englebert humperdinck s legendary career stretches over the past 30 years. Now, however, it s reinvention ahoy! as he releases . . . a dance album. adrienne murphy meets The King Of Romance and is told she has a beautiful handshake .
TRUE ROMANCE (Directed by Tony Scott. Starring Christian Slater, Patricia Arquette, Dennis Hopper, Val Kilmer, Gary Oldman, Brad Pitt, Christopher Walken)
Suggestive emails, rude texts, watching porn, sharing a bath – let our columnist introduce you to the latest and greatest way to spice up your love life: beforeplay
KIM PORCELLI sees DAVID KITT in Brussels on the eve of the release of his new album The Big Romance. Back in Dublin, the pair settle in at the Long Hall for the long haul…
Photography: MYLES CLAFFEY
Fans of emo rockers My Chemical Romance took to the streets last Saturday, forming a black parade - which also happens to be the name of their new album.
A hit album, critical acclaim, sell-out shows… everything was going swimmingly for DAVID KITT until a sunday paper made serious allegations about him and his Government Minister Dad. In a gloves-off interview with COLIN CARBERRY, Kittser responds to his detractors and explains why, despite the journalistic flak, 2001 has been a great year
As a visual poem to Jean Luc Godard's Danish leading lady and then wife, Anna Karina, Vivre Sa Vie offers an amazingly close replication of the sensation of falling in love
One of the new breed of value for your euro events with a free CD-R for the first 100 punters, this is the ultimate anecdote to the rip off of spiralling ticket costs.
There is nothing wrong with a holiday fling – and it doesn’t have to be about romance. Especially if one of your idols starts chatting you up over cocktails…
Actress, writer, director, singer and not quite so archetypal French heroine Julie Delpy renders terms like ‘renaissance woman’ positively anaemic. Currently back on the map with Before Sunset, one of the cinematic highlights of the year, she talks art, sex romance and Gallic caricatures.
Will we go to orgies for sex every Friday night and speed date for romance on Saturdays? Perhaps we will bypass all the messy, physical business and just pop a pill to give us an orgasm? Thus begins a fascinating three part series on the ways in which our sexual activities are likely to change over the next ten years, as technology invades the bedroom and the old assumptions about sin and guilt are finally, thoroughly disposed of.
"To tell you the truth, I don’t see myself as being all that interesting or attractive." that being so, Colin Farrell must be one of a very few who doesn’t. Dublin’s latest superstar, famous for cussing, bedding women and (lest we forget) acting, has been inescapable in the gossip columns in recent months. But how much is truth and how much fiction? In this candid interview with Tara Brady, he talks about drink, drugs, football, fame, hype, luck, romance and – in his latest box office winner The Recruit – working with Al Pacino
Watching David Bowie on television recently one couldn't help but think of Neil Hannon. Not that he is a musical "chameleon"—to use the phrase most often applied to Bowie—but he does seem to be a person more comfortable presenting to the world a series of ever-changing poses designed to conceal rather than reveal his "real self", as in vocally situating himself somewhere between Barry White and Prince on the magnificent Charge, or satirising—while still relishing—his role as the eponymous sexist hero in Becoming More Like Alfie. Strangely enough, Neil confesses that he was thinking something similar while watching Bowie being interviewed
Falling in love not only altered David Kitt’s heart but helped reshape his musical vision. Olaf Tyaransen visits his home cum studio and hears about the family affair that is his new album and how meeting Poppy reawakened his love of pop. all this and why the son of a Minister opposes the smoking ban! Photography Roger Woolman.
For all the flak they get from parts of the press and large sections of music fans, you have to admit that at least the Fall Out Boy/My Chemical Romance/Panic At The Disco! axis are trying to do something different with what has become an extremely narrow-minded genre. The latest FOB is more of the same wordy, slightly too clever punk-pop but, next to the dreadful boneheadedness of Sum 41 (the cover features Mr. Avril gobbing), it sounds like high art.
Imagine the scene: It’s 3.50am, Chamillionaire’s track has just finished playing at an underground sweaty club. The house lights rise to induce the clubbers’ squints, and rising from the speakers is ‘The Idiots’, the last track of the night, and a perfect accompaniment to the meeting of lips (for those with partners) and eyes across the dancefloor (for those without). Shame its refrain is the less romance-inducing ‘drunk in the middle of a doughnut shop”.
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.
The lyrics on his debut solo album are a revelation, opening up a vanished world in which romance and the supernatural find their way seamlessly into workaday farming and fishing life
A lot like When Harry Met Sally might be more apt. This cute 'romance-deferral' comedy sees a puppyish Aston Kutcher and Amanda Peet’s goth-lite heroine in a familiar genre groove. They meet, hit it off, fail to get together and then, after a bloody age – or 107 minutes to be precise – they do.
You mightn’t be familiar with the name Ken McHugh, but chances are you own and love at least one record he has produced, such as Creative Controle’s calling card debut ‘Bloodrush’ or David Kitt’s exquisite modern Irish masterpiece The Big Romance.
The Swedish fivesome’s trademark sound is so ridiculously simple that you’ll be humming it all day, and with their quirky humour, probably with a grin on your face.
With trademark buzz-saw guitars and memorable tunes, their back catalogue is an object lesson in the power of the sub-three-minute pop single, with the added appeal of the subject matter – sex, romance, love and guilt. But despite the “maturity” of the audience, there was an edgy atmosphere in the packed Village tonight.
Chase This Light is not a genre-defying album for the history books – it just gives the impression that Jimmy Eat World are still capable of producing one.
JANE SIBERRY has a voice so exceptional it could stir absolutely anyone, even those whose idea of romance involves fifteen pints of Guinness and an eleventh hour lunge at the least intimidating person in the vicinity.
Director Fintan Connolly’s sophomore effort is a rather more contemplative exercise than his previous buzzy urban thriller, Flick. Trouble With Sex is a low-key modern Irish romance in much the same vein as Karl Golden’s The Honeymooners or Liz Gill’s Goldfish Memory – a pleasing will-they-won’t they strut set by the banks of the Liffey.
It ought to have been perfect. Everygirl meets Everyfratboy, their collective likeability bolstered by an off-screen romance and sympathy garnered from the Brangelina fallout. Finally, we thought, Jen’s found a vehicle to properly showboat with her finely attuned comic skills. She and Vaughn tear strips off each other while Jon Favreau quips like it’s 1996. Go Vaughniston! Can’t fail, right?
Does electronica ever go beyond great feats of sonic cleverness - and, occasionally, great beauty - to also possess a warm human heart? In 2002, the year after the beat-boxed dose of palpable humanity that wasThe Big Romance, we know that it does
Richard Linklater’s swooning 1993 romance for the Douglas Coupland generation is one of those movies you just succumb to, or you don’t, and I’m militantly entrenched in the former camp...
This is depressing stuff – stagnant lyrical miserablism, copping optimistic nods at Morrissey and Curtis but entirely lacking in any poetry, mystery or romance. Timid, by the numbers rock that, while affecting to shake up a transatlantic rumble, falls resoundingly flat.
Watch our exclusive David Kitt video interview - filmed after the success of his debut mini-album, the aptly-titled 'Small Moments', and shortly before the completion of 'The Big Romance', an album which went on to be counted as one of the best Irish records of last year.
During his misspent youth, Johnny Cash crashed and burned so spectacularly, so frequently, that a future rock biopic became something of a certainty. James Mangold’s fine film has plenty of seamy detail – Cash’s amphetamine fuelled tours with Elvis and Jerry Lee Lewis, hysterical groupies, a drug-bust at the Mexican border. Primarily though, Walk The Line is a romance, a dark, spiritual, difficult, redemptive love story.
Pedantic readers will know of this column’s fondness for love played out in strange displacements, and romance doesn’t come more twisted than the grand passions at the darksome heart of Kim Ki-Duk’s breakthrough film, re-issued (to excited yelps chez Brady) as part of the generally orgasmic Asia Extreme season at the UGC
I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again…never before has the Irish scene been so accessible, familial, fertile and diverse. While this is definitely an encouraging situation, unfortunately, it is also a double-edged sword, and pretty soon, the question arises as to quality control.
Tabloid fame came knocking for Audio Fiction when their drummer rescued Drew Barrymore from a New York bar brawl. Their smokey indie-dance is worth making fuss over too.
A frankly rather cynical Joe Jackson (no relation) suggests that love might not be the only reason that Lisa-Marie Presley's decided to become Mrs. Michael Jackson.
She may have a reputation as an actress who has a penchant for getting romantically involved with many of her leading men, but Julia Roberts is guarded about her personal life. She has been romantically linked to Matthew Perry, Daniel Day Lewis and Pat Manocchia, a friend of the late John F Kennedy Jr. among others, but she is constantly surrounded by a loyal staff, whose job it is to preserve her privacy. However, she has been involved in some very public liaisons,
as Stephen Robinson reports.
Country rockers Richmond Fontaine are back with their most accessible LP yet. Frontman Willy Vlautin talks about juggling music and literary careers, and his recent foray into racehorse ownership.
This Is My Father is a new Irish film which manages to be commercial but not patronisingly Irish. CRAIG FITZSIMONS spoke to one of the stars, PAT SHORTT.
I'M NOT entirely sure that it's what the web's founding fathers had in mind when they put up the first server, but as an example of how the 'Net has given individuals a global voice, you won't find better than the homepage maintained by a Turkish fellow named Mahir.
You may not be aware of this – but you, dear reader, are living in one of the most romantic places on earth. That’s according to countless writers and readers of romantic fiction, for whom Ireland and the Irish are bywords for commercial success. On St. Patrick’s Day, a US publishing company will publish Emerald Enchantment, an anthology of all things green, red-haired and romantic. New York-based tara mccarthy, seeking insight into the tragic history of her own romps in the hay with Irishmen, assesses its contents – and has little difficulty separating fact from fiction.
Illustration: MIKEY CROTTY
Nobody actually shouted “hit the bitch” during the previous Dublin run of Oleanna – as happened on Broadway – but Irish audiences were sharply divided in terms of the male and female adversaries in David Mamet’s controversial play. Personally, I found the polemical exchanges at the heart of the production a little ham-fisted.
Controversy is already swirling around the forthcoming Abbey Theatre production, Barbaric Comedies. JOE JACKSON finds out what it s all about and talks to one Irish actress who decided against appearing in the play
In the run up to her Sligo Live appearance, chanteuse Martha Wainwright talks about learning from her father Loudon, channelling Edith Piaf and the perils of true romance.
When we catch up with Bell X1 frontman Paul Noonan on a fine August afternoon, he’s bracing himself for a grueller of an autumn schedule that will begin with a handful of festival appearances – including an Electric Picnic set – and culminate in full-on month-long European and US tours. Reading dispatches from the band’s recent blogs, it’s apparent that the landscape of modern touring is far from Beat Generation romance and way closer to a Ballardian landscape of endless petrol stations, motorways and ferry docks.
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
Charlotte Hatherley doesn’t do stockings, but she would like to have it off in a thunderstorm. And she wears nothing in bed but a smile. Oh, sweet Jesus.
Cathy, Ciara, Kelly and Tara are collectively known as BELLEFIRE and are Westlife
manager Louis Walsh’s latest project. STEPHEN ROBINSON investigates Louis’ angels
They may look after Lambchop’s pets and occasionally leg it from Crawdaddy to catch the last train home, but when not partaking in such hi-jinks, Dublin quartet Delorentos are busy trying to kick rock music another rung up the evolutionary ladder.
He’s one of the best known photographers in the world, yet blogger turned street style phenomenon SCOTT SCHUMAN is not widely recognised outside the fickle fashion bubble. On the evening of his first visit to Ireland, Celina Murphy talks to The Sartorialist about how style in the Big Smoke compares to fashion in the Big Apple.
Accompanied by images from his photo diary, DONAL DINEEN takes us through a month-by-month guide to the records that kept himself, and the Today FM faithful happy in 2001
Cork act Kooky, aka Tony O Sullivan, has just released his debut album, The Good Old Days, but it s been a long time a comin , as John Walshe found out.
He became a cult bestseller with The Shadow Of The Wind. Now Spanish writer Carlos Ruiz Zafón is back with a prequel, The Angel’s Game. He talks about the influence of Dickens on his work and his debt to the ’70s school of American cinema.
Tim Booth does. The James frontman chats candidly to John Walshe about fame, riches, sexuality, being called a 'faggot' on the Lollapalooza tour, and the band's
brilliant 10th album, Millionaires.
With 2009 entering its final months, it’s time to take stock of the quality of northern releases thus far. If this year’s batch of stand-out records have anything in common, it is their determination to break boundaries and confound expectations
The wine is flowing. The food is good. The spirits are high. And then it’s time for dancing. If you’re in the mood to shake some sex action, the office party might seem like the perfect opportunity to make a move on someone you’ve been lusting after. But beware. The potential for disaster is, well, huge…
She’s worked with film makers as diverse as Alan Parker and Quentin Tarantino. For her latest role Bronagh Gallagher found herself in a Middle Ages love triangle. No wonder she kept breaking out in giggles.
Her split with Damien Rice caused headlines around the music world. Now Lisa Hannigan is taking her first steps as a solo artist with a wonderfully ethereal debut album, Sea Sew. She talks to hot press about the end of her partnership with Rice, her hopes for the future and the influence of romantic entanglements on her powerfully feminine songwriting.
When THE JIM ROSE CIRCUS comes to town, some very strange people want in on the act. STUART CLARK met them and ended up talking about body piercings, glass eating, and the legality of public displays of female genitalia. Pics: CATHAL DAWSON.
Having bagged an Oscar for the angst-ridden Brokeback Mountain, director ANG LEE lightens the tone with his new movie, a paean to the Woodstock festival. He explains why he chose to honour the high-point of hippy culture
They’re loud, they’re proud and they “endorse” really heavy amplifiers. Also Lafaro are partial to a spot of inter-band shagging. That’s what their website claims anyway. You are right to be intrigued.
Look out for a blinding performance from Kevin Bacon. Moviehouse talks to Nicole Kassell, co-screenwriter of The Woodsman, the provocative new drama in which the author plays a paedophile recently released into a hostile small-town community.
Recently freed from the responsibilities of being in a relationship, our columnist has decided to make hay while the sun shines and exploit the advantages of single life to the full.
In the last issue of Hot Press, Olaf Tyaransen shared his confessions of a single Irish male. This time around, Adrienne Murphy offers one woman s perspective on love, sex and the pursuit of happiness.
AND THAT WAS JUST IN THE HOLLYWOOD BOARDROOMS! NEIL McCORMICK LOOKS BACK AT THE MOVIEMAKING YEAR IN WHICH ARNIE TOOK A TUMBLE, DINOSAURS CAME BACK FROM THE DEAD AND MICHAEL JACKSON’S PETER PAN DISAPPEARED OFF TO NEVER NEVER LAND.
Gosh. 2004. We came (almost literally when Quentin T. swaggered back into town), we saw, we felt gooey. An awesome, sweltering, overwhelming time was had by all – well, by movie buffs at any rate. Dead genres arose and appeared to many. Documentaries – long the bridesmaid of cinema history – got their groove back, thanks in part to that Moore fellow’s rants and raves.
It was an historic occasion when Bryan Adams bounded on stage in Ho Chi Minh City last week, kick-starting the first rock gig in Vietnam since the fall of Saigon. Report: Kevin Barrington.
Continuing the theme of cars and road imagery in his music, chris rea has delved into the world of 1960s Italian sportscars for his latest project, La Passione. colm o hare finds out about it.
Never ones to be left behind the times, Bono and chums have gone 3D with the release of U2 3D. Director Catherine Owens gives us the inside track on the historic project.
The brutal regime of Idi Amin is the subject of Kevin Macdonald‘s The Last King Of Scotland. Here the director explains why, to capture the real Africa, he insisted on shooting on location in Uganda.
A water polo match between Hungary and the Soviet Union might seem an unlikely springboard for a moving meditation on freedom and oppression, but Children Of Glory director Krisztina Goda has pulled it off.
Four Weddings And A Funeral and Notting Hill man Richard Curtis is back with another film that has heartstrings and funnybones in its sights. But is Love Actually any good? Craig Fitzsimons and Tara Brady endeavour to find out
Having established himself with a number of juicy supporting roles – most of them opposite Russell Crowe – the very naturally blonde Paul Bettany is moving to centre court for Wimbledon.
Indie-hit Once director John Carney talks to Tara Brady about how to make an Irish musical, while star Glen Hansard confesses he was pleasantly surprised at the film’s success.
“I grew up in a tough neighbourhood, and we used to say, ‘You can get further with a kind word and a gun than with just a kind word’.”
- Robert De Niro as Al Capone in The Untouchables
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.
A surreal journey into the inner life of an Irish transvestite in ‘70s London is the basis of Breakfast On Pluto, the latest cinematic collaboration from writer Pat McCabe and director Neil Jordan.
You mightn't expect to find Ireland’s sharpest new indie talents tucked away in a rural abode, but that’s where The Immediate have decamped, ready to lead the fight against MySpace while making the punters dance.
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.
He may have been nominated for a Mercury, but don’t expect Wicklow’s Fionn Regan to go changing his spots. Hannah Hamilton meets a musician who’s weathering the media storm, but sticking steadfastly to his own trusted path.
Patrick Freyne talks to Ken McHugh of Autamata about his double life as artist and producer, his new album, Colours of Sound - and about moving to the country.
Veteran agitprop folk-rocker Steve Earle talks to Peter Murphy about kicking against George Dubya, jamming in Galway and revamping Shakespeare for the 21st century.
In a year that saw events which will forever change the world in which we live, selected hotpress contributors offer some personal recollections of the past twelve months. We begin by listing the critics’ choice of 2001’s single and album releases
From Oasis to The Ping Pong Bitches, ALAN McGEE is living proof that there s life after
success, excess, Labour, near-death and, oh yes, Creation Records. Even if you re a Rangers
supporter. Interview: STUART CLARK
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.
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.
Author and columnist Candace Bushnell, who has been dubbed the Sharon Stone of journalism , on love, sex, drugs, drink and the dark underbelly of high society from New
York to Dublin.
Craig Fitzsimons meets Jimmie Dale Gilmore, possessor of a unique high ’n’ lonesome voice and yet another great product of the Lone Star State who, belatedly, is
experiencing a modicum of stardom himself.
Hi-tech slo-fi merchants
The Plague Monkeys discuss science,
vocal heroes, glockenspiel loops
and The Day Of The Triffids with a
suitably quizzical Peter Murphy.
Hi-tech slo-fi merchants
The Plague Monkeys discuss science,
vocal heroes, glockenspiel loops
and The Day Of The Triffids with a
suitably quizzical Peter Murphy.
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.
Michael Ondaatje wrote The English Patient, and is regarded as one of the greatest writers in the English language – but his latest tome, Divisadero, has confounded and impressed critics in equal measure.
Having revolutionised television with Lost, wunderkind producer J.J. ABRAMS has now focused his sights on the ailing Star Trek franchise. But can a ‘Trek agnostic really breathe fresh life into the most famous brand in science fiction? And will his gamble of casting relative unknowns as the iconic Enterprise crew come off?
Nerd godhead Kevin Smith has gone back to the motherlode with his new movie, Clerks II. Middle age has done little to dent his infatuation with potty humour, he tells Tara Brady.
In a world exclusive interview, Morrissey sets the record straight on sex, religion, politics, David Bowie and his Irish heritage, and casts a Trinny & Susannah-esque eye over Brian Cowen
Fianna Fail TD, guitar player, marathon runner and father of David, TOM KITT on: Charlie, Beverly, Liam, Bertie, Carr Communications, drink, dope, religion, protest singing and the high regard in which he holds his famous son.
Interview: OLAF TYARANSEN. Photography: MELLA TRAVERS
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.
Irish director Terry George has made one of the most powerful movies of the year in Hotel Rwanda, the Oscar-nominated film that tells the harrowing story of the genocide of the Tutsi tribe by Hutu extremists. Here, the ex-Republican activist – and former hotpress contributor – talks to Tara Brady about collaborating with Nick Nolte, Don Cheadle and Joaquin Phoenix, the challenges of bringing such provocative material to the screen, and why the West's failure to intervene contributed to the scale of the atrocity.
They've had their share of troubles but now arch Hollywood bad boy Robert Downey Jr. and Val Kilmer are back on the A-list - and fronting a movie together.
When your personal background includes dusting down knives for sex and walking up the aisle wearing a white shirt with your husband’s name written in blood on it, then playing all-action heroine Lara Croft on the big screen probably seems like the very essence of normality. Angelina Jolie describes the joy of death-defying work, explains why England is more attractive to live in than the US, underscores the importance of her UN role and, finally, talks about life and love post-Billy Bob. interview Tara Brady and Craig Fitzsimons
Three-minute love songs simply can't cope with all the intricacies of a complex relationship, and inevitably veer off into angst-ridden cliché or syrupy feelgood banality. Dr. Millar, however, attempts to tell it like it is, and explains how and why to John Farrell.
Now that he's discovered the joys of the Dobro, are Frankie Lane's madcap, balcony-scaling days over for good? Not a bit of it. *It's all really just about finding a new way of being nasty.* He tells Siobhan Long.
From Taxi Driver and Raging Bull to The Last Temptation Of Christ and his latest leftfield masterpiece The Walker, Paul Schrader has gifted us a succession of Hollywood’s finest moments. Here he talks to Tara Brady about the changing face of film, lying to the FBI and his admiration for the late Ingmar Bergman.
Sprawling across four restless, angry and sometimes contradictory sides, "Rattle And Hum" is nothing less than U2's most ambitious album yet. Review by Bill Graham
With the return of Sean's Show to Channel 4, Ireland's most successful funny man (he'll love that - Ed) is back in the spotlight. But behind the obsessive, neurotic, insecure, angst-ridden exterior of the show's central character, is there an obsessive, neurotic, insecure, angst-ridden individual? Here Sean Hughes worries over religion, dreams, sex, drugs, family and ... Christmas (aaah!). Interview: Joe Jackson.
John Noonan, who played a pivotal role in the IRA’s military campaign against the British occupation of Northern Ireland, gives a revealing interview to Jason O'Toole.
Recorded in the bucolic splendour of County Westmeath, Bloc Party's second album is a labyrinthine concept album about urban living. Better to take a risk, says frontman Kelé Okereke, than to repeat yourself .
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
How the mafia did Noel a favour by twatting Liam; the U2 song Oasis might cover; the most he’s spent on cocaine; a great night out in Ireland’ and what it will say on his tombstone. Noel Gallagher answers the reader’s questions. Turning up the heat Stuart Clark.
The case for and against Holocaust Revisionist and Nazi apologist DAVID IRVING being allowed to speak on a public platform in Ireland. For: GERRY McGOVERN. Against: EAMONN McCANN
He’s been a Scottish warrior, a Panamanian revolutionary, a sheriff, a banker and a robot rag-and-bone man, all in the last eight years. in Scorsese’s new epic Gangs Of New York he plays, of all things, an Irishman. Brendan Gleeson holds forth on 19th century squalor, his late blooming as an actor, and the pleasure of working with big Marty.
The Mexican-Canadian Dark Angel starlet Jessica Alba gets all grown up with a lasso and leather bra in the Rodriguez/Tarantino directed film adaptation of Frank Miller's neon noir Sin City.
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
You may well have thought Samantha Mumba had tumbled off the face of the earth. Not so. She’s been enjoying a year's break and plotting the next phase of her career. Ahead of the release of her new movie, the zombie comedy Boy Eats Girl, Mumba is in ebullient mood, as she talks about life in the goldfish bowl – and why she and Louis Walsh are still the best of friends. [Photos: Peter Evers]
WITH THE RELEASE OF HER FIRST LIVE ALBUM *LOVE FOR SALE* MARY COUGHLAN HAS PUT THE PERSONAL AND COMMERCIAL TRAUMAS OF THE PAST THREE YEARS BEHIND HER. IN A FRANK INTERVIEW SHE OUTLINES HER DARK DAYS TO SIOBHAN LONG AND INDICATES THAT PERHAPS A FUTURE COVER VERSION OF *WON'T GET FOOLED AGAIN* MIGHT JUST BE IN ORDER.
Boyzone are, irrefutably, Ireland s first ever bona fide Pop gods. Reviled by many but dreamed about, screamed at and lusted after by far, far more, they are the men boys of the moment. Joe Jackson meets Louis Walsh and John Reynolds, the Svengalis behind Boyzone, and asks Steve, Shane, Ronan, Mikey and Keith what it s like when every female alive wants to shag you senseless. As if he doesn t know.
Champagne corks were popped last week as Snow Patrol joined that elite group of bands who’ve simultaneously topped the charts in Ireland and the UK. It’s all a far cry from the days when their fame was confined to the University of Dundee Students Union bar. Gary Lightbody takes time out from wowing the masses in Dublin and Belfast to tell Stuart Clark about their twisty and turny route to the top.
She is one of the best known sex therapists in the world, with a bunch of million selling books to her credit. But Tracey Cox is still searching for Mr. Right. Well, sort of...
Is there a technique to picking up a member of the opposite sex – or does it just happen? Feeling that he could do with a little bit of help in that department, journalist Neil Strauss hooked up with a cult community of Pick Up Artists and set out to learn the secrets of the trade. With all those Christmas parties looming, his advice might just come in handy.
It’s been a hell of a year for The Thrills, propelled from rehearsal rooms in rainy Dublin to a number one album, sell-out shows and limo-driven tours of L.A. at night. Hotpress catches up with the band as they kick off an irish homecoming trek with an exclusive Dublin fan club gig.
MARILYN MANSON may be the epitome of Middle America's worst nightmare but, as STUART CLARK discovers, he's not that bad, really. On the agenda: Bono, Eminem, Moby, George W. Bush and the Columbine shootings
CORONATION STREET. It s an
institution. So who wants to live in an institution? Well - there s Ken Barlow, Vera Duckworth, Deirdre, Fiona . . . you know them all, don t you? Be
honest! ANDY DARLINGTON visits
the Street of Dreams, and finds out that it s real!
Backstage at Creamfields, JOHN WALSHE talks to FATBOY SLIM about the joys of fatherhood, being one half of the posh and becks of the chemical generation; sharing a hot-tub with Baz Luhrman and how he got Christopher Walken to tap-dance
Thought that’d grab your attention! Having made his name with such arthouse classics as In The Mood For Love, Fallen Angels and Chungking Express, legendary Hong Kong director Wong Kar-Wai is back with the eagerly anticipated 2046. A dazzling collage of existential longing, wacky sci-fi and lurid pulp thrills, it confirms his status as, well, one of the real greats of modern cinema.
Private, reserved and self-controlled, Tanita Tikaram seriously wonders if there’s a place for her music in the world of frantic rock and frenetic rave. Interview: Joe Jackson
The last 18 months have been a hell of a ride for The Thrills, catapulted from the relative obscurity of the south dublin suburbs to the top of the uk charts, rubbing shoulders with Van Dyke Parks and Peter Buck along the way. But are the band suffering from diver’s bends? is that laid-back california-in-my-mind facade starting to crumble? We put on our therapist’s hats and endeavour to find out, if something’s gotta give, what gives?
Morrissey of The Smiths has taken the place of both Duran Duran and the Thompson Twins, single-handedly wiping them out, at least on my one increasingly [used] cassette. When I told him whose conversations we were taping over he said, "Good. I'll talk louder then." Not a man to be taken lightly.
Spike Lee is a firebrand film-maker and not one to mince his words. So what is the spiritual father of African-American cinema doing making an old fashioned heist flick?
Fiona H. Stevenson aka Fay Wolftree Webb was the gifted Hot Press writer once dubbed the ‘High Priestess of Punk’ in Ireland in the mid-’80s. in later life, having moved to England, she had to cope with the complex and difficult reality of living with manic depression. on December 18, 2003, aged just 39, Fiona died, apparently of a prescription drug overdose. in a personal tribute to Fiona, and as a means of highlighting a major mental health concern, former Hot Press writer Paul O’Mahony here recalls his first love and enduring friend.
A Tinsel Town director of the old school, Michael Mann goes back to his ‘80s roots in his new movie, Miami Vice. In a forthright interview he talks about working with Colin Farrell, why he insisted on shooting in Paraguay and explains he’s not as tough as Hollywood gossip would have you believe.
RTE is often, and rightly, castigated by the print media for sub-standard productions, but its new comedy-drama series Bachelors Walk is already being heralded as one of the station’s best ever projects before it's even half-way through its eight-part run.
STEPHEN ROBINSON goes on location to discover the secret of the show’s success
Beaten down by the acrimonious collapse of In Tua Nua and lifted up by a hard-fought victory over cancer, leslie dowdall is back with a new album and new outlook on life. I m just delighted to have been given a second chance, she tells joe jackson. Pix: COLM HENRY.
Neil Jordan's controversial new film Interview With The Vampire has angered both the gay community, who objected to the dilution of the movie's homoerotic content, and the author of the novel from which it is adapted, Anne Rice, who disagreed with the choice of Hollywood golden boy Tom Cruise in the starring role.
However, with Anne Rice conspicuously recanting and the critics in the U.S. responding rapturously, signs are that this is one Vampire which won't lay down and die. Report: Helena Mulkerns
Beaten down by the acrimonious collapse of In Tua Nua and lifted up by a hard-fought victory over cancer, Leslie Dowdall is back with a new album and new outlook on life. “I’m just delighted to have been given a second chance,” she tells Joe Jackson. Pix: COLM HENRY.
As Barack Obama gets ready to take up residence at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue, Bob Geldof, Josh Ritter and Laura Izibor offer their views on his presidency. Plus what the rest of the rock ‘n’ roll community including Bruce Springsteen and Ani DiFranco are saying about the new man in the White House.
The star of what s set to be the summer s hottest movie, High Fidelity, on love, obsession, movies, rock n roll, his pal Bruce Springsteen and the records he turns to when he s had his heart broken. With support from co-star Lisa Bonet and director Stephen Frears. Text: CRAIG FITZSIMONS
P.J. HARVEY's latest album, Stories From The City, Stories From The Sea will surprise listeners with its positive spirit and sheer lust for life. Hell, she even manages to get Thom Yorke to sound like Tom Jones! KIM PORCELLI meets an artist who has come in from the cold
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.
John Walshe talks to Jamiroquai mainman, Jay Kay, about the funk soul brother’s latest album, A Funk Odyssey, his testy relationship with British tabloids and why President George W. Bush is a “bad fucker”
From the early excesses of the Birthday Party through meisterwerks like The Good Son to his new release, Live Seeds, Nick Cave has spent nearly fifteen years probing those crevices of the human psyche that few care, or even dare, to venture into.
Here, in a highly personal, in-depth interview, Gerry McGovern grills the god of Goth about his ambivalence towards and obsession with religion, his love of dysfunctional people, his thoughts on the past and his hope for the future, oh, and how to reconcile life as an internationally renowned icon of doom with being a mummy’s boy! (Only joking, Nick!).
The long, barren post-World Cup drought is almost over as the promised land of yet another footie season hoves into view. Jonathan O’Brien assesses the contenders and no-hopers for the 1998/99 Premiership
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.
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?
It's been ten years that's shaken a fair bit of the world and now, suddenly, OASIS are back. what better time for a reflective, confessional, candid and scandalous one-on-one with a man who always gives great quote, NOEL GALLAGHER. Interview: STUART CLARK
When Pulp released the obsessively carnal This Is Hardcore, it was widely touted that the band's main mover, Jarvis Cocker, had lost the plot entirely. But Pulp are back on the road now and Cocker is in fine form - as eloquent when talking about pornography and sex as he is reflecting on the vagaries of the press and his relationship with his father. Interview: peter Murphy.
When Pulp released the obsessively carnal This Is Hardcore, it was widely touted that the band's main mover, Jarvis Cocker, had lost the plot entirely. But Pulp are back on the road now and Cocker is in fine form - as eloquent when talking about pornography and sex as he is reflecting on the vagaries of the press and his relationship with his father. Interview: peter Murphy.
Boyzone are, irrefutably, Ireland s first ever bona fide Pop gods. Reviled by many but dreamed about, screamed at and lusted after by far, far more, they are the men boys of the moment. Joe Jackson meets Louis Walsh and John Reynolds, the Svengalis behind Boyzone, and asks Steve, Shane, Ronan, Mikey and Keith what it s like when every female alive wants to shag you senseless. As if he doesn t know.
EDDIE IRVINE is Ireland s leading sporting playboy. The Grand Prix driver is a multi-millionaire whose taste for the extravagant runs to owning a private jet, a yacht and around ten cars. Here, the ladies man of Formula One talks to NIALL STANAGE about sex, drink, drugs, rock n roll oh, and driving.
Boyzone are, irrefutably, Ireland’s first ever bona fide Pop gods. Reviled by many but dreamed about, screamed at and lusted after by far, far more, they are the men – boys – of the moment. Joe Jackson meets Louis Walsh and John Reynolds, the svengalis behind Boyzone, and asks Steve, Shane, Ronan, Mikey and Keith what it’s like when every female alive wants to shag you senseless. As if he doesn’t know.
In an exclusive interview, Once stars Glen Hansard and Marketa Irglova talk about the love affair that sneaked up on them, recall their Oscar-winning adventures, give us the inside track on the movie's remarkable success and explain what it's like to hang out with the Coen brothers for an evening.
(N.B. This is a work of faction. All names have been changed in order to protect the guilty from certain incarceration in state mental institutions or correctional
facilities.)
Niall Stokes draws on his best-selling book Into The Heart: The Stories Behind The Songs Of U2 to offer a unique insight into the way in which some of the greatest songs in the history of popular music came into being.
Best-selling crime-writer PATRICIA
CORNWELL
has a gripping new tale of sex, exploitation and violence to tell. But this time it s her own.
LIAM FAY hears the story she didn t tell on Kenny Live.
Pix: colm henry
From stardom with Westlife to the breakup of his marriage, and a subsequent attempt to kickstart his solo career, Brian McFadden had an extraordinarily eventful year. With his private life routinely splashed all over the tabloids and controversy currently raging over everything from his latest video to his admiration for Nirvana, he remains in the eye of the storm. In a candid interview with hotpress, he discusses living his life in the media spotlight, his decision to leave Westlife, drink, drugs, sex and the continuing fallout from his break-up with his wife Kerry.
Winning an oscar was a culmination of a life-time's struggle for GLEN HANSARD. But success extracted a heavy toll on the singer, plunging him into self doubt and leaving him feeling confused and adrift. As The Swell Season prepare to release their second album, he talks about the long road back to sanity, his romantic break-up with songwriting partner MARKETA IRGLOVA and why, having derided Ireland in the press, he’s now proud of his home country
again. Plus Irglova talks about the end of their love affair and the challenges that fame and Fortune bring.
From the pits to the pits no, hang on, that s the story of Welsh soccer. Or is it Welsh rugby? For the manic street preachers, by contrast, it s all onwards and upwards. james dean bradfield tells jonathan o brien about their unlikely climb to the top.
Returning from an extended hiatus, Manic Street Preachers are in stridently upbeat form. In a revealing interview, they reflect on their enduring cultural imprint and talk about long lost Manic Richey Edwards.
It’s been a tumultuous few years for Josh Ritter. Against the dramatic backdrop of the Swiss Alps, he talks about his number one fan Stephen King, recalls the day he met Bob Dylan and explains why it’s never a good idea to drink before a show
It's been over four intriguing years since Damien Rice's extraordinary debut album O was launched. That record went on to become a huge underground international hit, selling in excess of 2 million copies. Now his long-awaited follow-up – the similarly simply titled 9 – is finally ready to hit the shops. So how did Rice so successfully capture the collective imagination? And will the latest instalment in the Rice musical biography propel him to even greater heights? Hot Press talks exclusively to some of the key players in his remarkable rise and rise.
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
The HP-7 Summit is back with Michelle Doherty, Rocky O'Reilly, Niall Breslin, Mark Greaney, Niamh Farrell, Messiah J and Danny O'Donoghue sat around the only table that matters this Christmas.
In the first part of a two-part interview, Michael D. Higgins, Minister for Arts, Culture and the Gaeltacht, talks about his philosophy of art, about his own poetry and, more controversially, about RTE, the IRTC, the future of commercial radio - and the sustained and slanderous campaign against him in the Sunday Independent.
As U2 gear up for the release of No Line On The Horizon, they meet HP to talk about the creation of their latest masterwork, meeting world leaders, the way they’re perceived in Ireland, the current state of the music business and their future plans.
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.
Fr Shay Cullen, an Irish Columban Missionary priest, tells Jason O’Toole about falling in love, the battle against corruption in the Philipines, the scourge of western sex tourism – and why the Irish government isn’t doing enough to protect children from paedophiles.
THE FINAL YEARS OF peter cook
The father of modern British comedy, peter cook s death in 1995 brought the strangest chapter of his life to a close. Ravaged by alcoholism, he dedicated his final years to sloth, drink, drugs, porn, daytime television and late-night radio phone-ins. But even in his darkest hours, the black humour and brilliant wit that marked him out as the towering comedy talent of his generation just kept on breaking through. liam fay reports.
THE FINAL YEARS OF peter cook
The father of modern British comedy, peter cook s death in 1995 brought the strangest chapter of his life to a close. Ravaged by alcoholism, he dedicated his final years to sloth, drink, drugs, porn, daytime television and late-night radio phone-ins. But even in his darkest hours, the black humour and brilliant wit that marked him out as the towering comedy talent of his generation just kept on breaking through. liam fay reports.
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 . . .
The recipient of a Late Late Show tribute and the outgoing presenter of The Arts Show, MIKE MURPHY avails of a timely opportunity to reflect on the highs and lows of his personal and professional life and to assure JOE JACKSON that, contrary to certain popular mythology, he is neither a marshmallow nor a flowerpot man
In the second and final part of his exploration of the Secret Sexual History of Elvis Presley, joe jackson describes the king s prowess as a peak performer, reveals the great loves of his life, and charts his sordid, sad and ultimately tragic decline and fall.
In the second and final part of his exploration of the Secret Sexual History of Elvis Presley, joe jackson describes the king s prowess as a peak performer, reveals the great loves of his life, and charts his sordid, sad and ultimately tragic decline and fall.
For over three decades, the political agitator and columnist Eoghan Harris has been the focus of abundant controversy, consistently raising hackles with views that are seldom less than heretical.
The legend of the booker prize-winning author is of a life of fear and loathing and bad craziness that not even Hunter S. Thompson would dare to invent. But the truth is even stranger than the fiction. From a pampered mexican childhood through lost family fortunes, doomed movie ventures, alleged swindling, a couple of convictions and a serious drug habit, Peter Finlay has re-emerged atop a mountain in Leitrim, a little god of the literary world. Interview Olaf Tyaransen Photo: Nick Hitchcox
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.
Cherry Ghost’s mainman Simon Aldred is clearly in love with all things Americana. That Aldred resides in rainy Bolton hasn’t lessened his fascination with Marlboro Country.
In a surprise move, Crosstown Rebels has signed Luciano collaborator and fellow Chilean minimalist Pier Bucci. Like his recent release on Cadenza, these four tracks have an understated sense of intricacy, as moody bass clicks, fractured percussion, resonating chords and warm, balmy melodies meet.
While the voice isn’t quite what it used to be Bennett is still capable of weaving nostalgic magic as this collection of candlelit dinner friendly love songs demonstrates.
‘The band most likely to do a Franz Ferdinand in 2005!’ proclaims a UK music weekly. This single tells a different story. Bloc Party go one further than the usual flotsam of Joy Division-inspired noiseniks and combine their angular guitar-based funk/punk with a certain amount of heartfelt sentiment.
A classic Disney fairytale collides with modern-day New York City in ENCHANTED, a story about a fairytale princess (AMY ADAMS) from the past who is thrust into present-day by an evil queen (SUSAN SARANDON).
After delighting us with one of 1999's best singles and perfect pop moments, 'The Ballad of Ray Suzuki', prodigious and prolific couple Stuart and Karn deliver another wildly eclectic and electric collection of slick technoid pop.
An even more unfortunate entry into the thwarted-nuptials genre than any of its recent predecessors (The Runaway Bride, My Best Friend's Wedding, The Wedding Singer etc.) it is truly mind-boggling that The Wedding Planner was ever green-lighted for production, let alone how it managed to become a starring vehicle for pop-princess Lopez.
Epic power trio Muse have revealed who's supporting them when they play two ginormous concerts at Wembley Stadium - and a couple of Dublin residents are among the line-up.
"Hollywood is all fucked up: you have to kiss people's asses and shit like that" explained the great Julie Delpy in a recent interview. Hollywood, of course, is invariably loath to depict itself in such an unflattering light - but LA Without A Map is a truly savage inditement of cine's heartlessness, and deserves to be seen for that reason alone.
Hailed as the new Courtney Love, Distillers vocalist Brody Dalle has surely been taking tips from the ex-Hole star on how to keep herself in the headlines.
Hey hey hey, here comes joy and merriment! Time for dancing in the streets! Hugh Grant stars in a rewrite of Four Weddings And A Funeral!!! Julia Roberts too! Yippeeee!!!.
DISNEY's '90s output has been somewhat hit-and-miss, with only 1997's astonishingly dark Hercules coming close to must-see status, but this one is a cracker, and compulsory viewing for those privileged enough to be in touch with their offspring.
UK reviews for Soon It Will Come Time To Face The World Outside - the debut album from Cork's Boa Morte - range from excellent to, er, even more excellent. See what the quiet riot's all about at an upcoming live date near you
Sexed Up is the regular Hot Press Sex Column, by Anne Sexton, published in association with Durex. If you have any ideas, thoughts, comments or questions on sex, go to the bottom of this web page and get them down – right now!
Ann Sexton on what women really want for Valentine's Day, plus the Sex O'Clock News
Inexplicably subjected to a recent barrage of lukewarm-to-hostile reviews, The Luzhin Defence is, in my much-sought-after opinion, the single sweetest love story of the last five years or so, and mandatory viewing for anyone with a brain and a heart.
Five years since The Used released their seminal, self-titled album who would have thought we’d still be entertaining records that sounded like weaker versions of it?
Esentially a hip-hop version of Dirty Dancing (yes, that bad) Save The Last Dance is a crushingly predictable affair of the all-too-familiar 'boy meets girl from opposite side of the tracks and they get together through their mutual love of dance' variety.
PART THREE of the much-hailed 'Dogme 95' Danish arthouse project which has already brought us Festen and The Idiots, Mifune is by far the most involving of the trio, largely because it's filmed in straightforward, conventional fashion and doesn't seem too preciously proud of its own detached 'artiness' (The Idiots was terrible shite altogether).
1977 went straight to No. 1 in the UK and spawned four hit singles. By the time the group came to record the follow-up, Nu-clear Sounds, they were still only 20.
The name is unfamiliar (and let's face it, absolutely ridiculous) but in the States they have notched up Grammy nominations and hit singles to beat the band. Of course, the fact that they have received such plaudits is no indication of quality. In fact, Sixpence None The Richer come across as an indie version of The Corrs, complete with titles like 'We Have Forgotten' and Andrea Corr-style vocals from Leigh Nash.
TOMBSTONE (Directed by George P. Cosmatos. Starring Kurt Russell, Val Kilmer, Sam Elliot, Bill Paxton, Powers Boothe, Michael Biehn, Charlton Heston, Dana Delany, Jason Priestly, Joanna Pacula, Michael Rooker, Billy Zane)
Not Loach’s greatest film – arguably, not even one of his better ones – Bread And Roses still beats the living shit out of almost anything else to gain release this year
Iron Maiden's past few years have seen something of a creative rebirth, with the return of their prodigal lead vocalist and 2003’s impressive Dance Of Death, culminating in this, their 14th studio record, and one that easily matches up to their best work.
A mixture of singer-songwriter narrative and hip-hop savvy, courtesy of Milk D (of Audio 2 fame), the single and album opener serves as a perfect appetiser for what is to come.
Small, sweet and winner of the World Cinema Audience Award at the 2007 Sundance Film Festival, Once provides as touching a relationship as any movie since Before Sunset.
You certainly wouldn’t need telling that You And Me And Everyone We Know came to our shores via Sundance. With its seemingly endless capacity for navel-gazing and quirkiness (spit), it belongs right down there on a special me-me-me triple bill featuring What The Bleep Do We Know? and My Life Without Me
Africa has now moved to the musical position occupied by Jamaica a few years back and great records by folk such as youssou’n Dour and Mahlathini helped to leaven the absence of reggae music.
As you might expect from a bunch of Springsteen-loving misfits, Stay Positive is delivered with a generous amount of their now trademark skewed cynicism.
There's a nasty undercurrent to the film that frequently threatens to capsize the entire project. Thankfully, the uniformly fine performances and impressively lush aesthetic save The Heart Of Me from its failings
Gone is the major label deal, along with most of The Ataris' members, and Welcome The Night sees them return as a seven-piece, complete with cello player and handling their own affairs.
Pop, is it? We’ll give you some pop... on this deliriously good mini-album of theme tunes for the better class of romantic adventurer. Pop hooks you could hang a summer wardrobe on? Check. Intelligence? Check. Best pop vocalist in the country? Check.
The credits may read – “produced by PRINCE and arranged, composed and performed by (insert stupid squiggle symbol),” but I think we can treat this album as the real return to the fray by the Purple Poet of Pervdom himself.
There have always been two main problems with Good Charlotte. One, they have lousy timing. Two, while a lot of people love them, an equal amount loathe them.
Do men want sex without ‘feeling’? Are women genetically programmed to want sex to ‘mean’ something? Or, to put it another way, is there really any difference between the genders when it comes to the issue of casual sex?
THE WEALTH of acting talent on board in This Is My Father should tip you off that they're not there just to pocket the cheques, and despite its faintly 'Oirish' premise, the movie - brainchild of the three Quinn brothers - is ludicrously enjoyable from start to finish, acted with huge passion by practically all concerned, and genuinely affecting above and beyond what anyone might have dared to hope.
Most of us have, at certain times, been guilty of doing The Saw Doctors a great disservice, airbrushing them out of the Irish musical family portrait. In the meantime they’ve continued to sell more records and play to bigger audiences around the world than most of their cooler countemporaries.
While the BBC will insist on adapting Jane Austen’s masterpiece every fortnight for television, Joe Wright’s splendidly dirty (as in ancient hygiene standards, not Darcy porn) rendition of Pride And Prejudice is actually the first film version in 60 years.
Despite a somewhat understated stage presence, they quickly find their feet with slice after slice of infinitely catchy pop, complete with five part harmonies, lazy, moseying rhythms and shimmering, sunny melodics.
Though largely pointless, recent remakes of Dawn Of The Dead and Texas Chainsaw Massacre haven’t been nearly as disgraceful as we might have hoped and The Hills Have Eyes is infinitely superior to either.
Though it unquestionably belongs within the Euro-pudding genus, The Chorus mercifully avoids the sickly sweetness of such confections as Cinema Paradiso or anything marred by the presence of Roberto Benigni, despite taking a rather sentimental journey into quaint Stella Artois country.
"Make every album as if it's your last," is Snow Patrol's motto, and if, heaven forfend, their second album should be their swansong, it would certainly stand as a fine legacy.
When you’re on the look out for a man, a Singles Club is a good place to start. Or is it? Well, our sex columnist thought she’d check out the lie of the land – and this is what she found…
Over the course of THE LETTING GO (recorded in Iceland last winter with Björk producer Valgeir Sigurdsson) one stumbles hither and thither on a characteristically savage poeticism.
Men, it turns out are right. You can have great sex without falling in love. Because, it seems, that’s the way we are programmed. So is the romantic ideal of love all its cracked up to be?
Magnet are right up there with Jeff Buckley and Radiohead, not least because of Johansen’s ethereal, heart-swelling vocals and its perfect coupling with orchestral strings and digitised heartbeats.
IS L a Thomas Pynchon fan, an acolyte of the siren, 'V', in the American gamester's first novel? Probably not since 'L' is a pun on the French feminine and the L of this record is a far less contrary character than Pynchon's R Sphinx.
A tetchy-as-ever John Lydon deigns to speak to us mere mortals on the occasion of the announcement of a London live date in June - wherein The Sex Pistols will be reminding people, he says, "what being British is really about"
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.
Exit Hellsville is the third album from Eamonn Dowd’s motley crew of Racketeers, and like its predecessors, it’s a damn fine example of gravel-voiced country rock.
So much has been written, spoken and, most importantly, blogged about Arctic Monkeys that it’s difficult to believe this is their debut album. The four piece’s incredible rise is, in the main, due to a Libertines-esque use of the Internet to spread their gospel without ever straying far from Sheffield.
Perhaps Gore’s finest achievement with Counterfeit is that all 11 songs gel seamlessly and flow as smoothly as if this was a collection of originals from the same mean and moody pen.
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.
Best known as the original lead voice in Riverdance, John McGlynn may have suffered from a case of sibling domination. His twin brother, Michael, wielding the Anúna baton, seems to have hogged most of the limelight in the past, but now it seems that John is set to redress the balance.
Eccentric, humorous and a giddy story-teller, she ensures that tonight we’re guided through love-lorn territories with laughter and warmth. An intimacy is created, luring the audience in and allowing them explore frequently stunning and moving pieces of music, infused with Rusby’s infectious personality
Expectations for new material are, understandably, quite high, both from long term fans of the band and the ever-broadening circle of new admirers, Indeed, the days of Bell X1 filling medium size stages could well be numbered – as it is, tonight’s stage can barely hold the band’s enthusiasm and confidence.
In the new Hot Press, Star Trek movie director JJ Abrams – known for his work on Alias and Lost – makes the shocking admission that he's always preferred George Lucas' take on sci-fi.
Though few performers can carry off the Casio/solo-guitar/funny-banter combo (just ask Kittser), Rhys has mastered it with startling ease. He mumbles his random anecdotes, punctuated by odd cricket or ocean sound from his trusty Casio… the whole effect sounds not unlike Neosupervital rousing the comedic spirit of Andy Kaufman.
Though his last movie, Spring, Summer, Autumn, Winter…And Spring was all pretty and pastoral, the exhilarating Korean filmmaker, Kim Ki-Duk, can generally be relied on to put fish-hooks and the like up in some very dark and painful orifices indeed.
How can I give you some inkling of the interminable tortures that lie in wait for you should you be so foolhardy as to attend Message In A Bottle, Kevin Costner's latest box-office smash?
Officially the hottest band of the moment with phenomenal sales of their debut album in its first few days of release, the Arctic Monkeys stole the show at the second date of the NME tour.
The highlight of the Cork leg of JD's trawl for Ireland's best unsigned act came when Nassau presented a polished set of psychedelic pop numbers that brought the evening to a deliriously woozy climax.
When the news came through it was well after midnight. The Hot Press production crew were doing their usual crazy stint trying to pin the beast down, and put it to bed. In the middle of the mayhem and the pressure, it still came as a terrible shock.
The very release of this double elpee is something of a mystery. After all, it's only been two studio albums (No Rest For The Wicked and No More Tears) since the double live Tribute and the mini-live Just Say Ozzy came out.
Perhaps Gore’s finest achievement with Counterfeit is that all 11 songs gel seamlessly and flow as smoothly as if this was a collection of originals from the same mean and moody pen.
Awards by the dozen, celebrities wall-to-wall, gobsmacking world exclusives and of course, great music: it can only be the Hot Press Irish Music Awards. Only 24 hours to go - here's how it's all shaping up
Fran King was one of the finalists on You’re A Star, but don’t let that put you off. Beautification, the Terenure native’s debut album, is an assured collection of sun-kissed shimmery pop/rock, equal parts Crowded House and Elvis Costello, with a smattering of Elliott Smith and Brendan Benson thrown in for good measure.
From Nikki Blonsky’s bravura opening number, the delightfully subversive ‘Good Morning, Baltimore’, Adam Shankman’s musical extravaganza simply never lets up.
When Clooney and Zelweger are together, it’s tumbleweeds not sparks that fly. Still, it’s hard to entirely resist Clooney when he’s batting his eyelashes in our direction.
Imagine growing up in Falkirk, a very small and very rainy village in Scotland, and living a youth of unrequited love, forbidden desires, drinking cans of cider in fields, awkward sexual encounters with female friends and dirty bed sheets. This might help you to understand Moffat’s background and lyrical content, but nothing can prepare you for the brutal honesty and frankness with which he sings.
Just when you thought the body-switch comedy had thoughtfully been put out of its misery, along comes this delightful froth on a daydream from indie-graduate Winick.
As our near-zombie hero, Andrew Largeman (Braff) warms and eventually melts for the girl (Portman), Garden State mimics a detective story, providing a suspenseful drip-feed of morbidly fascinating details from Andrew’s family life and his current late twenty-something malaise. Ultimately though, this is a gorgeous redemption song, dark-witted, but not dark-hearted.
A surprisingly gentle, Preston Sturges-inspired satire on Hollywood from the blessed pen of David Mamet, State And Main is almost scarily good-natured coming from the man behind such far-from-gentle classics as the scalpel-sharp Speed The Plow.
Any notions that Antony And The Johnsons might somehow retain their underground aura are put well and truly to bed. Tonight the general age profile at Vicar Street puts one in mind of a tea-party thrown in honour of Daniel O’Donnell.
Thirty lucky fans were treated to a special acoustic Bell X1 show in the intimate surroundings of Bewley's Cafe Theatre in Dublin on Sunday. **NOW UPDATED with photos!
Around fifteen minutes into my first and only viewing of Scrubs, Zach Braff’s buffoonery became more than I could bear, and I concluded that without first opting for the television-friendly benefits of a full frontal lobotomy, I could never hope to be part of the target demographic. It delights me to report then, that Garden State, an indie-fied comedy written, directed and starring Mr. Braff, is a far, far better movie than I dared to hope.
“If you build it, they will come” – a familiar quote from a Hollywood baseball movie – became the mantra for Dolan’s Warehouse’s 10th birthday celebrations.
Separated by years and an ocean, an old lover might have seemed like a far away place. But when she arranged to meet him back where they had shared passionate sex, and a lot more besides, they both knew that they were opening up a sea of possibility.
This is a big, bad whirlwind of a movie with remarkably complex protagonists and appropriately storming performances which simultaneously provides Turkish delights and great big ‘Welcome To Hell’ placards. An absolute shot in the arm for European cinema.
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.
IT TAKES a heck of a thick neck to blithely ignore all that's happened musically over the last five years. Either that or a cast-iron identity that surpasses fleeting trends and passing fads. Randy Newman has always managed to pull it off with panache.
HAVING passed through both the Dáil and the Seanad, the new Sexual Offences Bill needs only the signature of the President Mary Robinson to become law.
When a long-term relationship ends, our sex columnist finds that her friends all want to rally around to uncover a brand new mate for her. Sometimes, however, their approach is somewhat less than subtle.
If you imagined that writer-director Guillermo del Toro couldn’t top the occultist Nazis, demon-spawn puppy love and super kitsch of the original film, then think again.
A WORK of such complete and utter meaninglessness as to border on the profound, Million Dollar Hotel is by some measure Wim Wenders' most pretentious, most self-indulgent and least affecting work to date, although we'd probably accept it from just about anyone else.
Twelve months ago she was a humble drama student. Now Emily Taaffe is starring in Brian Friel's adaptation of Three Sisters. No wonder she's looking so pleased
In theory, The Ring 2 ought to have been a ridiculously safe bet. Gore Verbinski had already delivered a clinically efficient Hollywood remake of the original J-horror Ringu, and the involvement of the original surviving cast (Watts and Dorfman) plus Hideo Nakata, the Japanese director behind Ringu, Dark Water and Chaos, promised chills, if not something more audacious. So what the hell happened?
A PISS-POOR slice of low-rent northern-English comic whimsy, with misguided feelgood pretensions and the most horrific costume design this side of Velvet Goldmine, this painfully lame romantic comedy should be available on video in all good bargain-bins for 50p before the year's out.
Maxïmo Park could have easily disappeared into the slew of angular, affected guitar bands that emerged in the UK last year, but two factors helped them stay on the muso radar. One was them being the first non-electronica signing to the unspeakably hip Warp label. The second was their enigmatic frontman Paul Smith with his candid/overwrought lyrics – whichever side of the fence you sit on – and labour intensive stage workout.
In between stifling yawns at the relentlessly flashy edits, one can expect mucho macho angst, and a Christian allegory so fixated on salvation it could be authored by Mel Gibson’s Free-Presbyterian equivalent.
NEOSUPERVITAL has taken the music of the 80s as his blueprint, added in a large dollop of tongue-in-cheek humour, mixed in some observations on modern Ireland and garnished it all with a sprinkling of wry irony. And he’s bloody brilliant at it.
Anne Sexton is the winner of the Hot Press Search For A Sex Columnist competition, run in association with Durex. Originally from Ireland, she spent many years in South Africa. A graphic artist, she has an honours degree in English and always harboured a desire to write. She also has an abiding – and uninhibited – interest in sex.
Shakespeare fans, please draw a deep breath and count to ten: Ten Things I Hate About You, the latest dumb-ass Yank teen comedy, purports to be a modern-day remake of The Taming Of The Shrew.
This issue coinciding with Valentine's Day, Caught In The Net has decided to show it has a sensitive side that's willing to woo and not just jump into bed on the first date
For his latest astonishing trick, slacker deity and screenwriting wunderkind Charlie Kaufman (Being John Malkovich, Adaptation, Confessions of A Dangerous Mind, Human Nature) tackles the twisty, time-travelling, amnesiac romance with vaulting, overwhelming success.
They go out in the freezing cold at 3am for condoms and spend hours searching for the G-spot. With St. Valentine’s Day romance in the air, our sex columnist says, ‘Let’s hear
it for the boys’...
They may be Europe s premier exponents of dishevelled cool and string-laden romance, but, as tindersticks mainman stuart staples explains, there s always been that Nottingham Forest element to their music. We re 35% more popular in Greece than Sting, he tells a gobsmacked stuart clark.
She has won rave notices – and more than a few awards – for her turns in Bloody Sunday and Hamlet. Now Kathy Kiera Clarke is to star in The Abbey’s new production of George Farquhar’s The Recruiting Officer.
Maybe the best way to get a handle on Devils & Dust is by process of elimination. In other words, it’s not a big band extravaganza with sax and piano fanfares for the common man. It’s not Human Touch or Lucky Town, both of which suffered from pick-up pros trying to play E Street shuffles, and as any fool knows, the only ones who can do that are the original Jersey shower. Nor is it the bleak and beautiful lunar landscape of America under the Republican gun a la Nebraska. It’s not Tom Joad either, although it does share some of those album’s attributes, namely a writerly rigour with regard to research and character development, plus a slew of wetback protagonists inhabiting southerly borders both geographical and moral.
...here's the Hot Press Irish Music Awards, and a massive bash avec much live music is pencilled in for Belfast in April. Read on for the categories and nominees in full
The perfect pop record: it’s an elusive goal. Some people say Pet Sounds, others any one of a rake of great singles from the collected works of Abba. In either case, they wouldn’t be far wide of the mark. But the magic pop gene also disports itself in all sorts of musically diverse situations, from ‘We Are Family’ by Sister Sledge, through ‘Perfect’ by Fairground Attraction, to ‘There She Goes’ by the Las.
She has won rave notices for her turns in Bloody Sunday and Hamlet. Now Kathy Kiera Clarke is to star in The Abbey’s new production of The Recruiting Officer.
It's a truism that, come the third album, an artist either puts up or shuts up. That doesn't apply here, this being 'Elvis' fifth album.
He has persistently 'put up' music with an IQ superior to his contemporaries, simply.
if you are the kind of individual who lives for musicals, Baz Luhrmann’s latest blast of kitsch madness is almost certainly the most mouth-watering feast served up for your consumption since Madonna’s Evita
MUCH ADO ABOUT NOTHING (Directed by and starring Kenneth Brannagh, with Richard Briers, Michael Keaton, Robert Sean Leonard, Keanu Reeves, Emma Thompson and Denzel Washington)
“Why is it/When a man wants a woman he is called a hunter/But when a woman wants a man she is called a predator?”
Dory Previn (‘When A Man Wants A Woman’)
One of the things that becomes clear as the wonders of A Rush Of Blood To The Head unfolds is that Coldplay are making a truly startling sound within a basic rock format
I Never Thought This Day Would Come is a confident, big-hearted and ebullient record, which sees Peter Wilson tell his truths from behind the mask of Duke Special.
Would you be faithful to someone for the rest of your life? This is a question that’s been plaguing me lately. It does seem like a nice idea, but I’ve always been a bit of a sceptic.
Getting dreessed especially for sex is a great turn on. There's nothing like knowing that you are the object of someone else's desire - but isn't it time that men got in on the act?
HAILING FROM Macroom, Co. Cork are the recently formed Coil, a four-piece who trade in a type of narcotic Goth pop music. The group’s line-up is Ann-Marie Ryan (vocals), Mark Tangney (guitar), Paul Kelleher (bass) and Rory Hanly (drums).
Valentine’s Day is on its way. But forget the cheesy cards, the flowers and the pink ribbons. What every smart woman really wants on February 14th is the hot breath of a lover whose naked desire is for her, and her alone…
MIND-BOGGLING. There is no other word for it. A decade ago the country was tearing itself apart over the legalisation of divorce. Three years ago, we introduced it by the most slender of majorities – the vote split almost evenly down the middle and succeeded by less than one per cent. Now Councillor Anne Devitt of Fine Gael has proposed that we open up castles by the sea as “romantic” places in which to have civil weddings.
Of all the films in all the theatres in all the world, Casablanca is the single biggest fluke of the lot; a shining testimonial to William Goldman’s supposition that, in movies, nobody knows anything
Women, we are told, talk too much. This is an unfair criticism of my sex. We have a strong desire to communicate and share our thoughts and feelings – but not all of the time. Many women, particularly sexually inexperienced ones, find it hard to discuss their desires with their lovers. Instead they hope that their men will intuitively know what it is they want. This is a mistake.
Morty McCarthy, drummer with the Sultans of Ping and unreconstructed Corkman, is teaching English in Stockholm University. He gives us the lowdown on local attractions.
Once a beacon for new talent, the Eurovision song contest has become dreary and predictable, which is why we shouldn't be too upset about the failure of Dustin and Dervish.
There is more information available than ever on sex. So all you have to do to become a good lover is to read all the books? Not so. In fact, there is a growing belief that technique is over-rated…
We’ve come a long way since the Censorship of Publications Board banned an Irish Family Planning booklet in 1976. But we still have a lot to learn about sex, love and respect.
When it comes to flirting, Irishmen are rank amateurs – as our correspondent discovered on a foray into the murky but, as it turned out, quite enjoyable world of speed dating
Far from leading to violence, studies show that the availability of hard core porn leads to a reduction in sex crimes. And besides, perfectly normal people enjoy it.
It’s a question that is asked in most relationships at one time or another. But what should you do when you get the feeling that the fantasy is more important than the reality – that you are just a surrogate for what someone else really wants?
To mark the 30th Anniversary of the launch of Hot Press, this issue comes with a free reprint of selected material taken from the magazine's first six months in 1977. It offers a unique insight into what was a seminal moment for Irish music and culture.
THE BALLOT–BOXES HAVE BEEN OPENED, THE VOTES SCRUTINISED UNDER THE STRICTEST OF SECURITY AND NOW THE RETURNING OFFICER STEPS UP ONTO THE STAGE TO ANNOUNCE THE RESULTS OF THE 1993 HOT PRESS READERS’ POLL
An old friend. A warm place. A moment of rare intimacy. Lust takes its own wonderful shape. Having slept together before, what difference would one more trip through the wild undergrowth make?
Atomic Bomb is positively Spector-esque in its ambition, although curiously enough, it’s not a showy record, the playing being mostly subservient to the songs.
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.
30th Anniversary Retrospective: Well, in 2007, at least the choice is yours. Which is a bit of a change from 1977 when Hot Press launched. Back then, you couldn’t even buy a condom legally in Ireland…
SHORT CUTS (Directed by Robert Altman. Starring Andie McDowell, Bruce Davison, Julianne Moore, Mathew Modine, Anne Archer, Fred Ward, Jennifer Jason Leigh, Chris Penn, Lili Taylor, Robert Downey Jr., Madeleine Stowe, Tim Robbins, Lily Tomlin, Tom Waits, Frances McDormand, Peter Gallagher, Annie Ross, Lori Singer, Jack Lemmon, Lyle Lovett, Buck Henry, Huey Lewis)
Returning to London from a trip to Tuscany, Bootboy re-evaluates his love for urban anonymity, and discovers why there’s no room for big fish in the small ponds.
From child actress to Rilo Kiley frontwoman to hanging out with Elvis Costello: every day is Groundhog Day, but when you're Jenny Lewis that's not necessarily a bad thing.
MARY SHELLEY’S FRANKENSTEIN (Directed by and starring Kenneth Branagh, with Robert de Niro, Helena Bonham Carter, Tom Hulce, John Cleese, Ian Holm, Aidan Quinn)
Sprawling across four restless, angry and sometimes contradictory sides, "Rattle And Hum" is nothing less than U2's most ambitious album yet. Review by Bill Graham
Colm O'Hare turns over a new leaf or two from the huge variety of publications on the shelves this Christmas, from rock biographies to more general Irish published works. So, for those of you who like your entertainment between the covers, read on . . .
Although one of Ireland s smallest counties, Leitrim boasts of a strong musical heritage that can trace its lineage back to the 15th and 16th centuries with ease.
To suggest that music is thriving in Sligo is akin to declaring that there s been a bit of an upturn in the economy lately. Music of all breeds, creeds and colour can be found in abundance around the county.
As St Patrick’s Day approaches, what better time to celebrate all that’s great about Irish culture. From music and film to food and literature, Ireland has always punched far above its weight.
It reads like a scene from Twin Peaks but turns out to be far stranger than any fiction. Bill Graham dons his best John Travolta strides and eavesdrops on the American slants being given to Irish traditions at the Green Linnet Folk Weekender.
Pix: DAVID NEWTON.
Neil McCormick, a friend of U2 in their earliest days, who, as a writer, has closely monitored their progress since then, analyses Eamon Dunphy's much-touted 'authorised' biography "Unforgettable Fire" – and can't quite believe what he reads
All Write Now, we said. And boy did you follow instructions! The entries poured in from all over Ireland, and further afield, in their thousands. We were snowed under – but, as the song says: That’s the way, uh huh, uh huh, we like it…
