Having played to 80,000 people last year in Croke Park, The Police have confirmed that they’re returning to Ireland for a June 20 show in the grounds of Belfast’s Stormont Castle.
...or July 27th is, to be exact: for that's when Rod Stewart hits Belfast's Stormont Castle. Lock up your mothers (IF they want his body AND they think he's sexy)
As the dust settles in the wake of the Stormont Settlement, eamonn Mccann assesses the situation and wonders just how much of their ideology Republicans are in the process of jettisoning.
Martin McGuinness was one of the key figures in the troubles in Northern Ireland . Many unionists believe that the one-time IRA man was at the heart of much that was wrong and divisive in Irish life. But ultimately the quiet Derryman has taken on the role of peacemaker – and he is now the Deputy First Minister in the new power-sharing administration at Stormont.
As the new leader of the SDLP and Deputy First Minister in Northern Ireland, MARK DURKAN will have plenty to occupy his mind in 2002. Here he talks about the early death of his father, politics and paramilitaries in the North, the Dublin/Monaghan bombings, his opposition to Sellafield and membership of Greenpeace – and what Mo Mowlam might have piped into the Good Friday talks!
Words: JOE JACKSON
It's Friday, May 22. The votes haven't even been counted yet, but already a succession of post-ballot parties are taking place. Your prime location is the Mandela Hall at Queens University Belfast, where a few hundred groovers will congregate around an event organised by those feverish tykes from the local music magazine, Blank. The name of the game is 'Keep Ulster Brattish' and admission is a mere quid.
It's Friday, May 22. The votes haven't even been counted yet, but already a succession of post-ballot parties are taking place. Your prime location is the Mandela Hall at Queens University Belfast, where a few hundred groovers will congregate around an event organised by those feverish tykes from the local music magazine, Blank. The name of the game is 'Keep Ulster Brattish' and admission is a mere quid.
No-one knows a city like a local and so we asked Mike Edgar to be our guide to Belfast. Here he chooses ten things for visitors to do in the North s leading city. Only one problem: he forgot to tell us where to get an after-hours drink!
The Editor s office at Loaded is exactly how you imagined it would be. Heinous stains on the carpet. Tatty posters and ranting, scrawled messages on the walls. Buckshee liquor piling up on the table and numerous publishing awards plonked in the spare corners.
Kicking off our 2007 coverage of the northern music scene, Hit the North answers all of those questions that have been keeping you awake at night. And a few that haven’t.
You know them as heartfelt songwriters. But when they’re not mucking about in the studio, Neil Hannon and Thomas Walsh enjoy nothing more than a game of cricket. And they’re not just in it for the cucumber sandwiches, either.
NIALL STANAGE sees GERRY ADAMS and EAMON DUNPHY fight out an honourable draw. Pix: Peter Matthews
They've been talking about it for weeks. Now the moment of truth has finally arrived. The sense of anticipation that has been building up over the past few weeks, around the impending clash of these two old adversaries, has been immense. It's been billed as the clash of the titans, the battle of the giants, the mother of all matches and even, extraordinarily, as the rumble in the mumble. Now the house-full signs have gone up, the touts are out in force and there's an air of
expectancy you could cut with a knife.
NIALL STANAGE sees GERRY ADAMS and EAMON DUNPHY fight out an honourable draw. Pix: Peter Matthews
They've been talking about it for weeks. Now the moment of truth has finally arrived. The sense of anticipation that has been building up over the past few weeks, around the impending clash of these two old adversaries, has been immense. It's been billed as the clash of the titans, the battle of the giants, the mother of all matches and even, extraordinarily, as the rumble in the mumble. Now the house-full signs have gone up, the touts are out in force and there's an air of
Eddie Jordan is among the people behind the initiative that brings the money-spinning World Rally Championship to Ireland for the first time ever this year.
Journalist Susan McKay's new book, Bear In Mind These Dead, revisits the families of victims, for many of whom the emotional scars have been slow to heal.
Between the unattractive alternatives of the Belfast Agreement and a return to war, there has to be a new way forward for the Republican movement. So says former IRA man and respected Republican TOMMY McKEARNEY. Interview: EAMONN McCANN
PICS: CATHAL DAWSON
As Secretary Of State in Northern Ireland, Mo Mowlam [pic left by Mick Quinn] played a crucial role in formulation and implementation of the Good Friday Agreement. It helped that she is no conventional politician but rather a warm, down-to-earth and decent individual with a genuine commitment to positive action. in both the UK and Ireland, she became by far the most popular British figure in the history of Northern politics - which may explain why, in the end, she was shafted.
As Secretary of State for Northern Ireland, MO MOWLAM M.P. has one of the toughest, most thankless jobs in British and Irish politics. The task facing her is an unenviable one: to bring together the two extremes of both traditions, however briefly, for the purposes of all-party talks. In this exclusive interview, she talks about the difficult journey to date, and the immense challenges which lie ahead of her. Our man who went to Mo:
JOE JACKSON.
Pix: COLM HENRY.
Snow Patrol and Ash are just some of the North’s rock ambassadors who have given their backing to the Oh Yeah Music Centre, a state-of-the-art multi-media development which will put Belfast on the international musical map.
STUART CLARK collars Divine Comedy mainman Neil Hannon for a brief but highly intimate chinwag as they both take a break from drinking the bar dry at the Heineken/Hot Press Rock Awards in Belfast.
Promoter Jim Aiken, who passed away recently, was a hugely important and universally admired figure in the Irish music scene. Here, leading industry representatives pay tribute. (free content)
Senate leader Donie Cassidy, a reluctant interviewee, opens up about his rivalry with Fianna Fail colleague Mary O'Rourke and reminisces about his days in the show-band business.
There are those who believe that the Downing St. Declaration offers the best hope of peace in Northern Ireland for twenty-five years. But as Sinn Féin’s consideration of the fine print drags on, Bill Graham accuses them of theological nitpicking and argues that their negotiating position makes impossible demands on reality.
He may not be your average indie kids dream ticket, but Brian Kennedy has lived in very interesting times. An initially promising career was scuppered by record company machinations, but, under the stewardship of Van Morrison, he matured into a remarkably successful solo artist, as well as a respected novelist. Then there were the small matters of performing at George Best's funeral, the recent Eurovision controversy - and his current run at the helm of RTE's flagship summer Saturday night entertainment show.
Yes, you've read that headline somewhere before! But referendum on the Belfast Agreement gets into full swing in the North. Diary: NIALL STANAGE. Pix: peter matthews
Yes, you've read that headline somewhere before! But referendum on the Belfast Agreement gets into full swing in the North. Diary: NIALL STANAGE. Pix: peter matthews
Over the past twenty-five years, attitudes and experiences in the North’s two biggest cities, Belfast and Derry, have been markedly and vitally different. To understand why may help us to define both the opportunities for and the obstacles to peaceful change. Report: BILL GRAHAM
In the magical, wind-swept landscape of Ireland's remote north-west the cameras roll as U2's Bono and Maire of Clannad make the video for their collaborative single "In A Lifetime". Bill Graham joins the entourage at work and at play and talks to the main protagonists.
With close to forty TDs in the Dáil, and Labour in government with Fianna Fáil, the parties of the left have undergone something of a renaissance in Ireland over the past few years. There are those, however, who view this as a grand illusion, arguing that the cause of socialism is being ill-served by our elected representatives. Meanwhile, following the collapse of the East European model of communism, the left is experiencing a crisis of its own. GERRY McGOVERN talks to the activists who see themselves as carrying the socialist torch and profiles the parties who have yet to make an impact at the polls. Pix: CATHAL DAWSON.
There’s no pipe of peace – in fact no pipe at all from the non-smoking sinn féin leader – as Olaf Tyaransen asks if, given Osama Bin Laden’s use of terror as a political weapon, Gerry Adams might not have some sympathy for the world’s most wanted man. that question and other contentious queries relating to the IRA, Jean McConville and the murder of Garda Jerry McCabe are dealt with in an interview which also takes in Eoghan Harris, George Bush and Bono, and ends with the interviewee humming a familiar Monty Python tune.
Papers released through the Bloody Sunday Inquiry show that, as far back as 1972, even a Tory government in Britain could contemplate the idea of a united Ireland. EAMONN McCANN reports on bad news for the Unionists
Why the similarities between FF and SF may be greater than first anticipated. Plus: linguistic weirditude on The Irish Times letters page and our columnist launches a new book which gleefully satirises the Northern political process.
SOME people s spirits may have been lifted by the news that a British general election is likely to take place on May 1st, but not mine. Is there no way that anyone can engineer the termination of John Major s appalling government sooner than that?
Tributes have been pouring in, to one of the most important figures in the Irish music industry over the past fifty years, the concert promoter Jim Aiken, who died yesterday (free content)
THE CATHOLIC Church will legalise the pill. The IRA will cease firing. The reasons given in both cases will be fascinating, the language used a testimony to diplomacy and delicacy.
THAT WAS a bad old vibe in the United States recently, when that babe cut off her husband’s pecker with a kitchen knife after he had allegedly raped her. A bad vibe . . .
When the Northern powder keg went off, the conflict was painted as an ethno-religious one, rather than as a clash of political principles. But what was really going on remains unfinished business...
Foul-mouthed rebels with their fingers on the trigger and a take-no-prisoners attitude - no, it’s not the latest from Stormont, it’s Colin Carberry’s guide to the Northern Irish bands to look out for this year.
What a strange warp we were in. On Good Friday, I walked through an almost deserted BBC building in Ormeau Avenue with Mike Edgar, the producer of the Heineken Hot Press Awards show, as well as one of the presenters. Deeper into the bowels we went, along claustrophobic corridors, until we finally came to Edit Suite No.5.
AMID ALL the brouhaha – and indeed the brouhoho – about the IRA cease-fire and the promise of peace in our time, it seems to have escaped the attention of many commentators that the agenda being pursued was fully outlined in these very pages last year. By me, Samuel J. Snort, of course.
Lord Laird’s chequered past and unsavoury acquaintances make his criticism of Phil Flynn somewhat strange. Plus: Our columnist recalls a difficult meeting with Van Morrison and explores the origins of the singer’s legendary pugnacity.
Should the illegal arms be handed over? The Northern Ireland Secretary, Sir Patrick Mayhew, was, understandably, very anxious about the answer to that question. And he’s probably even more anxious now as he awaits publication of the report of the Scott Inquiry into arms-related sales to Iraq.
While the rest of you were off stuffing your faces with turkey, here at HotPress we were busily polishing our crystal balls in readiness for our annual gaze into the future. S
They say that he was among the most powerful – and the most ruthless – Republican activists of them all. Here the legendary Bobby Storey, reputed to have been Director of Intelligence for the IRA, talks for the first time about his role in the struggle, and about some of the critical events that led to the IRA ceasefire and the Peace Process.
