He’s spent the past few years hanging out with Kate Moss and Primal Scream, but now it’s time for Irvine Welsh to look up some old pals. Yup, Begbie, Spud, Renton and Sick Boy are back in Porno, an XXX-rated tale which makes Trainspotting look like Harry Potter
Stuart Clark talks to Everton star-turned-analyst Andy Gray about Ireland’s chances of qualifying for the World Cup, why HOtpress is his favourite music publication, and his remarkable lack of bitterness over Archie Gemmel’s goal being used in the shagging scene in Trainspotting.
With even the comparatively tranquil Euro 2004 marred by trouble on the Algarve, the issue of football hooliganism remains a live one. Now, one of its definitive texts has made it to the big screen. Craig Fitzsimons meets the men – and learns about the hard men – behind The Football Factory
From dark age to middle age, Nick Cave is such a far cry from the blood-spilling junkie of rock legend that these days you’re likely to encounter him commuting to his 9 to 5. Except of course that his job is writing and making music, his new album is called Nocturama and there are, he admits, some sizeable blow-outs in the memory banks.
If you’re a big guitar head you’ll enjoy trainspotting this album, but if you’re an ordinary Joe who likes to keep abreast with new trends in contemporary music, forget Shangri-La – it’ll make you feel like you’re listening to a wedding band.
A few years back, Underworld were viewed as one of the most important bridging links between the mediums of rock and dance. Album number two Second Toughest In The Infants had consolidated their enviable position as darlings of the rock press, and 'Born Slippy' had blown up the mainstream following its inclusion on the Trainspotting soundtrack.
If ever a film was destined to polarise opinion, this is the one. An insider document of the weekender/raver lifestyle, with vague similiarities to Trainspotting and a thumping techno soundtrack, Human Traffic is extremely unlikely to translate effectively to those outside the chemical-generation culture.
From psychedelic anime to Japan's answer to Trainspotting, the Japanese Film Festival 2008 brings a delightful miscellany of movies to Dublin, Cork and Limerick.
This is the Hotpress Student Guide 2002. We know that the last thing you want is a load of worthy and boring tips on how to be a good boy or girl. So instead, we thought we’d give you a little bit of help in the much more important task of being baaaaad.
PATRICK JONES is the brother of the Manics NICKY WIRE. And his new play explores similar themes to the band s music. Poetry and politics and action changed the world, he tells Joe Jackson
Film types living in Cork will undoubtedly be flocking to Set For Action – The Cork Film Forum, which will be held on Wedneday August 26th in the Firkin Crane Centre beside Shandon.
She’s one of the chief movers in the Cork music scene. But what does Cork Rocks’ founder Francesca Brown get up to when she’s back at base? Photos by David O'Mahony.
Despite all appearances, Tamsin Grieg’s Black Books character Fran isn’t an unsympathetic, neurotic freak. “She wears dresses… she makes an effort,” she tells Paul Nolan
Surviving the exit of Darren Emerson, as well as various personal traumas and professional challenges, Underworld have re-emerged with their most positive album yet in 100 Days Off
Welsh actor Rhys Ifans is best known for his role as the easy-going slacker Spike in Notting Hill, but in reality he's a driven actor who's more concerned about imminent war than the state of the British film industry. But he still enjoys a pint, and yes, he did sing with the Super Furry Animals
It's been almost two years now since Anam's Brian O hEadhra unpacked his rucksack from top to bottom, two years of tearing all over the globe, from Düsseldorf to Darwin, Chicago to Castletownbere. With three albums well and truly reared, the band have recently been coaxing their fourth offspring, First Footing, out into the big bad world, blinkering its eyes against the glare of daylight.
Having survived a flirtation with coke-addled infamy, nice-boy Britrockers Keane natter about the long road to recovery and how it feels to be Bret Easton Ellis' favourite band.
The Junk yard: Voices From An Irish Prison is the title of a powerful new collection of writings by inmates of Mountjoy Prison. ADRIENNE MURPHY hears how the pen has replaced the spike for one former inmate, PENNER, and also talks to the anthology s editor, MARSHA HUNT.
Actor Peter Mullan first achieved mainstream success with his brilliant leading role in 1998’s My Name Is Joe, for which he received a best actor award at Cannes. His latest project concerns the abuse of young women by the Catholic Church in the Magdalen Sisters, which he wrote and directed
The first rule of interviewing LOU REED is that you don t: he interviews you. Peter Murphy survives the turning of the tables and is rewarded with thoughts on Joyce, Wilde, Dylan, Ginsberg and on becoming an elder stateman for the alternative thing .
Liam Fay talks to the three men behind the first “unmissable” movie smash of '95 SHALLOW GRAVE and hears why comparisons with the American death-and-glory tradition are a misnomer.
Belfast, then Glasgow and NEXT STOP – the cover of the Radio Times?
Stuart Clark joins fast-rising Snow Patrol on Scottish manoeuvres. PICS: IAN McMURRAY
In a rare interview, DJ, Sabres Of Paradise mainman and all-round geezer andrew weatherall tells stuart clark about why he won t be working with Primal Scream again, comes clean about his Van Morrison obsession, and does his best not to slag off Kula Shaker and Mansun.
You'd have thought that 12 consecutive top 40 hits would have earned them the key to the executive bathroom but, nope, before the ink was even dry on their Guinness Book Of Records entry, THE WEDDING PRESENT were shown the door by their record company. Unperturbed, everyone's favourite indie popsters found a new label, a new bass player and a new studio accomplice who's helped them produce their best album since the classic George Best. A slightly battered and bruised DAVE GEDGE gives a blow-by-blow account of the events to our ringside reporter STUART CLARK.
Their debut album Hopes And Fears launched a host of hit singles, going on to become one of the most successful British records of the past five years. But, their indie background notwithstanding, Keane have still been dismissed by some self-styled aficionados as just too nice to be considered real rock'n'rollers. "If only people knew," says lead singer Tom Chaplin.
The godfather of the modern Irish gothic tradition, Patrick McCabe, has released what critics are hailing as his darkest, and arguably finest, novel yet, Winterwood.
It s the morning after the night before and BRET EASTON ELLIS feels like he s got Marilyn Manson playing inside his head. A dinner date with fellow penslinger Irvine Welsh has gone seriously pear-shaped and like his most famous literary creation, the Californian is fit to kill. STUART CLARK offers tea and solpadeine, and in return gets the lowdown on American Psycho, trans-Atlantic stalkers and why both Air Supply and the Teletubbies are evil. Pix: Cathal Dawson.
The Streets’ new album, A Grand Don’t Come For Free, looks set to skyrocket Mike Skinner’s status as the voice of hedonistic British youth. Hot Press meets up with Skinner backstage in Derry to discuss the creation of his latest masterwork, the perils of fame, superstar collaborations, hanging out in Ibiza and the art and artifice of his onstage persona.
Annie Nightingale on BBC Radio One is Dance Music s fixture for insomniac clubbers. But for the BBC s first-ever female DJ this is just the latest incarnation of a career that began, sort-of, by insulting John Lennon. ANDY DARLINGTON reads the book, sits in on the show, and even finds time for an interview.
That a bonefide Irish film industry actually exists is no small achievement, but with a new Minister For The Arts now in place, this is hardly the time for complacency. To ascertain how best the industry can be maintained and developed, Hot Press film critic, cathy dillon, canvassed the views of a number of key players.
James Dean Bradfield on The Cult of Richey, The Spanish Civil War, Jon Bon Jovi, and the new album This Is My Truth, Tell Me Yours. Truth Serum: Peter Murphy. Light Detector Test: Simon Clemenger.
With Cameron Crowe s Almost Famous putting rock hackery on the silver screen, no less, Peter Murphy wonders if Seventies rock journalism is the new rock n roll. Helping him with his enquiries: PAUL MORLEY and GREIL MARCUS
It’s heart warming to note that some acts are thinking outside the box with regards to the usual gig experience, and bringing a little piece of (ghetto) heaven to the city.
A new Danny Boyle flick is never complete without a hyped to the hilt, in yer face compilation of the current cream of trendies, and The Beach is no exception.
The Cathedral Quarter Arts Festival offers a take on modern Belfast that rings true, as well as an eclectic musical line-up and some controversial readings from modern UK writers says Colin Carberry
2FM dance guru Mister Spring has re-compiled his The Fifth Nine album, after objections to several questionable samples on the initial Spanish pressing.
The relationship between drugs and creativity has always been a hotly debated subject. But narcotic indulgence has proven to be the downfall of many a gifted artist.
30,000 people, loads of A-list stars, four stages on Fairyhouse Racecourse. Yes, we're talking about WITNNESS. KIM PORCELLI reviews the biggest festival of the summer.
Continuing his occasional Bum Notes series of reminiscences on life as a musician, Peter Murphy fondly casts a nostalgic eye over the birth of his daughter and the, eh, interesting rock ’n’ roll circumstances that surrounded it.
