With his blonde strands thinning noticeably and his trademark feline features becoming bloated, time appears to be taking a particularly heavy toll on the once vital Tom Petty. Performing 'Room At The Top' recently on Later with Jools Holland he looked and sounded jaded. Such is the mood on Echo his "long awaited" follow up to 1994's Wildflowers.
Greetings From LA
beck and tom petty get together in Los Angeles for an impassioned rap on songs, songwriting, showbiz, the Unplugged phenomenon and how too much music can boggle the mind. mark rowland listens in.
Exhibiting a range of influences that includes U2, The Doors, Tom Petty and Steve Harley, the Skins are big on choruses and hooks that a week after the gig I’m still humming.
Make no bones about it, Box Heart Man is a cracking American rock album – not rock in the spiky haired punk or earnest grunge sense but the classic school of thinking, imbued with a sense of the nation’s musical history. Listen to the freewheeling scope of numbers such as ‘Build’, ‘Hope’ and ‘Jane’ and you instantly find yourself harking back to the glory days of the Long Ryders, Tom Petty & The Heartbreakers and Lone Justice, rock with a sense of country and folk and a feeling of real spirit.
Make no bones about it, Box Heart Man is a cracking American rock album – not rock in the spiky haired punk or earnest grunge sense but the classic school of thinking, imbued with a sense of the nation’s musical history. Listen to the freewheeling scope of numbers such as ‘Build’, ‘Hope’ and ‘Jane’ and you instantly find yourself harking back to the glory days of the Long Ryders, Tom Petty & The Heartbreakers and Lone Justice, rock with a sense of country and folk and a feeling of real spirit.
what good was rock’n’roll in 2001? No good at all – and yet we couldn’t have got through without it.
Peter Murphy reflects on a year in which some old codgers stood up to be counted and many of us lived “on songs and hope”
The Irish rock artist will preview his new single, 'Ido's Dog Fight', to more than 20,000 Leinster fans during the rugby game against the Llanelli Scarlets on Saturday 19 December.
From Chet Baker through Joe Cocker to The Cranberries, the world of music owes the late Denny Cordell an enormous debt. Bill Graham pays tribute to an inspirational craftsman who made Ireland his final home and resting place.
Creativity for depression? It s an exchange he can live with, says PAUL WESTERBERG, whose days of excess with The Replacements continue to haunt his latest acclaimed solo album Suicaine Gratification. Interview: JOE JACKSON.
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.
Bob Geldof recently received the freedom of the city of Dublin. But three decades ago, when Geldof first crashed the Irish entertainment scene, with his band, The Boomtown Rats, he was a thorn in the side of both politicians and priests in a notoriously conservative country.
Heading for the Trinity Fresher's Ball and a Vampire Weekend support slot, Iglu & Hartly make their third visit to Ireland in as many months with December shows in Dublin and Belfast.
In a rare interview, Simpsons writer Mike Scully talks about the show’s A-list musical guests, his love for Ned Flanders and upsetting the entire population of Brazil. He also tells us what to expect from The Simpsons Movie, which blockbusters its way onto the big screen in the summer.
The BLUE ANGELS have waited a long, long time for the release of their debut album Coming Out Of Nowhere. Now that this occasion has finally arrived the big question is: what next?
TARA McCARTHY talks to SHANE O'NEILL
No mere actor boy moonlighting as a rock star, Billy Bob Thornton is steeped in music and also in the kind of brooding Southern gothic aesthetic which informs his compelling album of song and story, Private Radio. Peter Murphy meets a singular man of stage and screen
He was one of the most controversial figures in the history of Irish broadcasting, turning Radio Nova into a money-making machine and courting confrontation with the gardai, RTE and the NUJ. With the end of the pirate era, he moved to England, where he came unstuck, following a scam that deprived Rupert Murdoch of millions. Many a colourful adventure later, Chris Cary is back in the news - and determined that he can convince the powers-that-be to let him operate the national long-wave frequency that once housed Atlantic 252.
According to many, the best thing to come out of Canada since Neil Young, Edwards is the complete artist – a great songwriter with a distinctive, slightly ragged voice, a damn good guitar-player and she looks very cool onstage. One thing is certain – she’s unlikely to be appearing at venues this intimate for much longer.
Occasionally one gets a hardy annual, but 1985 has been more of a hardly annual, than anything. Jazz hardly raised its head above the rafters, and only Wynton Marsalis brought forth a thing of beauty in ‘Hot House Flowers’. Miles Davis got worse, and sadly Philip Larkin, a great jazz critic, died.
Rregarded as the original, manufactured boy band, once upon a time The Monkees ruled the world. Now, half of television's fab four are back and, as you might expect, they have quite a tale to tell. Joe Jackson talks to Davy Jones and Micky Dolenz
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
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
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.
It’s a minor criticism though, and for the most part One Good Reason is a confident, rounded and absorbing record full of catchy radio singles and comfortable in its skin as an old school rock album.
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.
Having written his own obituary on his latest album, RANDY NEWMAN rises from the grave to discuss love, age, irony, honesty, the importance of melody and the tightrope act of being an idealist in pessimist's clothing. JOE JACKSON helps roll away the stone.
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.
Nirvana - Ten years after. Peter Murphy talks to producer Butch Vig, musician Mark Lanegan and critic Greil Marcus, and gets the inside story of the making of Nevermind, the classic album that changed the face of music, unveiled the anthem 'Smells Like Teen Spirit' and brought the world face to face with a screaming soul called Kurt Cobain.
Some bands graft and grind and eventually come up with something that cuts the mustard; others produce music of wondrous, lilting beauty without seeming to break sweat. Wheat, the pride of Massachusetts, belong quite emphatically in the latter camp.
Quick Look is an album bursting with energy and ideas, all rooted within the fairly traditional acoustic/electric rock format yet sounding fresh and exciting
Ex-Almighty man and sometime Dublin resident (he now spends most of his time in LA) Warwick has an impressive pedigree. Apart from his time with the Scottish punk-metallers, he’s played with New Model Army and even guested with his earliest inspiration, Stiff Little Fingers.
She certainly gave them what they’d come to hear and like her or not, Twain is a seasoned performer with more than enough hits to carry a major event like this.
Now 43, the former Michael Jackson backing singer shows little sign of giving up the territory she’s so successfully staked out for herself over the last decade.
Now 43, the former Michael Jackson backing singer shows little sign of giving up the territory she’s so successfully staked out for herself over the last decade.
Meteor Music Award nominee Maria Doyle Kennedy is finally giving a full release to her 2005 Skullcover album, which has previously only been available through her website.
At their best - 'Scooby Snacks','‘Big Night Out', 'Korean Bodega' - FLC provide the comedy take on Lou's New York by way of seminal rap-rock crossbreeds like Big Audio Dynamite
Meet Glen Campbell is a masterclass in how to make a song your own. The man knows it too: dig the sleeve’s Ezekiel quotation: “Sing to the lord and make music in your heart to him.”
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
THIS WHOLE "Can Caucasians Rap?" claptrap is getting very tired. The US press might be having a field day over the fact that a new wave of white devils (Dr. Dre's boy Eminem, Remedy of the extended Wu-Tang Clan, Non Phixion) are moving in on the 'hood, but the race issue is as after-the-fact now as it was when The Stones and Led Zeppelin were committing grand larceny against Howlin' Wolf and Willie Dixon.
Earle commands protest chops that go back to Guthrie, but he also has the smarts to examine the allure of war, both as boys’ own glamour and last-ditch career option. Most of the songs study the anatomy of soldiery.
American Doll Posse is Tori Amos's most ambitious role-playing exercise to date. She’s stepped outside the comfort zone of her Bösendorfer piano and seen to it that the boys and girls in the band earn their pay.
The record, a double album, doesn’t always live up to the sum of the parts. Like the Stones, U2 and REM, the Chilis can often seem like victims of their own longevity and familiarity. The best songs on this collection are inevitably the ones where they venture out of their own comfort zone.
THE CRITICS PANEL WHO VOTED FOR THE TOP 30 ALBUMS AND SINGLES OF THE YEAR ARE AS FOLLOWS: BILL GRAHAM, LIAM FAY, GEORGE BYRNE, STUART CLARK, LORRAINE FREENEY, TARA McCARTHY, GERRY McGOVERN, NEIL McCORMICK, DERMOT STOKES, OLIVER P. SWEENEY, SIOBHAN LONG, STEVE AVERILL, ANDY DARLINGTON, COLM O’HARE, JOE JACKSON, HELENA MULKERNS, DAN OGGLY, CATHY DILLON, NIALL CRUMLISH, OLAF TYARANSEN, PATRICK BRENNAN, JACKIE HAYDEN AND NIALL STOKES.
Foo Fighters’ sixth studio album is a transitional rather than definitive piece of work, but one that sees them growing older with 'patience and grace'.
They’ve embraced the big sound of America but The Killers still aren’t fully comfortable with the burdens of stardom, reveals frontman Brandon Flowers.
