During the heady days of Italia ’90, The Stunning provided the unofficial soundtrack to the nation’s summer-long party, playing a series of uproarious shows around the country and treating the top-ten like their local. thirteen years later, having just re-released their classic album, Paradise In The Picturehouse, the group reflect on what a long, strange trip it’s been and why they’re not ready to hang up their guitars just yet.
There was a point at the turn of the ‘90s when — much like Something Happens! a year or so before — it seemed to be the law to like The Stunning, and in the summer of 1990 the question was not whether you had the album, but what was your favourite song on the all-conquering Paradise In The Picturehouse: that is, there was Stunning snobbery.
And now it, and The Stunning, are back – albeit for a limited period only. If you were one of those who thrilled to this first time round, chances are that this reissue will leave you all dewy eyed and nostalgic.
Saturday was chatterday here in the Hot Press Chatroom, with appearances from Josh Ritter, The Stunning, Elbow, Oppenheimer, Cathy Davey and That Petrol Emotion.
You re the frontman with The Stunning, you make an innocent remark about farmers and acid house and you end up creating banner headlines in The Western People. Lorraine Freeney assures Steve Wall that this is the sort of stuff Hot Press never stoop to, and also hears about the new album, Deco in The Commitments and the art of bridging the rural-urban divide.
And that s just the band! Galway s finest, The Stunning, take time out from sticking pins in themselves as their debut album Paradise In The Picturehouse finds itself perched atop the Irish charts to explain the secret of their success to an attentive Michael O Hara, who undergoes a road to Damascus experience en route.
An office in downtown Dublin. A band. A journalist. And a tape recorder. Yes, it s another extraordinary Hot Press interview. Starring: The Frames. Directed by: Mick O Hara. With: A cast of 200,000 readers.
An office in downtown Dublin. A band. A journalist. And a tape recorder. Yes, it s another extraordinary Hot Press interview. Starring: The Frames. Directed by: Mick O Hara. With: A cast of 200,000 readers.
Waterford band The Heard have recently picked up some notable plaudits from the likes of Alison Curtis at Today FM, and at times it's easy to see why. Raw production lends a hint of punk energy to their otherwise straight melodic rock songs. 'Holiday Camp' brings to mind Modern Life Is Rubbish-era Blur whilst 'Shame' has the swagger and punch of The Undertones and the melodies of The Stunning. If there is a criticism, it's that the songs lack imagination. Decent enough nonetheless.
With just a few a minutes to go till the punters arrive, the Hot Press Chatroom is looking fab, and we're ready to rock 'n' roll, with times confirmed for this evening's acts.
The Coronas are among the top acts who have already been announced for the Oxjam CD. And Hot Press are giving your band the chance to appear alongside them...!
New age, techno pop and world music are the main ingredients for the hybrid Metisse stew, as well as Professor Skully’s inventive work in the synth lab and the stunning presence of Aida’s lush voice
In the new Hot Press, Peter Murphy picks his 20 highlights from the last 35 years of home-grown alternative culture (in strictly chronological order!). Take a look and then have your say on the indie moments that rocked in your lifetime...
Why have one of the most successful Irish bands of the past decade decided to split up? And who's going to get custody of the Fender-Rhodes keyboard? STEVE WALL tells STUART CLARK where it all went wrong – and right! Pic: CATHAL DAWSON.
EVA CASSIDY was an Irish American singer who died at the age of thirty-three in 1996. This year sees the release of her back catalogue on Dara records, including the posthumous Songbird album, which is generating belated interest in the artist's career. STEPHEN ROBINSON reports.
The Walls are about to embark on their most extensive Irish tour yet, including their biggest Dublin gig to date at the Ambassador and may be about to finally break the bank
The Walls are about to embark on their most extensive Irish tour yet, including their biggest Dublin gig to date at the ambassador and may be about to finally break the bank
He may have been beaten out of sight by Robson & Jerome, Wet Wet Wet, Lionel Richie and Unchained Melody , but Chris De Burgh was the undisputed star of Channel 4 s Top 10 Hits: Love Songs. BARRY GLENDENNING reports.
Kristen Hersh’s new solo effort The Grotto is being released on the same day as her first album in seven years with her former band, Throwing Muses. she explains this curious coincidence – and lots more – to Eamon Sweeney
Get your dancing shoes on. Electro newcomers Magistrates are here to rock your blocks off. They talk about hanging out with Damon Albarn, worshipping Michael Jackson and living up to the legacy of heroes like Bowie and Talking Heads
The Eclipse Music Festival in Waterville didn t exactly go according to plan but, as ADRIENNE MURPHY reports, out of the chaos came a day and night to remember.
The Rossport Protestors have been released from prison, but Shell remains determined to press ahead with its controversial Corrib pipeline. Locals say the fight to save their community has just started.
Having made the headlines recently with their attention-grabbing impromptu gig at the You’re A Star auditions in Portlaoise, Longford rockers The Rubens are now out to put the life and soul back into Irish pop.
The Stunning's new EP, Deja Voodoo, features cover versions of Beatles, Byrds, Dylan and Captain Beefheart tracks. But what about the more intriguing and embarrassing records that lurk within Steve Wall's collection? Olaf Tyaransen investigates and unearths a few surprises like The Goons, BBC sound effects albums, and ...Barry White?!
From a darkened studio in Artane to the bright lights of Top Of The Pops and beyond that 'Orinoco Flow' has taken Enya and all who sail with her on an unprecedented voyage of discovery. Niall Stokes joins the key figures as the flow swells into a torrent of success and is pleased to report that nobody on board is in danger of losing their bearings.
What would the old bishop of Down have made of the avowed feminist who made her name singing about blow-jobs in public places? The answer is open to debate, but as Colin Carberry discovers, maybe the bishop and Alanis Morissette have more in common than you might think.
The Walls and The Jimmy Cake do their bit for European unity by bringing their music – and an insatiable appetite for the craic – to Poland, Hungary, Slovakia and the Czech Republic. Our reporter Danielle Brigham survives to tell the tale.
Or not without crediting your sources at any rate! Their first three Top Ten singles sampled Annie Lennox, Kate Bush and Phil Oakey. Here modernist electric dance crossover ???? Utah Saints argue the morality - as well as the aesthetics - of sample-theft, explain its problems, name the guilty men, and then glimpse a vision of the future playing support to U2 in Portugal. Interview: Andy Darlington.
In the past, many Irish people suffered from an inferiority complex about their own culture – about the language, music, film and literature of this island. But music is one arena where things have changed dramatically. Report: Jackie Hayden
Actress, singer, chat show host, Vogue model and girlfriend to Mick Jagger and Marc Bolan – Marsha Hunt was all of these things and more, and survived to tell the tale. And then she became an acclaimed best-selling author. Interview: Olaf Tyaransen.
Pix: Mick Quinn
ADRIENNE MURPHY, Hot Press writer and environmentalist was among seven people charged with sabotaging a Monsanto-owned GM sugar beet crop in Wexford last June. From the field to the courtroom, from taking a stand to taking the stand, this is her personal account of a tumultuous ten months. Pix: Cathal Dawson.
The sheer quality, not to mention quantity, of the GALWAY ARTS FESTIVAL once more triumphed over inadequate facilities.
OLAF TYARANSEN reflects on a cultural banquet.
With the launch of a commemorative series of Irish postage stamps celebrating four of the nation's most important rock legends, we revisit some of the seminal moments in the careers of Phil Lynott, Rory Gallagher, Van Morrison and - first - U2
Their friends warned them against it and the textbooks were hardly more encouraging, but when ADRIENNE MURPHY gave birth to Fiach, herself and partner Dara were not to be dissuaded from travelling en famille for three months in the "hot thin waist" of Central America. This is their remarkable story
There are no guarantees of success in the music biz, but if you have what it takes there is plenty of expert help available to ensure you give it your best shot.
Stuart Clark, whose middle name is “Intrepid”, recently spent 48 hours on tour with PET LAMB, grindpopcore merchants extraordinaire. His liver and tympanic membranes survived intact, and after a mere six weeks recuperation, he filed this report.
To coincide with the release of the Today FM DJ’s double-CD compilation tracking the history of alternative rock in Ireland, Tom Dunne talks to Jackie Hayden about the state of Irish music, singer-songwriters versus guitar bands and the role of Irish radio.
Thirty years ago Neil Armstrong took that famous first step on behalf of all mankind. That means me and you. But wait a minute wasn t it also supposed to be a giant leap? So what happened next? And what went wrong? ANDY DARLINGTON reports.
In the second and final part of an extended interview with Limerick's very own Fab Four, STUART CLARK travels back in time to their humble beginnings and charts their extraordinary transformation into one of the supergroups of the 90s. From shiny pink tracksuits to shiny platinum discos, here's the whole unexpurgated story.
Oppenheimer, Jinx Lennon, Joe Rooney and his very special comedy guests are the latest additions to the Hot Press Chatroom at this weekend's Electric Picnic.
David Holmes, whose latest album The Holy Pictures received a resounding thumbs up in the latest issue of Hot Press, will join the Hot Press Chatroom at the Electric Picnic.
Clash legend Mick Jones, his Carbon/Silicon and Generation X counterpart Tony James, Elbow and The Flaws are among the stars set to appear at this year's Hot Press Chatroom at the Electric Picnic
Five years after their Hi-Lo debut, the former Stunning Brothers return to the fray with their strongest calling card to date. Recorded largely in the famed Black Box studios in France with the ubiquitous Dave Odlum at the helm, New Dawn Breaking is an immediately impressive record on almost every level (and very nicely packaged it is too in gatefold digipak!)
Don’t worry; this isn’t another jazz-funk odyssey, but one third of UK dub techno act Swayzak doing his thing. While last year’s Swayzak album, Loops From The Bergerie, had a synth pop sensibility amid its deep grooves, Taylor goes off on a more experimental tangent here, with outstanding results.
The boy Kittser’s seemingly unstoppable rise towards world domination continues with the second single from this summer’s certifiable soundtrack album The Big Romance.
Last month Hot Press and Oxjam made a call for bands to appear on a special free CD. We've picked our faves, now it's up to you to decide who makes the final cut!
Trans Am have consistently been one of Americana's more intriguing exporters of out-there guitar pop – and the 21-track Red Lines consolidates that reputation.
John Clarke, the head of 2FM, is the latest figure pencilled in to make an appearance at the RDS this October. Clarke, who is one of the most influential individuals in the industry here, will take part in the panel discussion 'Who Writes The Playlists - And Are Irish Artists Getting A Fair Deal?'.
In a world infatuated by the loud, the obvious and the immediate, it would have been easy for this tender collection - intimate, lo-fi and humble as it is - to have been lost in the ether of the too-ethereal. But then, seminal London Irish independent Setanta have a long and distinguished history of listening closely.
It’s official 1988 was a great year for music because it finally returned guitar-based pop to the chars where it belongs. Forget the turgid (Fl Acid House invasion which was merely a minimalist retread of early ’70s disco (what’s the betting on House Sucks badges in ’89?).
Not only are Metallica and Linkin Park making it a double-header in the RDS (and not only are more support acts en route) but this is the start of a beautiful friendship... with our newest festival, Reading Ireland
The true mark of quality songwriting comes through when songs are at their most naked, stripped of all studio trickery and jiggery-pokery - just the basic accompaniment and vocal
In 1994 Radiohead were unliked and unlikely Oxford outcasts (Radiohead? Crazyhead? Birdland?) who’d scored a flukey hit stateside with ‘Creep’. A year later they were the indie nerd’s answer to Oasis as the best band to come out of the UK since The Smiths.
After three years of red tape, Métisse are at last in a position to offer a follow-up to the critical and commercial hit that was My Fault. It is, as you’d expect, charming and intimate – almost to the point that the listener feels intrusive, and as before, the job description is Nightmares On Wax in aspect, loungy French (Côte d’Ivoire) schmooze in application.
While it's probably true that he was never likely to repeat his groundbreaking early years, the Popes have their moments, particularly in a live context where MacGowan often seemed more in control.
The Seattle band put on a spookily magical performance with lush instrumentation and a raw intensity that made this one of Fleet Foxes' most memorable shows.
It’s their safest record to date, yet also their most rounded with Cole delivering an unfaltering run of fine songs that suit the poppy presentation down to the ground.
Shock horror! No elvis Costello album! … In certain circles 1988 will be best remembered for the King’s lack of vinyl. His soundtrack for ‘The Courier’ was all well and good and ‘Out Of Our Idiot’ filled in a few of this particular household …
The Roses have been compiled numerous times before against the band’s wishes, hence the fact that Ian Brown and John Squire buried their grievances and hand-picked these fifteen stone cold classics for the one disc is an event in itself.
There’s a fair helping of standard Faithless tracks on Outrospective. The sinister dance epics ‘We Come 1’ and the dark and dangerous ‘Tarantula’ come from a familiar place. But the magic of Outrospective lies in the unexpected, which is magic thankfully in abundance.
Of all the mooted heirs to the U.S Garage throne of The Strokes, it would have taken a scarily prescient punter (or a fundamentalist goth) to have put money on the accession of Interpol.
The over of Van Morrison's new LP immediately brings to mind a controversial poem of William Wordsworth's called the Leech Gatherer, later retitled 'Resolution and Independence'.
Duke Special has the tunes, the talent and the charisma to carry it all off. He’s also possessed of one of the most gorgeous voices in Ireland, and he’s not afraid to use it to its full potential.
Even before we get through the opening credits, a Molotov of freak show lettering, crude animations and Ennio Morricone’s galloping theme, you know you’re in the Western’s answer to Latin mass.
Further adventures in Witnness '03 - more video interviews, reviews, gossip, pics and everything else that'll fit. It's the next best thing to being there
IF JULIAN Cope didn't already exist, nobody would've invented him. The spaceman has cometh in many guises over the last 15 years: flight-jacketed Scott Walker obsessive, collector of psychedelic Nuggets and Pebbles, krautrock authority, maggot-brained space cadet and now, modern antiquary - Julian belongs to a long and very zig-zag line of English eccentrics, one that stretches right back from Barrett through Byron to Blake.
This listener had to really work at the paradoxical nature of The Eraser's harrowing lyrics and impersonal, computerised and often discordant rhythms and melodies before they started to make sense, but ultimately it proves worth the effort.
Hot Press can now reveal the winning bands who will appear on the Oxjam CD alongside The Coronas, The Stunning, Dave Geraghty and more. Drum roll please...
If you’re like me, then The Divine Comedy 1993-96 was aural El Dorado, the last couple of albums were disappointing, and Absent Friends is the one you’ve been waiting for; the one you were worried Neil Hannon might never make.
Ani diFranco is not one to rest on her laurels. This, her twelfth album, was recorded only a matter of months after Little Plastic Castle, which was released last year to huge critical acclaim.
Tanya Sweeney gets up early to bring you the best of the Sunday afternoon artists, including Nina Hynes, Kings of Leon, Jerry Fish, Cane 141, The Walls and Automata.
Sheep, shite and desolation. It was to get away from all that, that a group of women camped overnight on Sliabh na mBan and had a discussion which resulted in the formation of the Irish Countrywomen's Association.
It was a year when all manner of ecological malaise seemed to come home to roost. In particular the Sudan was in turmoil, putting our own nasty little problems of smog, toxic waste and criminal fish kills into sharp relief –
Learn from the best with a wide range of workshops and master classes from some of Ireland's finest musicians, and some others from further afield. The workshops on offer this year include 'How To Get A Kick-Ass Recording' by the Bodytonic Crew, and master classes in drumming by Bobby Arechiga (in association with Meinl Cymbals), as well as much, much more...
In her new documentary – Dambe, The Mali Project – Dearbhla Glynn follows musicians Liam O Maonlai and Paddy Keenan on a musical journey to the heart of Mali.
A shaggy dog story: Tom Waits shows up at a Northern Californian studio, prospecting for premises close to home so that he can ferry his kids to and from school while working.
Why do so many gay men find it difficult to honestly express their feelings towards their partners? And would the introduction of gay marriage really change anything?
Last year Steve Wall was invited to the Ethiopian capital of Addis Ababa to deliver a talk on how to survive as a subsistence level musician in an unforgiving industry. It was an offer he couldn’t refuse.
Annual article: With Compass Records taking over the Green Linnet catalogue, the Nashville label has now become one of the biggest traditional imprints in the business.
The Irish were out in force at MIDEM, the annual music industry bash held in Cannes, in the south of France last week. With Irish music’s international stock running high and the Minister for Arts, Culture and the Gaeltacht Michael D. Higgins on hand to lend his support, it proved to be a very interesting year. Report: Niall Stokes.
It may be miles off the beaten track, but Connolly’s of Leap has become one of the best-loved live venues in Ireland. Now with the launch of Rescue Music, the man behind the Connolly’s phenomenon, Paddy McNicholl is embarking on an exciting new phase of activity. Report: Jackie Hayden.
Five years ago no-one would have believed it. But with dance music reaching new heights of popularity, Irish rock ’n’ roll is engaged in a desperate fight for its very survival. Reporting from both sides of the battle line: Stuart Clark
30 years after the recording of Bitches Brew, the release of The Complete Bitches Brew Sessions comes on like Apocalypse Then The Sequel. PETER MURPHY journeys upriver into the heart of darkness and unearths still more evidence to confirm MILES DAVIS reputation as one of the most peaceful and influential musicians of the millennium.
RTE2 have plenty of live music action to keep us placated for the next few weeks - here's the line up of bands and when to catch them. For more about the Other Voices series, click on the link at the very bottom.
With the death of Kurt Cobain in April casting a shadow over the following months 1994 will hardly go down as one of the most joyous in Rock history. Your guide to a month-by-month account of the names and events of the past year. Stuart Clark.
