Gallagher, U2 and the Rolling Stones – Kelly Jones has opinions on all of them! So who’s feeling the lash of the ‘phonics frontman’s verbal assault, then?
As Secretary Of State in Northern Ireland, Mo Mowlam [pic left by Mick Quinn] played a crucial role in formulation and implementation of the Good Friday Agreement. It helped that she is no conventional politician but rather a warm, down-to-earth and decent individual with a genuine commitment to positive action. in both the UK and Ireland, she became by far the most popular British figure in the history of Northern politics - which may explain why, in the end, she was shafted.
Republic Of Loose are that rarest of beasts – an Irish rock band who can get their groove on. Ahead of the release of their new album, they talk about standing out from the crowd.
His father, the Rev. Ian Paisley, has been one of the dominant figures in Irish politics over the past 40 years. Now Ian Paisley Jnr is a Junior Minister in the new Northern Ireland administration. So how different is he from his father? And how does he feel about cross border co-operation, education, abortion and homosexuality?
By popular demand, ULRIKA JONSSON is coming back to Belfast to co-host this year's heineken-hot press awards. olaf tyaransen meets up with television's Golden Girl and hears about the world of the small screen, the men in her life, the poet behind the party animal, tabloid intrusion and the importance of Van Morrison in keeping her head straight.
He was a midwife to grunge and has worked with artists as diverse as Marilyn Manson, Hole and Ozzy Osbourne. Far from being a studio boffin, though, Michael Beinhorn believes modern music is too often reliant on technology.
Though their second album, All The Way From Tuam, has yet to hit the shops in Britain, The Sawdoctors are beginning to pack em in in the strangest of places like Norwich and Leeds. Bill Graham talks to Leo Moran about the band s phenomenal success to date and, against a backdrop of cynicism among rock s self-conscious cognoscenti, asks the perennial question: what is hip?
As the new leader of the SDLP and Deputy First Minister in Northern Ireland, MARK DURKAN will have plenty to occupy his mind in 2002. Here he talks about the early death of his father, politics and paramilitaries in the North, the Dublin/Monaghan bombings, his opposition to Sellafield and membership of Greenpeace – and what Mo Mowlam might have piped into the Good Friday talks!
Words: JOE JACKSON
In 1993 she was broke, broken-hearted and reaching for a gun. Ten years on she’s a rich, famous, happily married author, celebrated worldwide as the creator of Sex And The City. Candace Bushnell tells Olaf Tyaransen how she got from there to here – even if she claims she still can’t write good sex!
Currently the hottest female property in music, Alicia Keys has come a long way from the little girl whose first record was kermit's 'it's not easy being green'. Admittedly, she's had some serious assistance from heavy friends - including music biz mogul Clive Davis - but mainly she can thank her own prodigious talent and spirit of independence. Matt Diehl hears how Alicia Keys came to share the grammy limelight with U2
THE CORRS' public image is one of unblemished beauty and soaraway success. But beneath the pop sheen lurk the darker lyrical themes of Andrea
Corr.
JOE JACKSON talks to her about the inspiration behind some of the Corrs' biggest hits, hears her anger at recent critical reaction and finds out what "Ireland's sexiest woman" really thinks about love, sex, drugs and rock 'n' roll and the whole damn thing.
JOHN FARRELL was brought up in an Irish working–class neighbourhood in Brooklyn. From a very young age he knew that he was gay. But it took twenty–five years before he could go fully public, with this powerful, funny and tragic telling of his own journey to sexual maturity.
Never mind figgy puddings and partridges in pear trees, there’s some serious seasonal business to be done as the annual HP-7 summit gathers in the crucible of cultural discourse that is The Central Hotel’s Library Bar.
Yup, we thought you'd like our stab at a tabloid headline. Thing is, there was a time when Danny Boy O'Connor looked inexorably set on a course for the California State Penitentiary. Then he discovered the therapeutic qualities of the House Of Pain and apart from the odd skirmish with the 2FM Roadcaster, there's been no looking back since. Crime reporter: Stuart Clark.
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.
Bono, Adam and Larry. Not to mention the self-styled King Boogaloo himself, Mr B. P. Fallon, whose new book U2: Faraway So Close offers an intimate visual and verbal diary of the band’s world-record shattering ZOO TV tour. For good measure the, um, also self-styled Mr Ramalama talks about Jimi Hendrix and the Mafia connection, toting guns with Tone Loc, giving Little Richard a hard-on, and other little, um, side voyages into other territories, man. Er, tape recorder thingy: Joe Jackson.
Astrology. an ancient science or a load of cosmic nonsense?
FERGUS GIBSON is probably ireland's best-known astrologer, a man who gave up a hit-making career in music to concentrate on another kind of stardom. Here her talks about his astrological work with David Bowie, Iina Turner and Garth Brooks, explains why your aura always reveals the truth about your love life, describes his own encounters with strange and inexplicable phenomena and, finally, gives our own STEPHEN ROBINSON a personal palm reading. star gazer: Cathal Dawson
The Red Hot Chili Peppers visited Lansdowne Road, Dublin on July 8 but we caught up with the band in Paris recently and heard why the west coast warriors of funk-rock have never been hotter
If a city can be defined by a catchphrase, then Let the good times roll epitomises new orleans. Landing in The Big Easy slap-bang in the middle of Mardi Gras, siobhan long gets a crash course in gumbo, voodoo, hot music, chilling crime and, believe it or not, legal Ecstasy. But, most of all, she gets a masterclass in how to party. Pix: steve lasky and cathy anderson
From A to Z, Paul Nolan and Ronan Fitzgerald introduce all the runners and riders for Punchestown – throwing in a baker’s dozen of acts who are not to be missed* along the way
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.
She can't sit still. She has the attention span of a senile goldfish. And she has got some very strange personal habits. But Bjork is still one of the brightest and most compelling pop stars the nineties has produced thus far. LIAM FAY travels to darkest Blackpool for a close and often strange encounter with the Icelandic imp herself.
With the tragedy which disfigured their last Irish appearance still fresh in people's minds, SMASHING PUMPKINS' return to a Dublin stage was never going to be an ordinary affair. As it turned out, PETER MURPHY witnessed an act of redemption and spoke to BILLY CORGAN about surviving troubled times.
He may unashamedly refer to himself as an artist and others may caricature him as a cold fish, but even if he suspects he has spent too much time writing and not enough living, john banville bears scant resemblance to the pompous boffin of popular prejudice. With the publication of his latest novel, The Untouchable, the acclaimed author gets his round in with liam fay. Pix: Cathal Dawson.
There is a serial killer on the loose in London, who has targeted the male gay community. But because of the spanner ruling, which has made a criminal offence of consenting SM sex practices, those who are most at risk are finding it impossible to talk to the police. And inevitably, the sensational distortions of the british media are only making matters worse. This year's Gay Pride March took place against that disturbing backdrop. Fay Wolftree reports. Pix: Leo Regan
It’s a rare thing indeed to hear an Irish lesbian speak openly and frankly about her life, lusts and loves. Gay writer, EMMA DONOGHUE, however, is one of the first of a new and more confident generation. At twenty-four, she has already produced a prodigious body of work ranging from drama to cultural history to her just-published first novel, Stir Fry. In the process, she has emerged as a proud and powerful voice for hundreds of young lesbians in this country. Interview: LIAM FAY. Pix: COLM HENRY
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.
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
Coke is it. Coke is the real thing. It's not the choice of a new generation but the choice of countless generations past, present and future. Coca-Cola knows how to get American presidents elected and is even responsible for Santa Claus as we know him.
Here BILL GRAHAM delves into Mark Prendergast's unauthorised history of the company, For God, Country and Coca-Cola, and discovers over a century's worth of evidence that Coke is no ordinary soft drink.
Christmas wouldn’t be Christmas without the dissection of the rock ‘n’ roll year that is the Hot Press Summit. Gathering round the table are the good and great of Irish music, but who let Podge & Rodge in?
The star of cult movies such as Natural Born Killers, Kalifornia and Strange Days, Juliette Lewis appeared to have a direct entry to rock's premier league when she turned her attention to her punk outfit The Licks. Instead, she opted to embark on a small-scale tour and play a series of small venues throughout the US and Europe. Peter Murphy was on hand as Lewis' magical mystery tour reached Ireland, and was witness to some truly fascinating scenes as the singer and her band bewitched the Dublin indie cognoscenti, travelled south to rock Limerick and strolled the red carpet to join the glitterati backstage at the Meteor Awards. Photography by Liam Sweeney.
With the focus of world attention increasingly on Unionism and its capacity to respond positively to the IRA ceasefire, IAN PAISLEY JNR. – the son of Dr Ian Paisley – talks about culture and the Protestant identity, about his father’s emotive brand of politics, about secret deals and about ‘that petty little Fuehrer’ Albert Reynolds. Interview: Joe Jackson. Pix: COLM HENRY
With the death of Johnny Cash two weeks ago, music’s Mount Rushmore finally crumbled. From the hell-raising country outlaw of the ’60s to his final incarnation as a patriarchal figure intoning songs of guilt and redemption, Cash’s voice resonated down through the years with undimmed intensity. In this special Hot Press tribute to the Man In Black, Peter Murphy talks to Cash collaborators Sandy Kelly and U2, and recounts the turbulent life and times of one of the most iconic figures in 20th century music
With a new tribute album to Gram Parsons on release, PETER MURPHY enlists the help of co-executive producer EMMYLOU HARRIS to recreate the tale of Southern Gothic that was the late singer s life.
When the offer came to produce the new Rolling Stones album in Dublin what answer could Don Was give but a resounding ‘Yes’. Mick, Keef & Co. are the latest in a long and impressive list of the man’s studio credits which includes Bob Dylan, The B-52’s, Willie Nelson, Bonnie Raitt and Paula Abdu. But throw in the small matter of the career of Was (Not Was) and the musical rehabilitation of errant Beach Boys’ genius Brian Wilson and we’re talking major industry player here. Bill Graham takes up the story . . .
When Nirvana exploded out of Seattle with the classic grunge album Nevermind, they were hailed as modern primitives, punk upstarts whose hard musical edge and authentic street style were the antithesis of the dominant ethos of corporate rock. Two years on however, their reputation as Rock 'n' Roll rebels is somewhat less secure. Bill Graham sifts through two new biographies of the band, and talks to Victoria clarke, the co-author of a third which has been effectively surpressed by the Nirvana 'corporation'.
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
DEREK BELL on art, spirituality and porn! MARTIN FAY on Sean O'Riada, Carnegie Hall and drink! And PADDY MOLONEY on superstar friends, Bono's problematic vocals and his critics, inside and outside the group. Yes, it's the second and final part of JOE JACKSON'S extraordinary interview with THE CHIEFTAINS.
He may well be a prime target for the jibes of other Irish comedian-types, but right now brendan o carroll is
riding the crest of a wave of popularity of quite phenomenal proportions. With three best-selling books to his credit, a smash hit play and a movie already in the offing, he s back on the road with his sell-out one-man show The Story So Far. Here, in a startlingly honest interview, he talks about his addiction to gambling, his contempt for the theatrical establishment, the fear and paralysis that is endemic in RTE, Father Ted, the Catholic Church, groupies and (cue fanfare please) his plans to become an M.E.P. Tape recorder: liam fay.
Pix: MICK QUINN
What on earth is milky-white, squeaky-clean, God-fearin PAT BOONE doing,
wearing leather
and studs and singing heavy metal anthems? JOE JACKSON delves behind the year s most bizarre comeback to extract a rare and fascinating interview with a man who once alienated rockers and now finds himself ostracised by Christians.
Sex and sanctity, grit and glitter, penthouse and pavement, God and the Devil, and all conical points in between!
PETER MURPHY dials M for ADONNA, the pre-eminent pop icon of this and every other year
After being a magnet for A&R men during the 80s, Dublin has recently developed into something of an underachiever. The city may have the second biggest growth-rate in Europe but there are a hell of a lot of gigs and records that simply aren t selling. peter murphy casts a critical ear over the capital s music scene and decides that what s required is a full-scale artistic enema.
lthough left broken-hearted by the demise of the Irish Press, CON HOULIHAN s latest collection of prose, Windfalls, confirms that his pen, like the Castle Island colossus himself, is still mightier than the rest. Now, at 71, a novel is in the works. SIOBHAN LONG embarks on a long night s journey into day with the legendary journalist.
Pix: COLM HENRY.
lthough left broken-hearted by the demise of the Irish Press, CON HOULIHAN s latest collection of prose, Windfalls, confirms that his pen, like the Castle Island colossus himself, is still mightier than the rest. Now, at 71, a novel is in the works. SIOBHAN LONG embarks on a long night s journey into day with the legendary journalist.
Pix: COLM HENRY.
lthough left broken-hearted by the demise of the Irish Press, CON HOULIHAN s latest collection of prose, Windfalls, confirms that his pen, like the Castle Island colossus himself, is still mightier than the rest. Now, at 71, a novel is in the works. SIOBHAN LONG embarks on a long night s journey into day with the legendary journalist.
Pix: COLM HENRY.
They go together like a horse and carriage. You can't have one without the other - or words to that effect. In fact, however, even rock 'n' roll has yet to invent an erotic language that does justice to the breadth and complexity of human desire. In pushing out the boundaries, madonna has taken on the role of sexual pioneer, and done it with courage and no little success. Niall Stokes weighs up the evidence . . .
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.
Each year, the BALLYBUNION BACHELOR FESTIVAL in Co. Kerry sees numerous unattached males flocking to the Kingdom for a week of boozing, carousing and
general merry-making, in a vainglorious attempt to prove their bachelorian credentials. OLAF TYARANSEN went along for this year’s ride. Pics (and occasional enraged outbursts): CATHAL DAWSON.
There's a definite buzz about Aileen Mythen, lead singer with B and the Honeyboys, as she talks about the secrets of her trademark black and yellow fashion sense.
Completing this triumvirate of albums from across the Atlantic is the latest release from Texas-based quartet Beyond The Pale. Their instrumental chops aren’t as strong as they might be however, they more than make up for any deficiencies in that department with superb vocals courtesy of three fine singers.
Their combined backgrounds, great songs, production by Jayhawk Gary Louris and stellar backing from a host of Americana notables makes this a sure-fire alt. country winner.
Hot on the heels of The Darkness' blitzkrieging of The Brits – is it me or is Justin's lunchbox getting bigger? – comes this equally bulging 38-track compendium of cock rock heroes past.
Katie Melua, who qualifies as Irish by dint of growing-up in Belfast, goes for chart glory again this week with the release of her On The Road Again DVD.
Schneider’s general strategy is to aim as far below the lowest common denominator as humanly possible, while extracting mild physical-comedy mileage from his scrawny physique and range of preposterously dweeby facial expressions.
Madonna has become the latest big-name artist to shake up the music industry, after signing a unique new contract with concert promotions company Live Nation.
The Corrs were at the British Embassy in Dublin today to receive an Honorary Most Excellent Order of the British Empire (MBE) from the British Ambassador, Stewart Eldon.
Lemon Jelly are Nick Franglen and Fred Deakin. (You can see why a clever name was important.) Their first three EPs remain highly sought for both Fred’s stunning screen-printed artwork and the nine tracks now collected here on CD for the first time.
The CDs and DVD from the Nelson Mandela AIDS awareness show will be heavily Irish in their content; Plus more news from the U2 camp with a photo retrospective tipped for publication
MASSIVE ATTACKER Daddy G and Jarvis Cocker are the respective Saturday and Sunday night headliners as Dublin’s Morrison Hotel plays host to an Easter DJ extravaganza.
MASSIVE ATTACKER Daddy G and Jarvis Cocker are the respective Saturday and Sunday night headliners as Dublin’s Morrison Hotel plays host to an Easter DJ extravaganza.
The pace is gentle throughout, with soothing tinkly arrangements of classics like ‘Green Grows The Laurel’ and ‘Bonny Light Horseman’ alongside lesser-known songs and tunes; the latter include an unusual jazzy interpretation of Robert Burns’ ‘The Slave’s Lament’, a march written by O’Leary for his newborn son Josef, and the title track co-authored by the two.
The Feeling are being hailed as the pioneers of the new soft rock movement. Twelve Stops And Home isn’t exactly the REO Speedwagon tribute you might expect, but it does come free of any rough edges.
Me and Mr Johnson features Clapton renditions of 14 of the 29-song legacy of Robert Johnson, mythical Mississippi bluesman recorded during his brief career in the 1930s.
Few tracks get the same treatment, yet they all remain anchored in her unmistakable delivery, a package containing a voice, six strings and more truth than you might want
We should have been warned. For a while now the whispers have been that, no matter how good The Go! Team were on record (ie. bloody fantastic) it wasn't a patch on the live experience. All well and good but, believe me, nothing could have prepared us to become part of a mass of waving arms, grinning inanely and chanting Go! Team as if our lives depended on it. It was that kind of night.
It would seem that inside every successful singer songwriter there’s a covers album struggling to get out. Following George Michael, Annie Lennox et al, the fad now appears to be passing into Irish trad circles, with De Dannan’s ill-advised Hotel Hollywood effort and now Luka Bloom’s first release for two years.
Stop press: Enormously highly anticipated reality-TV programme The Osbournes (slightly alters one's definition of "reality", doesn't it) which has taken the US by storm, has had to be pulled by MTV UK for "contractual" reasons
Unlike most soundtrack albums A Clockwork Orange OST assumes a mystique of its own, befitting the relentless cinematic onslaught that Kubrick aspired to create.
The Broadcasting Commission of Ireland has granted a Classic Rock licence to Radio Nova 100, a new station which will be available in Dublin and the commuter belt.
As far as self-aggrandising and self-promotion goes, Love & Life is truly an exercise in excellence. Just don’t expect the tunes to be quite as inspirational.
Far more than on any previous album, Cathy Jordan is at the forefront and she shreds the rulebook and pulls, from God knows where, the best vocal performances of her career.
The Deftones sound can be described as heavy. It's a heaviness, however, which is attributable to the bruising weight of emotion and atmosphere in the music, as much as to the effect of guitars and drums. The influence of The Cure and The Smiths is obvious: there is a real and pressing darkness to their music, absent in goth metal peers, such as Korn and Marilyn Manson.
In which LeAnn finally abandons her country roots and makes a play for the anaemic end of the MOR pop market, from Nashville to Trashville, as it were.
If it’s unlikely to be hailed as a masterpiece, the collective charms of Attal and his simultaneously gawky yet gorgeous wife ensure it’s never less than a playful and pleasing diversion
THIS IS a highly listenable collection from this Dingle-based uileann pipes player and whole-food restaurant manager who achieves a kind of new-age sound with his anciently-inspired, originally composed melodies.
We can now reveal the band who will take to the Live stage at The Music Show this weekend as winners of the Hot Press competition. Drum roll please...!
Cousteau's debut LP finally gets an Irish release, and about bloody time too, Guv'nor. The London-based collective have been clocking up superlatives across the pond like they were going out of fashion, drawing comparisons with everyone from Scott Walker to Tindersticks.
:et’s be frank. For all the heavy hitters guesting on this, Mary J Blige’s seventh album, the majority of Hot Press readers will have their interest piqued by the appearance of a certain U2 on a version of a certain song.
Joanne Hynes is one of Ireland’s most intuitive fashion designers, with a particular love for knitwear. She talks to Jackie Hayden about the vision thing.
If you break film down into the smallest possible grammatical units, then there’s a very good argument for saying that French director Claire Denis (with considerable assistance from DoP Agnes Godard) is the planet’s greatest living filmmaker.
Since the demise of Husker Du (surely the next bunch of Amerindie pioneers due for the resurrection shuffle) Bob Mould has, with his solo albums and Sugar, gone about his craft in an unpretentious and stouthearted manner.
Despite the valiant attempts of an efficient fog machine, irony quickly displaces mist in the Olympia Theatre as the most noticeable (if unintended) element of Good Charlotte’s show. "The world is a cold, dark, lonely place and no one understands me. But Ireland, I think you understand me!" screeches lead singer Joel Madden before launching into ‘The World is Black’, a surprisingly serious song from Good Charlotte’s surprisingly serious new album.
These bass-pounding songs about alienation and rebellion are the standard stuff of punk-pop, but I can’t help wondering what the pre-teeners, dwarfed by oversized Good Charlotte t-shirts (they don’t make them in extra, extra small), really have to be that angry about.
Fabulous, a. celebrated in fable; unhistorical, legendary, incredible, absurd, exaggerated; (colloq.)
marvellous, from fable, a story not founded on fact.
- Concise Oxford Dictionary
Former Throbbing Gristle man John Gosling’s logical and mature progression from his Welcome To Tackletown debut is brimming with guests and obvious hits.
Los Paranoias began as techno producers in Brighton when it was the UK’s clubbing capital, but now the rock revolution is in full swing, they’re not sure how to realign to the displacement. For their debut album they remain an electronic act, but with the qualification that they play ‘rocking electronica’.
People are always making suggestions. Why don’t you play this or that? It’s always helpful and quite often it can lead me down some interesting musical by-ways.
Now, there's a sentence you don't see every day. But when Hot Press hooks up with Ronnie Wood, there's always more where that came from. Read on to learn why the Stones won't be playing the "Party In The Palace", why Ronnie can be found in Arizona before tours and about the new DVD that captures Andrea and Slash's special relationship
Movies based in American high schools are seldom noted for their originality, but the lack of imagination on display in She's All That still boggles the mind - next to this, the likes of Breakfast Club could qualify as masterpiece cinema.
As far as sequels are concerned, everyone expects the laws of diminishing returns to be in operation, but even at that Legally Blonde 2 is taking the absolute piss, failing to provide so much as a smile-out-loud moment
The inescapable fact remains…while The Chalets are very much at home within the bosom of the Dublin music scene, had they been residing in London, New York or Detroit, they would be bleedin’ huge by now.
It took the best part of two years for Cotton Mather's superb second album Kontiki to reach this part of the world but the Texan Power Pop trio more than filled in any holes in their public profile with a series of rapturously received shows in these islands, including a barnstorming gig in HQ.
With little difficulty Hilary Duff and her sister Hayley play pretty, silly, rich girls who are forced to fend for themselves when their late daddy’s cosmetic empire gets into legal trouble.
Beauty And Crime might not convert the masses but it’d be nice to think there’s a place for such literate otherworldliness in the big, bad game of rock.
Armed with just his guitar and emotive voice, Bloom magically transformed a large theatre into an intimate bedsit, for this was not just a gig but a celebration of life, love, sex and the Irish weather
Financed by a maxed out credit card and shot in black and white, In Search Of A Midnight Kiss is precisely what we expect – nay, demand – from our indie schmindie movies.
Her father is a Norwegian shipping magnate who was once married to Diana Ross and Leona Naess has by all accounts, led a charmed life, flitting between New York, London and Norway.
Yes, well, let’s remember our manners, shall we?A meticulously, lovingly crafted homage to the Art Deco aesthetic and early twentieth-century matinees, the film is entirely composed using only digital effects and actors, although Jude Law occasionally blurs the distinction between the two.
It’s time we saw a miracle/it’s time for something biblical’ – he might look like a Sid Vicious upstart, but when Matt Bellamy said he was hell-bent on creating the ultimate live spectacle, he wasn’t fucking joking.
I spent two hours cleaning the cooker this morning. I have not done this before in my life. I wonder how much time other people spend cleaning their cooker. Do you wipe it clean after each time you?ve cooked? Do you do a weekly blitz on all the kitchen, including the cooker? Or do you simply wait for years until something inside you goes ?ping?? Answers on a postcard please.
From Blonde Bob to Big Star to Bonnie ‘Prince’ Billie, the smartest of avant standard-bearers always knew the value of going south. Cat Power (Chan Marshall to the IRS) is the latest: for this record she’s decamped to Memphis’ Ardent studios, an erstwhile Stax second base, and hired a bunch of Al Green alumni in order to salt her fairest airs with old-timers’ licks.
We knew there was little danger of getting crushed in the mosh pit this evening but only a stint in a nunnery might have adequately prepared us for the heavy-curtained reverential silence of the Olympia.
"Its hardly the “revolutionary point of view” that she is laying claim to, but it does sound all the more invigorating coming straight from the lips of the most famous woman in pop"
Aongside gentlemen of similar vintage and taste such as Shane MacGowan and Nick Cave, Will Oldham (by Bonnie ‘Prince’ Billy, Palace Brother, or any other name) is a master of adapting traditional musical and linguistic idioms to post-punk sense and sensibilities.
Tori Amos certainly believes in value for money. Boys For Peli, her fourth LP, contains no less than 18 tracks, adding up to over 70 minutes of music. What's more, she hasn't let herself down in the quality control department either, consistently reaching the high standards she sets for herself.
It’s a classic story, the once great but now slightly washed up band turning to the new kids on the block to give them a shot in the arm, hoping to recapture past glories and boost a flagging career. Then there was the time that Aerosmith made a record with Run DMC…
Velvet Revolver are a formidable collection of important figures from 80’s and 90’s hard rock, and this strong mixture of personalities lends their music a certain charisma, even when it isn’t particularly accomplished.
Despite the big guitars, big chorus and witty one-liners, this is a long way from the cheeky chappy, thumbs-up image of The Darkness that we’ve come to expect.
Spilllane’s trademark sweetly elegant delivery ensures the album doesn’t take itself too seriously, and for all their gloominess, these tracks exhibit Spillane’s remarkably prolific output of gorgeous, peaceful tunes.
Okay, the film is very family orientated, and expects that the audience will erupt with laughter at the very mention of the word “poo”, but much more effort could’ve been put into the script, even as a relentlessly puerile exercise.
Iicons is mercifully devoid of the usual filler that is the bane of hip-hop, namely unfunny skits based on outdated gangsta posturing, off-the rack bitch-dissin’ and equal-opportunities deployment of the epithets nigga, pussy etc.
If, as has been rumoured, they introduce an Honours List in this country as a means of acknowledging valuable contributions to the community, we'll have to propel the Danceline duo to the front of the queue.
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.
A match made in ... heaven? The Handsome Family - the husband and wife duo of Brett and Rennie Sparks who make beautiful, if rather spooky music together.
Creep is a lo-fi, subterranean British horror with a nasty shock at the centre. Could it be the film’s monster, a flesh-craving abomination stalking late night tube commuters?
The joys of poetry: Abby Oliviera enlivens Pride Week with a little ditty about her Highness's oral expertise. Are you sure Willy Wordsworth did it this way?
Icky Thump fizzes with ideas. Nevertheless, you wonder whether The White Stripes are trying too hard to prod a simple formula – guitar, drums, inscrutable irony – into a new direction.
Despite a body of work that marks him as one of the outstanding figures of British music over the past 30 years and high profile patronage from the likes of REM (who covered his song 'Wall of Death'), Richard Thompson continues to bathe in relative obscurity.
Not even a suspect device on the railway line could prevent the Bacardi/hotpress team from reaching Belfast for the Northern leg of the new-look plugged format.
Hot Press was granted an exclusive preview listen to so-new-it's-not-even-finished-yet Red Hot Chili Peppers LP By The Way, due out on July 8th. Peter Murphy gives us the rundown
Everyone’s favourite slime-green marketing phenomenon returns in this rambunctious sequel which successfully recycles the shrewd, irreverent wit of the globe-conquering original. Now wedded to the lovely ogress-Princess (Diaz), Shrek’s (Myers) domestic bliss is shattered by an invitation from his in-laws to visit their kingdom of Far Far Away – a campy Hollywood parody apparently populated entirely by English character actors.
As ever with this maverick talent, Gemstones is predictable only in its sheer unpredictability. Whilst his musical style remains at least moderately categorizable (those ragged folk rhythms are still present and correct), lyrically, his approach is more laissez faire than the economic policies of Reagan and Thatcher combined.
On the whole, Black Holes & Revelations is an album that delights, beguiles and satiates. At once familiar and new, this is Muse at their most crystallised, focused and ambitious.
Easily the silliest and most lobotomised film release you will see all year, but guiltily funny for five-minute stretches, this plays exactly like its two predecessors
A feminist wish-fulfilment fantasy with a heart to match its slyly cerebral qualities, you’d need to be a fiercely impervious piece of work not to swoon for Waitress.
If you can ignore the unnecessarily modern intrusions and a lead actress who, though capable, looks like she's just walked off a Maybelline commercial, then Becoming Jane is a real joy.
While being as effortlessly abusive as our EU cousins takes years of practice, we've come up with a few starter phrases that’ll have even the locals blushing
I used to think that no movie with the word ‘gothic’ in the title – even one with questionable spelling – would be dafter than Ken Russell’s 1986 modern Prometheus, Gothic. I stand humbly corrected. It’s not that Gothika is all that bad. But mere words cannot convey just how risibly silly Mathieu Kassovitz’s supernatural thriller is.
He's been languishing in the undergrowth for way too long. But Lonnie Donegan has emerged from the shadows with a mighty fine album, a calling card to be proud of, especially when he comes knocking on the doors of an entire generation who missed out on the delights of 'My Old Man's A Dustman'.
AGNES BERNELLE s death last month brought a truly remarkable
life to a close. SIOBHAN LONG looks back, in the company of
Gavin Friday, Philip Chevron and Alan Amsby.
Never mind the Osama lookalike – our royal correspondent argues that the big story about Willie’s birthday was that the Windsors didn’t go far enough with their ‘out of Africa’ theme
