While the entity that is U2 continues to be the dominant focus in the creative lives of its four members, away from the band, Bono, The Edge, Adam and Larry have all indulged in extra-curricular activities, bringing them – and their music - into contact with such legends as Bob Dylan, Robbie Robertson, Keith Richards, and Roy Orbison, By Dermot Stokes
Johnathan Rice has had album tracks co-opted for The OC, Six Feet Under and Smallville, but don’t hold that against him, as he is soon to redeem himself in his role as Roy Orbison in the new Johnny Cash biopic Walk The Line. Playing the bespectacled crooner should find Rice playing a different tune from his irretrievably noughties, albeit inoffensive, puppy-dog pop.
Anti-folk graduate and New Jersey native Nicole Atkins' debut album Neptune City is a beguiling mix of Roy Orbison, Loretta Lynn and Jenny Lewis's bangs. Just don't mention The Boss.
So this is Christmas and what have we done... As U2 prepare to enter the final yearof the decade, Bono devotes a long night at his home in Dublin to reflecting on his life, his music and U2's extraordinary career to date. Interview: Liam Mackey
For many people it is U2's greatest album. Twenty years on, to mark it's re-release, Colm O'Hare talks to Daniel Lanois and reflects on the extraordinary background to a monumental album.
She's the hard-rocking- and by all accounts, hard-drinking- Norwegian indie-babe sensation. Ida Maria tells us about the rare condition that lets her see music as colour and more.
The Nashville foursome The Mavericks breezed into our lives with the unstoppably classy pop hit 'Dance The Night Away' which has gone on to become a permanent staple on our radio stations.
Lovely former Longpigs frontman and occasional Pulp guitarist Richard Hawley talks solo albums, Sheffield sauces and swears a lot, before offering a world exclusive on Robbie Williams. Sort of.
Frazer Guided Melodies
TARNATION may make soundtracks to cinematic desert scenes but there s more to Paula Frazer s beautiful songs than a fistful of spaghetti western themes. Interview: Nick Kelly.
This year’s Heineken Green Energy festival has something for every music lover. Whether anthemic stadium rock (Snow Patrol) is your thing or you enjoy boisterous pop (Kaiser Chiefs), it’s a festival packed with sonic treats.
This eight album from the former Grammy winner is a revelation, a beautifully formed record that on songs like ‘Open The World’ manages to sound both seductive and disturbing as it puts you under its spell.
Compositional genius, musical visionary, tormented genius – Brian Wilson is many things, but a garrulous interviewee is not one of them. Peter Murphy undergoes strenuous discourse with one of the true icons of ‘60s culture.
The songs of Laura Cantrell are steeped in the timeless values of American country rock. But Cantrell, a former Wall Street banker, is a thoroughly modern artist.
Taking surf rock, doo-wop and bowery punk down the Euro-autobahn, The Raveonettes have hit on a winning combination of the wild, the innocent and the sado shuffle. Sharin Foo tells the story.
Taking surf rock, doo-wop and bowery punk down the Euro-autobahn, The Raveonettes have hit on a winning combination of the wild, the innocent and the sado shuffle. Sharin Foo tells the story.
Taking surf rock, doo-wop and bowery punk down the Euro-autobahn, The Raveonettes have hit on a winning combination of the wild, the innocent and the sado shuffle. Sharin Foo tells the story.
‘When A Man Loves A Woman’ used to be a pretty good song before it became a fairly awful movie. Now it will be impossible to listen to Percy Sledge’s tremblingly emotive cry from the heart without thinking of Andy Garcia giving moist-eyed Meg Ryan that puppy dog on prozac look.
Chances are in three decades time, nobody will realise that Hawley’s beautifully crafted songs don’t date from the 1950s. Hawley is a contemporary master of the sort of moody, majestic torch songs that flourished during that era.
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
This is unlikely to trouble the Britneys and Celines of this world too much in terms of chart positioning, but in terms of quality, kd is always pushing for the top spot.
As the founder of Island Records Chris Blackwell can claim a unique role in the evolution of popular music. He pulls up a chair and shoots the breeze about his Jamaican heritage, his relationship with Bob Marley and taking power-lunches with U2.
While the path to rock n roll stardom is never smooth, RICHARD ASHCROFT has experienced more ups and downs than most. In a wide-ranging interview with DAVE FANNING, he talks about drugs, The Verve, his new solo album and why the old hometown doesn t look so bad.
Carl Perkins, the rock pioneer who wrote Blue Suede Shoes and no less than four songs for the Beatles, is dead. ANDY DARLINGTON remembers his career from Sun Records and the legendary Million Dollar Quartet , through to Johnny Cash s Live At San Quentin . . . and a movie knife-fight with David Bowie
Although 1988 saw the continued assault on discerning sensibilities in the shape of SAW, there were (surprisingly enough!) one or two reasons to be cheerful.
One of Ireland’s premier singer/songwriters whose work has been covered by Christy Moore and the Corrs, Jimmy MacCarthy’s latest album The Moment illustrates a lighter side to his character. Below Jimmy gives us the inside track on the songs, the singers and the craft of writing
Making her solo debut, Andrea Corr has set about re-casting herself as a vampish singer with a taste for dark beats and sultry wordplay. In a forthright interview, she talks about her unexpected re-invention.
After 12 months which saw the group go from the indie B-division to rock’s premier league, Snow Patrol have had a more dramatic 2004 than most. In an in-depth interview, Gary Lightbody discusses a life-changing year, the Irish and British music scenes, friendships, relationships and where the band go to next.
Elstree, remember me, went the old Boggles tune. The location is a far-flung suburb of north London, former nerve centre of an entire B-movie industry, now home to television shows like East Enders, Holby City (wandering through the corridors, your correspondent comes across a room identified by the rather ominous notice: Make-up - GUTS), and of course Top Of The Pops.
As The White Stripes prepare to unleash another work of scuzz-bucket genius, frontman Jack White talks about his Catholic upbringing and explains why, as a teenager in blue collar Detroit, he fell hopelessly in love with the blues.
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?
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
Nearly a decade after the release of their debut single, U2 are widely regarded as the No. 1 rock band in the world. But the album and the film "Rattle And Hum" depict another kind of reality entirely. Larry, Adam and The Edge talk to Niall Stokes.
As the management force behind Boyzone, Westlife and Samantha Mumba, LOUIS WALSH is Ireland s Mr. Pop. In a candid interview with Joe Jackson he talks about his relationships with his acts, the ones that got away, the importance of the producer, the uselessness of critics and why he s unlikely to end up managing Van Morrison. Portraits: Cathal Dawson
This is THE CHIEFTAINS as you've never encountered them before - more like mad, trad and dangerous to know than the grand-daddies of Irish traditional music. Smoking dope with Philip Lynott! Busting muscles through wild sex! Yes, it's the bits that aren't in the official biography. But, soft, not a word to Paddy, OK? Part One of an exclusive two-part interview. By JOE JACKSON.
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
OUT FROM BEHIND THE GREASE-PAINT THAT ADORNS HIS FACE ON THE COVER OF ‘SPIKE’, ELVIS COSTELLO EMERGES TO TALK ABOUT THE MUSIC THAT RUNS IN HIS FAMILY FROM BIG-BAND TO SPEED-METAL, HIS MUCH-TOUTED IRISH CONNECTION, WORKING WITH PAUL McCARTNEY, HIS CONTEMPT FOR MUCH OF TODAY’S POP MUSIC AND THE FEELINGS THAT INSPIRED HIS DEATH-WISH FOR MARGARET THATCHER.
They love Ireland and Ireland loves them. As the Arcade Fire ramp up for world domination, the band talk about love, death, war and making music in churches.
IN THE FIRST PART OF A WORLD EXCLUSIVE INTERVIEW IN THE LAST ISSUE OF HOT PRESS, BONO UNVEILED THE NEW U2 ALBUM, SPOKE ABOUT ITS GENESIS IN CYBERPUNK LITERATURE AND THE BAND'S HUNGER TO PUSH ROCK'N'ROLL TO ITS LIMITS. HERE HE ELABORATES ON HOW U2 GO ABOUT WRITING THEIR SONGS AGAINST THE BACKGROUND OF GLOBAL CHAOS, HIS ARTISTIC REFERENCE POINTS OUTSIDE MUSIC, THE SUBVERSIVE POWER OF HUMOUR, AND HOW HE ADMIRES THOSE WHO 'PARTICULARLY AGGRESSIVELY' DON'T BELIEVE IN GOD. AND THEN THERE'S THE STORY ABOUT JOHNNY CASH AND THE EMU. CAN THIS MAN BE FOR SURREAL? INTERVIEW:JOE JACKSON.
Jenny Lewis may have disavowed her past as a child actress (she played Lucille Ball’s grand-daughter in some toxic early 80s US sit-com), but, judging by her entrance tonight, she has no intention whatsoever of giving up on the life theatric.
HMV’s acclaimed 'my inspiration' campaign – where artists reference a song or lyric that has inspired them, is to be taken to a new level with the first-ever album compilation of 'my inspiration' covers.
Like its predecessors, this double CD features some of the finest Irish and international artists in a pared-down, mostly unplugged setting, letting the songs do the talking
Born on 26th February 1932 in Arkansas, the guitarist, singer and songwriter Johnny Cash is one of the true legends of country music, a performer whose popularity transcends the boundaries of that art-form.
Funeral was by no means a fluke. The Arcade Fire are unquestionably the real deal. And to prove it they’ve now thrown in another contender for ‘best record of the decade’.
Sinéad O'Connor's records don't necessarily reveal themselves speedily. I know that, on the first hearing, 'The Lion and the Cobra' seemed to me an ill-fitting match of various discordant styles. I didn't really crack it 'till its sixth time round my turntable.
Though often overlooked, some of U2’s most exciting and challenging music through the years is to be found hidden away on the flip side of their singles. From U23 to Melon bill graham rides the wild horses of the U2 back catalogue and finds that there’s quite a few thoroughbreds among their many cover versions and experimental remixes.
