One thing you could never accuse the Stereophonics of is playing to the in-crowd. From their very first album they have adopted something of an outsider status, attracting more and more of an audience as the barbs of those too cool to bother with them also grew longer. One can only assume therefore that Language, Sex, Violence, Other? sounding so distinctly of the moment has to be more through accident than design. But right from the off, the combination of power chords, throbbing keyboards, samples and beats make Language, Sex, Violence, Other? sound like a thoroughly modern rock record.
Right from the off, the combination of power chords, throbbing keyboards, samples and beats make Language, Sex, Violence, Other? sound like a thoroughly modern rock record. It also has some good songs on it too, which was kind of the whole point of the Stereophonics in the first place.
This week sees the start of the first-ever national TV campaign on the issue of Violence Against Women under the banner End The Silence. Hot Press talks to a victim of domestic violence and a violent man, as well as getting the response of a leading expert working at the front line of the campaign against domestic violence in Ireland. Words Jackie Hayden
GER PHILPOTT examines the terrible ordeal of American writer Robert drake who was savagely attacked in Sligo earlier this year against the wider backdrop of continuing violence against gays in Ireland.
. . . Or not, as the case may be. In this extremely revealing interview with peter murphy, henry rollins speaks frankly about relationships, violence, depression, squaring up to Al Pacino and the problems that come with a life lived on the road
One thing you could never accuse the Stereophonics of is playing to the in-crowd. From their very first album they have adopted something of an outsider status, attracting more and more of an audience as the barbs of those too cool to bother with them also grew longer.
The voice of Deacon Blue, Ricky Ross has returned with this, his fourth solo album. Again it’s filled with terribly mawkish lyrics and sterile music. It’s a painful listen, like that scene in Wayne’s World where Gareth pictures his worst nightmare as being at a Kenny Rogers concert while undergoing dental surgery. I'm not one to advocate violence, but it's got to be said that anybody who buys this record should be shot. Sorry Ricky.
Well begorrah and top o' the mornin' to ye all, welcome to Oireland, a fictional theme park for tourists, populated by red-haired ragamuffins who're far too fond of the drink and incline to violence after the thirtieth pint, but sure there's no harm in 'em.
Unleashing a savage avalanche of escalating violence that far outstrips any modern-day American precursor in terms of pure unblinking brutality, Takeshi ‘Beat’ Kitano’s first US-filmed, English-language outing is also one of the most hair-raising and hard-hitting mob thrillers you will ever have occasion to witness.
I KNOW that there are more important things going on in the world than car clamping like, for example, the grotesque murder of the former IRA man Eamon Collins. But what can we say about that monstrous deed that adds to the sum of human insight, knowledge or happiness?
They say that you play venues like Whelan’s twice in your career – once on the way up, once in the other direction. The Stereophonics are somewhere between the two at the moment so their appearance at the Wexford St. venue has to be an unusual state of affairs. Indeed it is, part of a series of club dates designed to introduce new album Language, Sex, Violence, Other? and make the daily chore of talking to the press more bearable.
The 98,575,983rd Cockney-gangster thriller of the last year or two, Essex Boys could never be accused of excessive originality, but does at least treat its gratuitous-violence quotient with a deal more sensitivity than the last few flicks of this ilk.
“Rap is something you do, hip-hop is something you live”. So say the liner notes to this essential best-of compilation from KRS-One and longtime collaborators
Boogie Down Productions. Anti-violence, anti-guns and anti-materialist, they spread their hip-hop philosophies – “strategies toward enhanced health, love, awareness
and wealth‚” in the late 80s/early 90s via astute and highly socially-conscious raps they termed “edutainment”.
The violence sparked by cartoons mocking the prophet Mohammed forces us to ask serious questions about the importance of free speech – and the responsibilities which that right entails.
Adrienne Murphy reports on the aftermath of the violence which engulfed the Reclaim The Streets protest in Dublin and finds many wondering, not for the first time, 'who will guard the gardai?'.
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.
At a time when the British hip-hop scene is again witnessing extreme violence, COLM WALSH meets MC HARVEY of SO SOLID CREW and discovers how the problem is affecting the UK garage scene
Though her hippyish sensibilities are a throwback to the flower-power era, Florence Welch - aka Florence And The Machine - is one of the year's most hyped new artists. She talks about domestic violence, Andy Warhol and why sometimes hangovers can be good for you.
The conflict in the North is commonly analysed in terms of the kind of people involved in the violence. Paramilitaries, for example, are frequently explained, or explained away, as psychopaths or racketeers.
Reputed to have been the IRA's Chief of Intelligence, Bobby Storey talks for the first time about his role in the struggle, his organising role in the Maze prison break, and his feelings on IRA violence.
The creator of Bowling For Columbine, this year’s most devastating big screen documentary, shoots from the hip on violence, gun control, Charlton Heston, George Bush, satire and the Canadian solution to an American problem
Amid very public images of violence and allegations of intimidation and brutality on the part of members of the force, public confidence in the Gardai has plummeted. Imogen Murphy reports on what needs to be done.
Every day another outrage. Every day another act of vengefulness and malice. Intimidation. Violence. Shootings. Then murder. The North has seen some desperate times lots of them even more full of doom than this, for sure. But seldom has there been a week of more intense clandestine viciousness than the one we have just been through.
The Winner In Me - Don Baker's Story, by Jackie Hayden, is the painfully honest account of the private life of one of Ireland's best-known musicians, and describes his efforts, as an adult, to come to terms with an unhappy childhood and a past littered with violence, crime and alcoholism. In this exclusive extract, Don describes how he believes his troubled childhood relationship with his mother left him with an enduring fear of betrayal in his relationships with women.
The sense of shock about what happened when football-related violence erupted at Lansdowne Road for the first time during the Ireland v. England game still lingers, almost a week on.
Although accusations of anti-semitism and gratuitous ultra-violence are being used to denounce the film in certain quarters, Tara Brady nonetheless contends that Mel Gibson’s The Passion Of The Christ is ultimately a poignant and overwhelming experience.
A defining personality of the seismic changes in Northern Ireland, Billy Hutchinson is a paramilitary turned politician, a convicted UVF murderer who spent 16 years in the Maze and who will now represent the PUP in the new Assembly. But if Hutchinson has abandoned violence, it hasn’t altogether abandoned him. As he reveals in this interview with niall stanage, there have been three attempts on his life by the INLA in the last 18 months.
Pics: Michael Taylor.
LOST LIVES, the stories of the men, women and children who died as a result of The Troubles, is one of the most remarkable and essential books of our time. NIALL STANAGE interviews one of its authors, BRIAN FEENEY, and on the opposite page, recounts how his own life was touched by a violent chapter that many now hope is drawing to a close.
. . . she was reet petite! That's not true, actually. Instead, the maverick motorbike-riding DUP councillor and former Lord Mayor of Belfast talks about loyalist paramilitary violence, the assassination of prison officers, the indifference of London, his hostility to Mary Robinson, his scorn for the Official Unionist Party - and his own willingness to take up arms in the cause of keeping the six counties out of a united Ireland. Interview: JOE JACKSON. Pix: CATHAL DAWSON
With anti-Republican sentiment running high in the wake of the Enniskillen massacre and the O’Grady kidnapping, and with the first wave of joint RUC-Garda arms searches in progress, Kate Shanahan travelled to Belfast for an exclusive interview with Sinn Féin President, Gerry Adams. In it, the Westminster MP recalls his childhood in Belfast, evaluates the position the IRA now find themselves in and outlines his personal views on subjects as diverse as abortion, the Catholic Church, Dessie O’Hare, Bono and the role of violence in the Republican struggle.
Is Ireland really drowning in gargle? Is there no hope for the youth? and is ever more draconian legislation all we can do? Dermot Stokes sidesteps the hysteria to offer some sober reflection on the use and misuse of alcohol
WITH ITS RESOUNDING ECHOES OF THE TROUBLES, THE WAR BETWEEN THE BASQUE SEPARATIST GROUP ETA AND THE SPANISH STATE REMAINS BLOODY AND SEEMINGLY INTRACTABLE. WITH HIS FIRST BOOK, DIRTY WAR, CLEAN HANDS, IRISH JOURNALIST PADDY WOODWORTH PRESENTS A COMPELLING BUT OFTEN HARROWING ACCOUNT OF HOW VIOLENCE DEFEATS POLITICS AND TERROR BEGETS TERROR. AND, REFLECTING ALSO ON HIS OWN PAST POLITICAL INVOLVEMENT WITH SINN FÉIN, HE TELLS JOE JACKSON HOW HE HAS COME AROUND TO THE VIEW THAT TALKING IS ALWAYS BETTER THAN WAR. AUTHOR PORTRAITS: CATHAL DAWSON.
I ve had people start crying, people who went Sweet Jesus , and people who stopped coming to my house because of the issues I m dealing with. Paul O Mahony uncovers the extraordinary talent of Tony Crosbie, bubbling under the Dublin art scene with work personally informed by sexual abuse, domestic violence, alcoholism and drug abuse, but pointing the way to discovery and triumph.
Peter Greenaway’s latest film The Baby Of Mâcon has aroused critical opprobrium due to its blend of religious imagery and unnerving violence. Here, the director defends the movie, outlines his attitude to the moral guardians who object to his work and explores the importance of ritual in cinema and contemporary advertising. Interview: Patrick Brennan
At the time of writing indications are that Tori Amos’ ‘Cornflake Girls’ single will hit the No.1 spot in the British charts this week. Celebrations may indeed be in order – but for Tori right now there are far more burning issues to be talked through and dealt with. In an extraordinarily intimate, open and at times devastatingly honest interview, she talks about the horrific knife-point rape documented in ‘Me And A Gun’, the lingering wounds inflicted on her by the experience and the difficult healing process she has begun – including, she says, accepting the ‘prostitute’ in herself. Along the way she challenges a wide range of assumptions on love, sex, violence, religion, masturbation, feminishm, lesbianism and the main
man himself, Jesus Christ. By Joe Jackson.
Fifty Nigerians were forcibly deported last month. On their return to west Africa, they will face intimidation and violence. Why is the Government doing nothing?
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
An escalation of violence within certain deprived pockets of the Travelling community has provoked a Garda clampdown that many regard as heavy-handed. Meanwhile, despite some notable efforts to improve cross-community relations, Travellers must continue to cope with discrimination, alienation and a growing accommodation crisis. Mic Moroney reports on a people struggling to survive in the shadow of the Celtic Tiger.
From circus dwarves, incest and lesbian love affairs to severed organs and transvestite Indian brothels, John Irving’s novels are awash with enough tales of screwball sex and lurid violence to make even Quentin Tarantino blush. With his mammoth new 633-page novel A Son Of The Circus just published, the multi-million selling New Hampshire author indulges in a spot of verbal wrestling with liam fay, who discovers why he should keep this particular tête-à-tête purely literary. Pix: Cathal Dawson.
In the wake of the IRA’s complete cessation of violence, the Unionist community must engage in a process of re-defintion – because while they have been clinging to the last vestiges of the British Empire, the world around them has been transformed. By Bill Graham.
Dublin's unlikely new Lord Mayor, Tomás MacGiolla, gets a lot off his chest on subjects as diverse as pomp and ceremony, government discrimination against Dublin, the re-zoning scandal, violence and prostitution on the streets of the capital, conspiracies to undermine the Workers Party and, inevitably, his palpable bitterness towards Democratic Left. Interview: Liam Fay. Pics: Colm Henry.
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.
He revolutionised contemporary fiction with Fight Club. But, with more than one brutal murder lurking in the family undergrowth, Chuck Palahniuk's own life has been as troubled and disturbing as any of his books
Bearing in mind the chequered history of his predecessors, Eamonn McCann reckons Pope Benedict XVI may be letting himself in for a hell of a lot more than he bargained for.
The world is full of well-meaning people making things worse.
After the murder of the three Quinn children, well-meaners jammed the lines to phone-in programmes with suggestions, for example, that a covered walk-way should be constructed along the length of the Garvaghy Road
Coming off the suck of her dark leading role in Marina Corr’s Aerial, Ingrid Craigie is happy to get up to some mischief in the Gate’s production of The Misanthrope, as she tells Joe Jackson
Following the familial disquiet of Benny’s Video, the creeping dread of Hidden and Isabella Huppert’s unlikely shenanigans in The Piano Teacher, we’ve grown accustomed to the perversities of Michael Haneke.
It is very difficult to get any debate going about the banning of Natural Born Killers. The reasons are obvious. Since the film has been banned, not many people in Ireland have seen it.
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.
It’s not revolutionary or groundbreaking stuff by garage standards, but it’s an impressive enough statement of intent from potentially Peckham’s finest export since the family Trotter.
What's this, Bill Callahan's comedy hour? Not exactly. The flippancy of the whimsical title is just there to lull you into a state of joviality before the punches come raining down.
IT S A great concept, you ve got to admit. A Limey journalist who doesn t know his Big Punishers from his Lil Kims goes to South Central, spends a year hanging out with the local hip hop hopefuls and produces the first book on gangsta rap that you don t have to be dope, fly or packing heat to understand.
THE OBVIOUSLY dark and troubled mind of screenwriter supreme Paul Schrader has been responsible for some of the century's most compelling cinema (he penned the scripts to Raging Bull and Taxi Driver, the latter being almost better in screenplay form than it was as a movie.) Now an increasingly confident director, Schrader has gifted us the first must-see arthouse flick of the season.
"An end to the war, which means of course the forswearing of armed struggle on all sides, would be most welcome, wether or not it is accompanied by an immediate alleviation in the economic conditions of the working class."
Don Baker and King Sativa are among the artists confirmed to play the May Day Carnival. Meanwhile, Sinn Fein has condemned the "media hysteria" about the protests being planned for May 1
This is Murder Ballads made celluloid – epic, edgy and contemptuous of the standards imposed by convention. It’s also an endlessly fascinating, morally complex proper Western despite the potential for Skippy sightings.
Consent1 v.i. express willingness, give permission, agree, (to a thing, to do, that, or abs.); -ing adult, (esp.) homosexual. [ME f. OF consentir f. L CON- (sentire sens - feel) agree]
Gemma Hayes's debut album collects great reviews from such tastemakers as Music Week, the Sunday Observer and (ahem) Ok Magazine's 'Hot Stars' (the last of whom reckoned, 'She's not just a pretty face - she's actually very good.' Cheers, thanks...)
The enfant-terrible of Korean cinema, Chan-wook Park, is back with perhaps his most challenging and surreal feature to date. Yest, amidst the gore and torture, he says, lies a serious moral message.
These days you're more likely to meet a witch at the frontlines of mass anti-globalisation rallies than on the mountain tops under a full moon. Renowned American witch and author Starhawk tells Adrienne Murphy why.
For indie boys of a certain age, Tanya Donelly’s absence has been a cause to mourn. The Pixies may have written the A-Z yet in the early ‘90s nobody exemplified the bubble-gum indie aesthetic quite so hauntingly and thrillingly as Donelly’s band, Belly.
Thundering out of El Paso, Texas with the ferocity of a guerrilla firebomb come At The Drive In, touted internationally, somewhat hysterically if the press cuttings are anything to go by, as this year’s saviours of the US punk underground.
Following atrick Chamusso's arrest and torture for a crime he did not commit, he joined the African National Congress to become a freedom fighter for the cause. Catch A Fire, a political thriller based on Chamusso’s story.
Swedish cinema is not noted for its humour, its greatest exponent being Ingmar Bergman, who, for the uninitiated, is like Woody Allen without the jokes (or at least that's what Woody Allen would like to think). Which is a cliché of course, and one delightfully undermined by House of Angels.
The idea of a hip-hop act on Epitaph might have raised a few eyebrows amongst the West Coast Mohican Mafia, but Minneapolis trio Atmosphere are definitely imbued with the attitude of their spiky guitar label mates, if somewhat heavier on the funk then punk.
Depending on where you stand, this is either essential listening or something to be avoided like the plague, but if nothing else they make latter-day Oasis sound good – no mean achievement!
It falters on more than one occasion certainly, and the ballad card is played perhaps a touch too often, but Stripped proves that she is a major talent
DID we really imagine that it might be any different? What was it that created the expectation that Drumcree would not become another celebration of Orange supremacism in 1997? Looking back now over the events of the past few weeks, it s hard to believe that we were naive enough to hold out any hope of a compromise. It s hard to believe that we did not see the writing on the wall.
Having added such a forcefully new dimension to proceedings here in Ireland, it’s hard to believe that I Am Brazil is TRM’s first full-length album proper.
When an album kicks off with the line "She broke my heart, so I ate her liver/And dumped her putrefying carcass in the river", you know you're not in for an easy ride. But hey, hey, it's The Hitchers - Limerick's very own post-modern, guitar-pop ironists - with another instalment of cartoon punk for our delectation and delight.
Along with the voice, Fox has the attitude and substance to pull off a certain element of repetition in Messy. However she doesn’t quite dodge the usual pitfall of the genre, and has a tendency to lapse into Ali-G style faux-ghetto posturing.
*THE TWO biggest pleasures in life are fucking and killing.* This, stated succinctly and brilliantly, is the world-view of the redoubtable Perdita Durango, quite definitely the most unforgettable noir heroine since (at the very least) Thelma ... Louise.
For a city so often celebrated in song, it was inevitable that the horrific events in new york would be felt as keenly in the music world as in any other section of society. STUART CLARK reports on the industry response and compiles a broad selection of individual reactions to the attack
Talky, sparky and definitely profane, Studs is an Irish soccer film and underdog to root for. Set against the decadently muddy backdrop of Sunday league football, Paul Mercier’s comedy-drama (adapted from his own play) traces the suddenly changing fortunes of incompetent fictional amateurs Emmet Rovers.
Dabbling in the same muddied waters as Fight Club, but to much greater effect, David Ayers’ directorial debut (following his testosterone-drenched screenplays for Training Day and Dark Blue) takes us down, down, down into the most disturbing aspects of masculinity and American life.
Carlos Reygadas’ film starts as it means to go on – with a cartoonishly rotund, scruffy older gentleman receiving oral pleasure from a dreadlocked nymph, tear rolling elegantly down her cheek as she goes.
Playing like a high-brow version of the Stations of the Cross, this twisted redemption tale follows Marcus (Hernandez), a chauffeur and unlikely sexual plaything for Ana (Mushkadiz), the wild and privileged young woman he drives.
The war is over. There are many messages that can be read into the overwhelming endorsement of the Good Friday Agreement on both sides of the Irish border - but that is the most conclusive, and the most welcome.
Ferrell never lets a scene pass without adding a comic macho snarl or pelvic thrust. Heder is delightfully fey and goofy. If they’re ever looking to cast for Football In The Groin, I think we’ve found our guys.
Nauseating and insidiously compelling in equal measure, writer/director Minahan’s debut opus Series 7: The Contenders is the filmic equivalent of channel-surfing all night long on American network telly.
Despite being denied a visa to enter the UK this week, Snoop Dogg has promised he’ll be in Dublin on March 31 and April 1 to perform in The Point alongside P. Diddy.
Belfast-based novelist Jo Baker has once again become the subject of much attention in literary circles with the publication of her powerful and compelling second novel The Mermaid’s Child.
When Rodney Crowell last played here, at the Kilkenny Rhythm and Roots weekend, as part of his solo act he read (from a work in progress - a book about his childhood) a piece about the first time he heard Johnny Cash and the song 'I Walk The Line'.
Controversial Welsh filmmaker Marc Evans discusses his new project, violent reality-TV parody My Little Eye, and fondly remembers the mayhem his last one caused
One of the problems of working for a fortnightly publication is that events can so easily overtake you. Right now, on Monday 9th October, the stark reality is that the Middle East is on the brink of all-out war. By the time you read this, Israel may have forced the region over that brink, potentially plunging Egypt, Jordan, Syria, Libya and the Lebanon, as well as Palestine, into a full-scale conflict.
I could never figure out why so many scribes creamed themselves over the Pixies. To me they were mediocrity incarnate, musically limited and hardly bursting at the seams with lyrical wisdom.
The soundtrack features eight tracks from the canine one himself, and contributions from any hip-hop crew who happened to have a free weekend around recording time
How intolerant can we become? It’s a challenging question. We have already become one of the least tolerant and aggressive societies on earth. Few can compete. But 2003 witnessed an upsurge in control culture. This is especially the case in ‘official’ circles. There are six causes.
Irish journalist, novelist and musician JOE AMBROSE has JUST published The Violent World Of Mosh Pit Culture (book), an explosive first-hand account of life inside the mosh pit. STEPHEN ROBINSON spoke to him about the sex, brutality and freedom to be discovered within the ‘pits.
And now it, and The Stunning, are back – albeit for a limited period only. If you were one of those who thrilled to this first time round, chances are that this reissue will leave you all dewy eyed and nostalgic.
TRUE ROMANCE (Directed by Tony Scott. Starring Christian Slater, Patricia Arquette, Dennis Hopper, Val Kilmer, Gary Oldman, Brad Pitt, Christopher Walken)
The concrete jungle of London’s downtrodden and multi-racial East End is home to some of the most terrifying statistics BBC news has to report, as well as some of the hardest, filthiest hip hop and drum ‘n’ bass beats in the UK. The area’s many big mouthed, bigging-up MCs frequently play with the term urban poet, but rarely is it so aptly claimed than in the case of this young acoustic guitar-playing, Bukowski-reading, Radiohead-loving rapper.
With even the comparatively tranquil Euro 2004 marred by trouble on the Algarve, the issue of football hooliganism remains a live one. Now, one of its definitive texts has made it to the big screen. Craig Fitzsimons meets the men – and learns about the hard men – behind The Football Factory
WE RE heading for some kind of watershed, I m told. And yet, no matter how hard I try, there s nothing happening in the Northern peace talks that I can become even the remotest bit enthused about.
Common has retreated from the sonic adventure and wilful eclecticism of his previous release, 2002’s Electric Circus. Perversely, he has managed to achieve greater creative success in doing so. Rather than minimising its impact, the tight, cohesive nature of the material on Be is a welcome change of focus.
Recent violent attacks, such as the horrendous killing of two Polish men, may have involved young people. But that shouldn't lead us to tar an entire generation.
A BLOOD-CURDLING howl of violent white rage that looks set to reverberate around the world for some time to come, Fight Club is an almighty, disturbing, monstrous motherfucker of a movie which power-drills its way into the viewer’s head like few films since the heyday of Martin Scorsese.
After stepping down from her position as Director of the DUBLIN RAPE CRISIS CENTRE, OLIVE BRAIDEN tells KIM PORCELLI how far things have come, and how great a distance is still to be travelled to get justice for victims
WAKE up. Look at yourself in the mirror, Ian Paisley. What do you see? There’s three children’s faces there. Tight cropped hair. Grins from ear to ear.
I stopped playing football at the age of eighteen and stayed away from it for twelve years. By then I had a son, and it was kicking ball with him, and witnessing his unselfconscious enthusiasm for the game that first re-awakened the sense of magic that football had held for me during my own childhood and teenage years.
Over the past decade in ‘The Hot Press Political Interview’ the subject of Northern Ireland has, not surprisingly, surfaced time and time again. What follows is but a small selection of these quotes, specifically those that look to the future rather than to the past.
A misbegotten, footsore bone-crushing trek through the industrial badlands of Northern Germany finally left me in a single hotel room in Frankfurt uncorking a dutyfree bottle of Old Bushmills.
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.
She may be very sensitive about babies and young people and her ideal bloke might have to be respectful, responsible and Christian – but that don’t mean Kelly Rowland doesn’t want to be bootylicious.
Dizzee Rascal’s third album is an inspired affair, building on the basic sonic template of his acclaimed first two albums and adding new layers of audio trickery. Make no mistake about it – this is one mean sounding record.
Acclaimed by the Academy, Gavin Hood's film Tsotsi introduces audiences to a hoodlum's slow, but captivating, rehabilitation, along with the big no no's of childcare.
The more I think about it, the more angry I feel. What is this bullshit the bishops have been peddling, about not understanding fully the seriousness of child sexual abuse?
Ryan Adams’ third album in the space of a year is a meditation on his 20s, with each of the nine songs representing a year of his life from 21 to his current age of 29 – apparently he didn’t think 20 counted as he still felt like he was 19.
I find it hard to know where to begin, so deep is the sense of disillusionment I feel. Every few days now, it seems, we are confronted by some new racially-motivated abomination in Ireland. Last week the Richardson family from England were the victims a mixed race group of father (white), mother (black) and son (student at Trinity College), they were on a night out in Dublin, celebrating a family occasion. Walking back, along Pearse Street, to the apartment in which they were staying, they were attacked by a bunch of yobs shouting racial insults. The father, David Richardson, was stabbed brutally and almost died. Rushed to hospital, he remained in intensive care for days. Who knows what scars he will carry with him, physically and psychologically, for the rest of his days as a result?
Hezbollah may be a significant part of the problem, but there is no justification whatsoever for the indiscriminate murder of civilians, of which the Israelis are guilty in Lebanon.
Historian and broadcaster ROBERT KEE is best known for his acclaimed series Ireland – A Television History. He talks to LIAM FAY about the Northern conflict and the role of censorship in prolonging it.
Last House, remember, is no mere brainless cut-‘em-up but a twisted reworking of Ingmar Bergman’s The Virgin Spring from the same gentlemen who went on to direct Meryl Streep in Music Of The Heart.
UNBELIEVABLY TOUTED in many quarters as a serious contender for Oscars glory, Ride With The Devil – an elegiac Dixie/Western set during the American Civil War – marks a sharp change of territory for its highly-respected director Ang Lee, a man more commonly associated with fine-lined character dramas such as the impeccable Ice Storm.
It’s not cool and it’s not clever. Okay, so it’s not awful either. This latest adaptation of an Elmore Leonard, er, novel, is certainly one of the better films from the very chequered Leonard sub-genre and as the follow-up to Get Shorty, no-one could accuse Be Cool of not delivering more of precisely the same.
Even if the Peace Agreement is accepted it might not work and will almost certainly result in the alienation of many northern citizens. The politicians, however, will have us believe that a No vote would automatically mean a return to all-out war. Eamonn McCann thinks otherwise. Pics: PETER MATTHEWS
Her work is brutally explicit and fired by an anger that seems to know no limits. GERRY McGOVERN plunges into the black heart of two new works by one of contemporary art's most controversial women, Lydia Lunch.
Nerdlinger frontman Cormac Sheehan inadvertently got caught up in the rioting in Genoa last week while attending the G8 summit protest with anti-capitalist group Globalise Resistance.
1999 and what the hell is going on? Leisure time in our booze economy is more likely to entail getting plastered, donning a cheap '70s wig and dancing to some awful tribute act than checking out something new. Even the silver screen is dominated by the likes of Boogie Nights and Special Agent Austin Powers celebrating the 'shagadelic' seventies. Groovy baby, yeah? Not if you are looking through The Auteurs' untainted glasses.
Cats And Dogs is a highly appealing and well-executed slice of comedy which should ensure the film has crossover appeal beyond the built-in kiddie market.
For the most part, the May Day protests – timed to coincide with Europe’s Day of Welcomes – were peaceful. But outside Farmleigh House, where the European Union’s 25 Prime
Ministers were meeting, the shit finally hit the fan.
I M looking again now at a picture taken at the funeral of the West Belfast taxi driver John McColgan, who was murdered by the LVF. In the centre is Lorraine McColgan, John s wife, her face contorted with crying, her body doubled over in grief.
*Well, it's 9th and Hannepin/And all the donuts have/names that sound like prostitutes/And the moon's teethmarks are/on the sky like a tarp thrown over this...*
It is never a particularly auspicious sign when a film hangs around in post-production for over a year, and in The Thirteenth Warrior’s case, the process has been so protracted that director John McTiernan’s subsequent feature (the remake of The Thomas Crown Affair) has already beaten it to the big screen.
Just how far do you think you can push it tonight? Choose your poison, your company, your floor space and let human nature take its course to wherever… And no matter how high or low you’ve managed to take yourself or anyone else, on the available evidence Oisin Lunny has beaten you there already.
"I've made another great movie, and the critics have already said it's a great summer hit," Arnold Schwarzenegger declared at Cannes recently, promoting his latest bid for world domination, "The Last Action Hero".
Condemned by Palestinian groups as a malicious work of Zionist propaganda; damned by Jewish organisations for being ‘soft on terrorism’, this well intentioned and Spielbergised account of the Arab-Israeli conflict has something to offend everyone.
In the Port-au-Prince shanty Cité Soleil, “the most dangerous place on earth”, the violent youths employed to do the bidding of then-President Jean-Bertrand Aristide are called chimeres or ghosts. The name is apt; those who aren’t dead soon will be.
Original Pirate Material is the best album by a British artist since OK Computer. He is a rapper, producer, songwriter and bedroom boffin extraordinaire that has set a new benchmark for just how thrilling, insightful, innovative and brilliant music can get
The Sounds Of Science is a beautifully packaged, comprehensive anthology of the work of Adam 'Ad-Rock' Horowitz, Michael 'Mike-D' Diamond, Adam 'MCA' Yauch and, latterly, Money Mark Nichita, from their early hardore days, through the Bratpop of Licenced To Ill right up to Hello Nasty. Since the start of the '80s, when the Boys first inflicted their cacophonic buzzsaw guitarfest on New York, they have experimented with genres from hip-hop through to country, from punk to bossanova, sampling everyone from Run DMC to Rachmaninoff into the bargain.
STRIKING THE RIGHT CORD'
Film soundtrack buffs and nattily-attired acid jazz whippersnappers CORDUROY tell peter murphy about their strange
passion for Dave Allen's theme tune.
Surpassing even the recent Gangster No.1 in its constant use of the now apparently-acceptable 'C'-word, Mr. Madonna's follow-up to the strikingly fresh '98 mini-classic Lock Stock And Two Smoking Barrels is more of the same only better.
BERNARD FARRELL is flying in more ways than one. Speaking on the phone from Dublin Airport he's just picked up the Sunday newspapers and, following the five positive reviews his play "The Last Apache Reunion" received in the dailies, all of the Sundays are also singing its praises.
The future in nifty twelve-point type, summoned for you out of the ether by the Oracle of Hot Press, the redoubtable, all-powerful, spookily omniscient, scarily prescient, frighteningly knowledgeable but really quite friendly when you get to know him, Old Hayden. Read it and live better
Tonight’s noisily chatty office-party crowd are certainly excited about something, but it may or may not be Life After Modelling. They should be, though: the Lifers’ short set is a compact bang-zap of straight-as-a-die Noughties post-punk, leavened by dreamlike, hand-holdey boy-girl harmonies.
Fact, fiction and hard graft form the inspirations for DERMOT HEALY s acclaimed memoir The Bend For Home. LIAM FAY meets an author who moves rocks, stones and words. Pic: CATHAL DAWSON
Say what you like about the Stereophonics – and let’s face it, the Welsh superstars have taken their share of flak over the years – but 10 years since they first emerged they’re arguably bigger than ever.
Sinead O'Connor isn't exactly one to take things lying down, and some US websites are about to find this out for themselves. In an exclusive chat with Hot Press she puts the story straight and talks about her next album. Only here folks!
Colm O’Hare talks to Kerry King, guitarist with thrash-metal outfit Slayer, and discovers that under that murderous, violent exterior lies a great big pussy cat . . . almost.
They got their first break when their single featured on an ad for digital cameras. Now South Africa’s The Parlotones are setting out to conquer the world.
It is both a strength and a weakness that print journalism is so governed by the deadline. There is no ambiguity, as the courier sweeps away with the final proofs, or film or discs. Anything else is for the next issue, for tomorrow, for next year.
The time of the year that is in it, I suppose you are all expecting me to say a few words about the ancient sport of Bogball, what it means, and where it is headed.
The most unremittingly bleak and depressing indie offering to emerge from the States all year (with the possible exception of Paul Schrader's Affliction), this deeply fucked-up slice of white-trash junkie psychosis is a hard-hitting, supremely affecting journey into the black heart of the American nightmare, with some of its images powerful enough to merit comparison with Badlands, Taxi Driver and other similarly-flavoured excursions to hell.
Somewhere on my shelves is a book called Hooligan: A History of Respectable Fears. Even the title summarises the way too many people think about crime, and particularly the Minister for Justice and the Gardam.
Stuart Clark visited Swaziland to see the work done there by Skillshare International Ireland, who help the Swazis help themselves in the fight against AIDS, sexual abuse and violence. Photos by Gary James McGovern and Simon Parry
For the average expat Irish criminal living in Spain, life is a blur of booze, prostitutes and drug deals with the threat of violence, and even death, never far away.
Author Daniel Pinchbeck discusses psychedelic drugs and shamanism as potential tools for the evolution of consciousness – catalysts of change in our age of violence and ecological meltdown.
Reporting from the frontline of the Palestine-Israel conflict has convinced RTÉ’s Richard Crowley that the spiral of violence is likely to continue. But it is wrong to believe that the blame is equal.
Stereophonics are lining-up an invite-only Irish show at the end of January to introduce fans to their new Language. Sex. Violence. Other? album, which is due in March.
Violence? Racism? Crack cocaine? Misogyny? It must be the Happy Mondays at Witnness 2000. Rowetta speaks for the first time about coming under attack from the "big-nosed bastard"
It is five years since rapper TUPAC SHAKUR was gunned down on the streets of las vegas in a gangland-style shooting that took place on September 7, 1996. Since then he has become the subject of one of modern music’s most bizarre death cults, as he continues to sell millions of records and to top charts all over the world. but behind his death lies a story of hip-hop babylon – a sordid tale of intrigue, egos, drugs, sex, intimidation, violence – and, almost by the way, some great and enduring music.
By PETER MURPHY
During the days of protest at last month's G8 summit in Italy, police raided the Independent Media Centre in Genoa and tried to seize video footage. Journalist and documentary-maker Eamonn Crudden was among a group of twelve who travelled from Ireland to Genoa for the protests. He told ADRIENNE MURPHY about the experience.
EMINEM s supposedly knowing take on the violence, homophobia and misogyny endemic to rap has lost its lustre with his wife s suicide attempt. Report: Peter Murphy
"It was a Saturday afternoon, and I was alone in the Hot Press offices, heavily doped." So begins a story, possibly involving sex and violence, about reggae legend Dennis Brown. As it would
An ex-con, a foe of The Krays and a man capable of such acts of violence that he once sliced off a prison guard s ear, Mad Frankie Fraser now makes quite a nice living for himself spinning yarns about his gangster years. Stuart Clark interrogates him about prison, drugs, the IRA, Arsenal and a novel theory on Veronica Guerin s murder which, Fraser insists, the Irish media haven t had the bottle to print. Mugshots: Cathal Dawson
At the time of writing, we are in a state of suspended animation. The new, so-called Blueprint for the North which has been hammered together over the past fortnight by the Irish and British governments is finished.
It may have been ill-advised for Pope Benedict to make a speech that seemed critical of Islam. But there's no need for everyone to get so hot and bothered...
Public Enemies is an extraordinary and controversial book of photographs of British neo-Nazis, taken by Hot Press’ London photographer Leo Regan. “You’re never going to combat racism unless you know where it’s coming from”, he says. Report: Stuart Clark.
They've been steadily losing ground to a resurgent Sinn Féin - and now there are rumours of a merger with Fianna Fáil. So does the SDLP really have a future? Mark Durkan clears the air.
What do you feel, what do you say, what do you do, when someone you love – in this case a Loyalist gunman – is accused of deliberate, cold-blooded premeditated multiple murders? The conflict in the North has generated thousands of stories of the brutalisation of innocent victims. This is just one of them.
THE conflict in the North has nothing to do with religion. That is the startling argument put forward by Peter Robinson in an interview in this issue of Hot Press.
Popular culture has seldom been this unremittingly grim. Resurrection Man is based on the blood-curdling activities of
the Shankill Butcher, and it stars
stuart townsend.
Interview: craig Fitzsimons.
IN A recent issue of Hot Press, I hastily claimed that, given a choice of the latest country releases, I'd opt for Clint Black's album, No Time To Kill.
As the dust settles, we can say a couple of things for sure: the first is that the opinion polls generally got it spectacularly wrong; the second is that the pundits fared even worse, in terms of their attempts to call the result in advance
New Order are giants, the four-piece that saved guitar pop. At a terribly dull time in the '80s, they brought the rush of possibilities of electronic music to the knuckle-dragging indie masses and added sophistication, sex and mystery to their genre of choice, a genre dying on its arse. Every guitar band that has added electronica to its palette without fear of the sky falling in – from U2 to The Killers – owes New Order a cut.
New Order are giants, the four-piece that saved guitar pop. At a terribly dull time in the '80s, they brought the rush of possibilities of electronic music to the knuckle-dragging indie masses and added sophistication, sex and mystery to their genre of choice, a genre dying on its arse. Every guitar band that has added electronica to its palette without fear of the sky falling in – from U2 to The Killers – owes New Order a cut.
Spurred on by his colleague Barry Glendenning’s trenchant and pithy critique of the pundits and commentators of France 98 elsewhere in this issue, Foul Play – the man who puts the “anal” into “analysis” – has decided to dole out his own small but perfectly formed golden statuettes to the men who mattered (and a few who didn’t) at the 16th World Cup.
With his new book, How To Murder A Man, novelist CARLO GÉBLER has written a compelling account of the hatred and animosity that fuelled Ireland's land war of the 19th century. Here, he discusses the ideas behind his work and the motives that drive him, with ADRIENNE MURPHY. Pics: Colm Henry
But it wasn’t confined to cell block number nine. In fact the whole of Dublin city centre was engulfed as mobs of rioters were given the run of the city by Gardai, in the wake of the protest against the holding of the Love Ulster parade in O’Connell Street. Rory Hearne pieces together the anatomy of a riot.
Bill Clinton has written to the organisers of the Good Vibrations Records anniversary concert to commend the label, along with boss Terri Hooley, for their support
IF THE truth be told I'm not normally much of a lad for war movies. I'm generalising here, but they're too long, their scripts tend to stink, there aren't many women to be seen, and I never did dig the sight of human blood in huge quantities.
The Coalition blitzkrieg on Iraq is part of a wider “war on terror.” says George Bush. To justify this claim, he and Tony Blair made one feeble attempt at being as hard on the causes of terror as on terror itself, when they collaborated with the UN, the EU and Russia to publish what they called the Middle East ‘road map’.
At the time of writing it is nearly a week since the order prohibiting interviews with members of Sinn Féin and Republican Sinn Féin, as well as various proscribed paramilitary organisations, under Section 31 of the Broadcasting Act, was allowed to lapse.
They're Ireland's leading hip-hop duo but there's more to Messiah J & The Expert than gangsta stereotypes. Over brunch, they talk about their move towards using live instruments and their hotly-tipped new record.
East Timor may be out of the headlines but for those on the ground the problem in that ravaged country is less one of re-building than of almost total construction from scratch. MACDARA DOYLE reports.
The only serious present-day heir to sainted founding fathers DMC and NWA, ex-crack dealer 50 Cent became an overnight hip-hop Godhead with his beyond-phenomenal debut Get Rich or Die Tryin’, an echoing, booming, bloodthirsty beast saturated with paranoia, claustrophobia and general violent vibes. It sold ten million-plus copies, and Eminem aside, the spliff-toting kids in my less-than-Bronxlike suburb scarcely listen to anybody else.
There are fewer refugees living in Ireland than there are Irish emigrants in Munich, but that hasn’t stopped Justice Minister John O’Donoghue, however inadvertently, whipping up race hate on the refugee issue.
Suzanne Vega talks to COLM O HARE about the
proliferation of serious female artists, the break-up of her marriage and incorporating spoken word into her performances
IN THE last issue of Hot Press we previewed the play which turned out to be the most universally-acclaimed production of the Dublin Theatre Festival: Marina Carr’s The Mai, which is still running at the Peacock Theatre.
‘THE CASE in Ireland of the 14-year-old girl who got pregnant as a result of rape was a key issue in our formation,” said Jessica Neuwirth, President of the New York based organisation of Equality Now.
IT HAS been suggested that Graham Reid’s plays are pungent with “the thick and acrid air” of Belfast. Any actor performing one of these production in The Lyric Players Theatre in Belfast at this point in time would certainly know if that statement is true.
IT IS OFTEN DISMISSED AS BIGOTED, SEXIST, VIOLENT AND TUNELESS. THERE IS, HOWEVER, MUCH MORE TO THE STORY OF RAP THAN THAT, YES, BIGOTED VIEW MIGHT SUGGEST. GERRY McGOVERN SINGS A HYMN OF PRAISE TO WHAT HE BELIEVES IS THE MOST INTENSE ART FORM OF THE NINETIES.
May 10 saw a crowd of several thousand take part in a pro-cannabis rally outside the Dáil. However, political expediency and media scaremongering mean that misinformation about the drug continues to be rife.
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
While other European nations party until dawn, Irish clubs are forced to close their doors early. Now campaigners like Sunil Sharpe want the law be liberalised.
Trip-hop legend Tricky on how he's falling in love with Europe, why he's dying to work with Kylie and why if you live in a rough part of the UK, it's best to carry a knife.
She spent years struggling with bit-parts and support roles. But now Naomi Watts is a Hollywood player, in the same league as her friend Nicole Kidman.
Ted Hawkins, in Dublin recently to play a never-to-be-forgotten gig in Whelan’s, talks about his journey down the long and winding road which led him from an early, joyless life of petty crime and racial discrimination to his belated fame as one of the most respected of contemporary blues men. Interview: Gerry McGovern.
The Make Poverty History marches in Dublin and Edinburgh were among the biggest political demonstrations in years. Rory Hearne kept a diary of an inspiring week on the barricades.
Despite the IRA’s declaration of a ceasefire, there is considerable evidence to suggest that the Provos, like their Loyalist counterparts, are still engaging in “punishment attacks” and in the issuing of expulsion orders. Report: Liam Fay. Pics: Alan O’Connor
Eleven cannabis dealers have been murdered in Northern Ireland, victims of the IRA’s Direct Action Against Drugs vigilante killings. So far, no one has even been questioned in relation to the killings...
BEING OUT of the country on holidays means I have yet to see the latest interpretation of Shakespeare's A Midsummer Night's Dream (Gate Theatre) but one fellow journalist did describe it as "a menopausal sex fantasy".
He’s collaborated with Bono, Mick Jagger, and Destiny’s Child, hung out with Bill Clinton and co-wrote the biggest selling rap album of all time. but that’s only the beginning. The multi-talented Wyclef Jean here discusses George W. Bush, the death of his father and why Michael Jackson might not be such a strange guy after all
Peter Murphy discusses the finer points of prophecy with US writer T.C. Boyle whose latest short story collection includes tales of plague, air rage and terrorism
CHRISTY HITS the chill-out zone? It’s enough to put the heart across club culturalists and hardcore troubadours alike. Moore’s often bedecked his songs with gaudy tapestries, but on Traveller, in partnership with Leo Pearson, he’s cross-pollinating folk forms with deep space beats, head music and ambient swashes, sticking his neck out further than ever before.
There are times when language itself seems inadequate to the reality with which we are confronted. Over the past months, we have seen the most astonishing sequence of events unfold in Dáil Éireann.
Zoo TV takes on an entirely new dimension as U2 introduce a nightly satellite link-up with the distressful city of Sarajevo. Bill Graham talks to Bono about the idea's conception, downfalls, and ultimate importance.
Contrary to the usual hysteria around drugs, Irish authorities have been alarmingly slow to respond to the availability of a truly dangerous pill – dob.
ANI DiFRANCO is one of contemporary music's most impressive originals. Without compromising her independence or political radicalism, she has scaled the heights of commercial and
critical success. In this, her only Irish interview, she speaks candidly to NIALL STANAGE about TAFKAP, her battles with the music industry, American 'gun culture' and the troubled family life which lies behind one of her most moving songs.
SAVAGE, disturbing and fiercely moral, the searingly powerful American History X - something of an American cousin to Romper Stomper - follows hot on the heels of Arlington Road and anticipates the similarly-themed Apt Pupil.
It has taken a long time, but at last a really clear picture is beginning to form of the involvement of the Catholic Church in child abuse - specifically in covering up and colluding in the abuse perpetrated by its priests and brothers
Uber-hip electro-rock merchants The Bravery are brewing up a storm on the UK indie scene thanks to their blindingly inventive records and raw and energetic live shows. Interview by Hannah Hamilton.
He said it, we didn't. Henry Rollins may not be the most obvious embodiment of the American Dream but nowadays everything he touches seems to turn to dollars. Dan Oggly discovers the alternative approach to commerce.
Dear John,
I read this week with interest about the deportations you re organising at the moment. A whole eight of them in just nine days? God, you must be a very busy man. Well done!
The terrorist attack in Beslan has shown that Russia may yet emerge as a major battle ground in the conflict between radical Islam and the major world powers.
While the Cathedral Quarter Arts Festival offered a typically eclectic and dynamic programme once again this year, the organisers behind the event nonetheless weren’t afraid to deliver a few uncomfortable home truths about Northern Irish society.
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)
It’s hardcore heaven this autumn as Dischord records release a 20-year retrospective CD, the story of Hope Promotions is chronicled in a new book and Fugazi return for an Irish tour
Students are renowned for their loud music, substance abuse and copulating in the streets. But eating disorders, anxiety, stress and depression may be more true to life.
You could hardly describe it as just another day at the office when we sent Joe Jackson to talk to the Deputy Leader of the Democratic Unionist Party, peter robinson. In a rancorous interview, they still manage to cover the party’s attitude to Catholics, homosexuals, Albert Reynolds, The Pope, the IRA, loyalist paramilitaries – oh and the small matter of an impending civil war. Pix: Colm Henry.
Arguably, the most contentious and controversial Irish political commentator of the last 25 years, Conor Cruise O’Brien’s analysis of Anglo-Irish affairs has always followed its own unique path. However, the scepticism with which he greeted the paramilitary ceasefires as well as his hardline stand on censorship, have led some to question the relevance of this most conservative of political observers. Interview: JOE JACKSON.
Pix: COLM HENRY.
How long must we sing this song? We ve known for what seems like aeons that Ireland in the first two thirds of the 20th century was a cesspit, in which children were routinely and systematically abused, physically and sometimes sexually, by people in whose care they were placed in sports clubs, schools, orphanages, reform schools and so on.
THERE are times when you wonder if this is the right line of work to be in. Maybe it's the fact that it's a small country and we all think that we know each other well. Whatever the reason, there are few things more unseemly than the spectacle of journalists squabbling, and there's been a hell of a lot of it going on in recent years. The mud-slinging which has surrounded the impending publication of Emily O'Reilly's book about Veronica Guerin is just the latest and most intense example of a malaise which is rapidly coming to characterise the Irish journalistic milieu.
With Kid Rock, Eminem and D12, Detroit has challenged the supremacy of east coast and west coast hip-hop acts.
COLM WALSH caught up with D12’s Kuniva and Wendy Case of the Detroit news to find out what’s going on.
WE need to be very careful. During the 1970s, under the Fine Gael-Labour coalition, a violent and nasty culture developed within sections of the Gardaí Síochana.
Rioting in Dublin raises many questions about our society. Not all are easily answered. Of one thing there can be no doubt, however: Glasgow Celtic 'supporters' who participated in the mayhem peddle a uniquely Irish fascism.
“Bigots obsessed with men’s bums”. That was one commentator’s apt description of the galoots who gathered in the House of Lords at Westminster last month to vote down a proposal to equalise the age of consent for gays.
Grappling with weighty political themes is grist to the mill for Colin Meloy of Oregon art-rockers The Decemberists. He’s even written a song about the Shankill Butchers.
A glorious Olympic opening ceremony suggests a world at peace. But burning villages in Georgia and South Ossetia reminds us that human conflict is never far away.
It’s a long time since they graced the stadium circuit, but Simple Minds are still thinking big. Jim Kerr takes time out from sunning himself in Sicily to tell Ed Power their plans.
The chattering classes express revulsion at Young Ireland's spitting, shouting and shagging, but their piety masks a disgust at anything youthful and working class.
...Or at least it does where Halloween is concerned, as the old pagan feast is transformed into an orgy of amateur pyrotechnics, civil disobedience and open-air boozing.
Pre-Christmas unrest in the Balkans brought unpleasant memories of late '90s ethnic cleansing back to the soldier turned singer-songwriter James Blunt.
…for a while anyway. In a few short weeks Belfast's GHOST OF AN AMERICAN AIRMAN will leave home once again to tour distant lands. That's the bad news. The good news is that while they're here, Ghost... take time out to tell TARA McCARTHY what the hell they've been up to for the past two years.
GREG BAKER on the rise of neo-fascism and the disturbing - and violent - implications of the election of a British National Party councillor in the East End of London.
Down in Dublin for a couple of days a fortnight ago, I bumped into a rubicund retired diplomat in a Merrion Row pub. How long will Albert the Statesman last? he enquired. And we had a warm chuckle to ourselves over hot ports and brandy.
ADAPTED FROM Alex Garland's phenomenally successful novel of the same name, The Beach is by some distance Danny Boyle and company's most ambitious and expensive project yet, and the presence of Leo diCaprio in the central role will certainly boost its box-office prospects no end.
“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
WHO would want the job? Mo Mowlam was riding high in the wake of the Good Friday agreement last year; at that stage, she was entitled to feel that she had actually contributed something substantial to bringing about a peaceful solution to the awful conflict that has disfigured life in Northern Ireland for so long.
Avert your gazes, sensitive readers. Jon McClure of Reverend And The Makers offers his thoughts on Johnny Borrell, Thom Yorke and “the most racist television ad of all time”.
Daniel Lapaine and Alice Evans are the stars of The Abduction Club, a restoration romantic comedy set in Ireland. "It's like Jane Austen after having a good shag," insists Daniel
Cornershop have re-opened for business with a little help from Noel Gallagher and none at all from the BBC. Stuart Clark finds Tjinder Singh is less than miffed
Tony Cascarino: While Manchester United fans protest at Malcolm Glazer's take-over, one of their most celebrated old boys has performed a miracle at West Brom
With Thin Lizzy now officially a thing of the past, Philip Lynott is preparing to start anew with Grand Slam. At this transitional point in his public career Tony Clayton-Lea sought out the private Lynott to ask him his views on a wide range of issues including music, politics, religion, sex, drugs, Ireland, parenthood and rock'n'roll stardom. The result is probably the frankest and most revealing interview Philip Lynott has ever given.
DISCO PIGS stars, CILLIAN MURPHY and ELAINE CASSIDY, tell CRAIG FITZSIMONS about how they were drawn to the intense relationship and Cork patois of Pig and Runt
Our resident expert on everything, controversially argues that it is vitally important not to decriminalise dope if we are to make any gains in the war for drugs
All the talk among the teachers and the mandarins is about indiscipline in schools. Now, the Union Of Secondary Students, with President Hazel Nolan to the fore, is fighting back, insisting that the system itself needs to be changed.
With his new movie End Of Days hitting cinemas nationwide, GABRIEL BYRNE
speaks frankly to CRAIG FITZSIMONS about the challenge of playing Satan,
US cultural imperialism and Ireland's growing economic divide.
Inevitably iconoclastic obituaries terminated? Good. Autopsies – will have to be personal – your own moments in the sanatorium of Joy Division music, encouraged by sharp note sounds.
To get ahead in Irish society, a dubious attitude towards the truth has always helped. But as chickens come home to roost it is, at long last perhaps, time for change
Modern media, and especially the Internet, has given free reign to a whole new brand of intimidation, lying, vilification and abuse. Nor is cyberbullying confined to kids - it's just as ubiquitous among adults.
Two major London newspapers recently ran large advertisements which contained the most extraordinary injunctions to world leaders - and proposed the direst of consequences should they fail to comply. Under the dramatic headline World News Flash, it was confidently predicted that the world would end on July 25th 1994.But will it? And who is behind this incredible attempt to save us all from imminent extinction? LIAM FAY reports
WHERE S the emotion? Where s the elation? Where s the celebration? It s an odd sensation indeed. There s a feeling that the words of acclamation should come pouring out but they don t. They don t and they won t.
ADMIRING THE beautiful shorn features of Matthew Devereux on the cover of the last issue, mischievous, curiously boyish and teasing, I would like to know whether the skinhead image appeals erotically to women as much as it does to me.
Having been shot five times and survived a coma in his previous life as an LA gang member, hip hop sensation The Game has been offered a reprieve courtesy of Dr Dre's patronage and a deal with Interscope Records. But is the 25-year-old star already succumbing to his own hype?
An online petition has been launched to oppose the introduction of On The Spot Fines and Anti Social Behaviour Orders in Ireland.
[to sign petition go here ]
They’re the hottest thing to have come out of Belfast in years. Ahead of the release of their hugely anticipated long-play debut, guitar-abusing noiseniks and so I watched you from afar, give us a track-by-track lowdown on the album.
She is already established as Ireland’s most seductive screen icon. but in Sixteen Years Of Alcohol, Susan Lynch turns in a marvellously enigmatic performance.
Let s talk about heroin addicts. Yeah, they re the ones who ghost around town looking like death warmed up. Glazed eyes, sunken cheeks, rotting teeth. Hopeless cases, most of them, good for nothing except bag-snatching. They rob, they cheat, they lie. And when they ve done with that, they rob, they cheat and they lie again. They steal off their mothers. They steal off their lovers. And they steal off their children. If there s something that can be hocked, they ll hock it. If there s something that can be moved, they ll lift it.
Inevitably, The Best Of Nick Cave ... The Bad Seeds can only hint at the scope of the band's back catalogue. But if one listens to the group's ten studio albums chronologically, there are no gear-grinding changes of direction or radical overhaulings of the sound, all the more remarkable considering the amount of personnel that passed through the line-up.
If you know who to call, it's as easy to buy a gun in Dublin as a microwave. No wonder there are more firearms in the streets – and more gangland murders – than ever before.
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.
In Dublin recently to lend his support to the AIDS Action Alliance all-star Olympic Ballroom bash, Tom Robinson took time out to reflect on his Spokesman For A Generation past, his nervous breakdowns, his sexual re-orientation and his re-embracement of the Quaker faith
Considerable as the controvery has been over the decision of Judge Kevin Haugh to send questionnaires to the 1,100 potential jurors in Charles Haughey case, one significant factor has been missed.
Dating is an activity I’m trying to get the hang of recently. It requires a little confidence, and probably a good dose of maturity. Which is probably why I haven’t done much of it before.
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.
There was great consternation at government buildings on the day a few weeks back when Albert Reynolds, as he saw it, welcomed Gerry Adams into the constitutional fold as the de Valera of the 1990s.
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
Law enforcement agencies are worried it could be the new ecstasy. In the fourth part of Hot Press investigation into drugs STUART CLARK reports on the new breed of super-amphetamines
Craig Fitzsimons talks to David Gleeson, director of Cowboys & Angels, another exciting addition to the growning canon of unapologetically youthful and exuberent contemporary Irish movies
You know you re doing something right if your book disturbs both Cat Stevens and Snoop Doggy Dogg. But Sligo-born eamonn sweeney s debut novel, Waiting For The Healer, with its explosive mix of booze, blood, manic comedy and rock n roll, is also winning rave reviews for its uncompromisingly forthright author. Interview: liam fay.
A House are really good! That s just one of the shocking claims Graham Linehan makes in this award winning article based loosely on an interview he did with the band.
IT IS no secret that homeless figures in the capital soared with the Goverment's brilliant 'care in the community' initiative. Supposedly intended to reintegrate long-term psychiatric patients back into society, all that seems to have been achieved is the closing down of hospitals and an increase in the numbers of bewildered people living rough, denied the only security they have ever known.
Well, a bloke actually. Barry Glendenning offers a considered solution to Ireland’s drink problem: halve the price of gargle, legalise dope and ship all the youth off to Slovenia
A report from the World Health Organisation recently concluded that cannabis was less harmful than cigarettes or alcohol. So why is the Garda Commissioner persisting with the same old fictions?
By Olaf Tyaransen.
WELL, IT'S obvious, isn't it? The authorities helping the IRA out with their target practice, that is. Doubtless part funded by bodies with a vested interest in at least partially recreating an olde worlde war-time atmosphere. If the message to the IRA is Coo-ee! Over here!, what, then, I wonder is the message to the British public?
The reclassification of cannabis in Britain was a good day for the UK’s estimated five million users. But not a great day. A drug that is much less damaging than alcohol or tobacco remains illegal in most parts of the world, including Ireland, a situation which criminalises the user and benefits only the criminal gangs. It’s high time for a change, argues Olaf Tyaransen.
The suicide of a popular, pretty academically distinguished 15-year old-girl forces all of us to examine our own private desires for self obliteration.
It was the year Annie Kelly posthumously made her mark on the Northern Prison system and Janet Jackson caused uproar with her mammary moment at the Super Bowl. All in all, 2004 was a weird but not always wonderful 12 months.
It was the year Annie Kelly posthumously made her mark on the Northern Prison system and Janet Jackson caused uproar with her mammary moment at the Super Bowl. All in all, 2004 was a weird but not always wonderful 12 months.
THREE men are murdered in horrific circumstances in the seaside town of Scheveningen in Holland. The descriptions of the torture inflicted on them, and of the final brutal manner of their murder, are harrowing in the extreme. Putty or plaster of some kind, it is reported, had been rammed into the orifices of at least one of them. All three were dowsed in inflammable material and set alight. The bodies are so badly disfigured that they are unidentifiable. To contemplate it, even in the abstract, is enough to stop you in your tracks, to render you speechless at people s unbelievable capacity for evil.
In 1990, 22 year-old college graduate Christopher McCandless donated his $24,000 in savings to Oxfam and hit the road. Two years later he died in Alaska, after approximately 112 days in the wild. Legendary actor and director Sean Penn tells the story in his fourth film Into The Wild.
FROM A WHISPER TO A SCREAM is a major new six-part RTE series. Directed by DAVID HEFFERNAN, and featuring new interviews with the major players including Van Morrison, Bob Geldof, U2 and Siniad O Connor it traces the history of Irish music, from showbands to boybands and beyond. By PETER MURPHY.
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!).
When a police investigation was launched into Michael Jackson’s alleged activities with Jordan Chandler, the King of Pop’s media image went from Peter Pan into the fire. In his new biography christopher andersen becomes the spokesman for Wacko’s degeneration offering a damning portrait of the real man behind the mask. Report: Bill Graham.
Unpalatable truths about the 'war against terror' - and Ireland's involvement – will be revealed during the trial of Eoin Dubsky, the young Wexford man who spraypainted a US war plane refuelling in Shannon
Trinity College Dublin Student Union President Rory Hearne was arrested, detained and brutalised by Czech police at the World Bank
and IMF protest march in Prague on September 26th. He relates his experience to Stephen Robinson. Pictures: PETER MATTHEWS
There had been a working assumption that, in the thirty-plus years of the Troubles in Northern Ireland, we had just about seen it all. But last week proved otherwise
While lots of Northerners have moved on to fresh pastures over the past few years, new Hit The North columnist COLIN CARBERRY believes that it s a good time to stick around
There s very little torture involved in making a record until it s released and then the audience gets to suffer. PETER MURPHY meets the one and only LYDIA LUNCH.
Driven out of India while filming her latest film. Water, Deepa Mehta talks about protests, effigies and the controversy that follows her wherever she goes.
Cecilia Peck, director of music documentary-political travelogue Dixie Chicks: Shut Up And Sing reminisces about her Dingle childhood and explains what it’s like being part of a great Hollywood dynasty.
Jackie Hayden talks to Jackie Mason about the politics of humour, discrimination as a good career move, why he'll never go back to being a rabbi, how his middle finger got him into hot water - and why he probably won't be telling Moslem jokes anytime soon.
As the major force in the "Club of '22", whose attempts to oust Charlie Haughey from the leadership of Fianna Fail finally resulted in Dessie O'Malley's departure to form the Progressive Democrats, Charlie McCreevy was long considered a thorn in the side of the Taoiseach by the party faithful. Ironically then, it was McCreevy himself who was to be instrumental in setting up the talks with the P.D.s following the recent election which would result in Charles J. Haughey continuing to stay in power in a new kind of coalition government.
Generally regarded as one of the most candid of Irish politicians, Charlie McCreevy here lives up to his reputation as he shoots from the hip on matters both political and personal.
They’re the hottest thing in British rock, four working class kids done good from the wrong side of the Glasgow tracks. At the start of what is shaping up to be a whirlwind year GLASVEGAS talk fame, football and fisticuffs.
On Dublin s Grafton Street, it s all change. PAUL O MAHONY talks to long-time street-trader BRENDAN DOWLING about the old Dandelion Market and the evolution of a thoroughfare and also discovers another surprising side to the genial leather-belt man. Pic: CATHAL DAWSON.
As well as being a rising actress and Playboy cover girl, Dumplings starlet Bai Ling has at least eight spirits currently inhabiting her body, one of whom is so shy it insists she has sex with the lights off. Alrighty then.
Somebody is onto something, that's for certain. To begin with the name has a touch of magic. Dexy's Midnight Runners suggests something illicit, even apart from the drug reference. It's both strong and open, pointed and evocative. And in the end it's accurate because it registers the desired connection – Dexy's Midnight Runners are a soul band.
JUST when you thought it was safe to go back into the water, the jetty collapses. On Friday afternoon last, it was hard to escape an awful, mournful sense of dij` vu, as the word came in on the mojo wire that the new devolved institutions of governance in Northern Ireland had been suspended, and direct rule from Britain reimposed.
For the Chinese community in Northern Ireland, life can at times be difficult in the face of racism and violent attacks. But they can also spare a little time to party, as our very own Chinese checker Colin Carberry discovered on a visit to the hectic offices of the Chinese Welfare Association. Photos: Amberlea Trainor.
He may have done time in Long Kesh for possession of explosives but Progressive Unionist leader DAVID ERVINE has left behind his terrorist past and embraced a future based on shared social democracy which, he says, the peace process can bring about. Interview: JOE JACKSON.
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.
The last scintilla of doubt just rode out of town – groundbreaking news spoof The Day Today is back on the agenda courtesy of a brand new DVD, and the show’s gleeful send-up of current affairs broadcasting is now more relevant than ever.
As Stereophonics release their sixth abum, frontman Kelly Jones talks about his friendship with Oasis and reveals that he’s buried the hatchet with Muse.
The Minister for Justice, Michael McDowell, has just promised “to streamline and modernise our liquor licensing laws”. Karla Healion asks if the government is correct in its approach to curbing problems associated with alcohol.
It s the last song of the night. It s the final gig of the year one that has witnessed bizarre accidents, frustrations, some classic moments and the growing consensus that Snow Patrol is an increasingly fierce act.
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?
There is a serial killer on the loose in London, who has targeted the male gay community. But because of the spanner ruling, which has made a criminal offence of consenting SM sex practices, those who are most at risk are finding it impossible to talk to the police. And inevitably, the sensational distortions of the british media are only making matters worse. This year's Gay Pride March took place against that disturbing backdrop. Fay Wolftree reports. Pix: Leo Regan
They may not be that just yet but if current plans for global domination go according to the script Linkin Park will be very soon. Stuart Clark travels to London to hear the band’s new album Meteora and finds that American rock’s hottest property are surrounded by the kind of security normally reserved for Michael Jackson
DO YOU WANT NAILS OF FEEDBACK DRIVEN THROUGH YOUR BRAIN? DO YOU WANT YOUR EARS TO BLEED? THIS IS HARDCORE AND IT'S THE MOST VITAL ATTITUDE IN ROCK'N'ROLL, FROM LOU REED TO THERAPY? VIA NICK CAVE, FUGAZI AND... CHRISTY MOORE. OR SO SAYS GERRY McGOVERN, WHO ALSO ADVANCES THE THEORY THAT 'HARDCORE IS GENERALLY FOR HARD WHITE MEN'. SHOOTING GALLERY AWAITS YOUR RESPONSE!
This year’s Convergence Festival in the heart of Dublin promises a scintillating feast of events celebrating sustainability and cultural transformation. Adrienne Murphy takes a bite
In his latest book, the high profile psychiatrist addresses the idea of masculinity in crisis. But is it fact or fiction? And how have his own experiences as husband, father and professional informed his views? Joe Jackson asks the questions. And, oh, is size really important. Doc Shots: MYLES CLAFFEY
As World AIDS day approaches, Stuart Clark travels to Swaziland to witness the devastating impact the virus is having on the country, and discovers how overseas organisations like Skillshare International Ireland are helping Swazis to help themselves.
Irish fiction continues to grow in both popularity and hipness. In this special feature we talk to three of its most prominent young exponents: John Connolly, Conal Creedon and Julie Parsons.
Teen prodigy George Murphy followed in the footsteps of some of the biggest names in Irish music when he recently performed for the inmates of Wheatfield prison in Clondalkin. Danielle Brigham reports. Photos: Cathal Dawson
Whether starring in popcorn blockbusters or thoughtful art-house movies, Gabriel Byrne is a reassuring presence on our screens. But he reserves his deepest passions for keeping alive the flame of Irish culture among the diaspora.
It might now be appropriate for the Government to declare an amnesty for those asylum seekers who have come here, whether as refugees or as economic migrants
It might now be appropriate for the Government to declare an amnesty for those asylum seekers who have come here, whether as refugees or as economic migrants
Why, more than ever, the Irish government must lead the fight against racism from the front - by behaving in a manner that is absolutely "beyond reproach"
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)
Found this in the Guardian, tucked away anonymously, page 29, Sept. 19th:
Goodbye Elton John,
though we never liked you all that much,
You inspired Diana,
even though you were hardly butch
And it seemed to me
you lived your life
like a candle in the wind,
your hair never knowing what to cling to
When the rain set in.
And though we would have liked
to love you,
It would be a great big fib.
Your talent burned out long before
Your chutzpah ever did.
There is nothing more odious, to paraphrase a famous quip, than the British press in one of its fits of moral outrage. And it’s true. Nothing can compare. And I’m not just referring to the tabloids . . .
No problem! Eamon Gilmore has just taken over at the helm of the Labour Party. Here, in a wide-ranging interview, he talks about Bertie Ahern, the future of Labour, Gay marriage, God, abortion, bias in the media – and a whole lot more besides.
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.
