PEOPLE BUYING magazines for sick Grannies in hospital beware! It may sound like the sort of publication that has Russell Grant doing the horoscopes and Richard Madely talking about his perfect marriage, but the only pricks in For Women are of the bell-ended variety.
While women are still far from achieving equality of opportunity in music, the last thing women artists want – or need – is to be ghettoised, writes musician and journalist Kim V Porcelli. The point about the women who are at rock’s cutting edge – from Sinéad O’Connor through PJ Harvey to Peaches – is that they defer to no one in their pursuit of greatness.
From girls-next-door to super starlets, elvis presley had em all. Yet not all his relationships with women were consummated, and there are even those who claim that none ever replaced his mother in his affections. Still, The King found plenty of outlets for his wild and boundless physical appetites, as Joe Jackson reports in this investigation into The Secret Sexual History Of Elvis Aaron Presley. Part one of a two-part Elvis confidential special.
The docking of the Woman On Waves ship in Dublin has not only highlighted the plight of Irish women who have to go abroad for abortions, but attracted the attention of the world’s press. ADRIENNE MURPHY reports on the furore surrounding its arrival
He’s the seventh son of a seventh son, he adores beautiful women, he doesn’t have a million in the bank and he couldn’t sew a button on a shirt. fashion designer Paul Costelloe reveals all this and more to Stephen Robinson – and also explains what he really meant when he made that infamous observation about irish women and style.
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.
MARY HARNEY, the new leader of the Progressive Democrats, has targetted "women and youth" as potential party supporters. There are a number of things wrong with that, not least that she sees women and youth as being two entirely different, mutually exclusive categories.
There’s nothing that modern women like more than complaining about how useless men are in the sack. But the truth is that there are lots of things that women get wrong too.
Prayer as the best remedy for pre-menstrual tension? So says one of Bush’s boys as misogyny stalks the US establishment. Plus: the passing of the great writer and activist Howard Fast.
If we care about the lives of Irish women, then a no vote in the march 6th abortion referendum is a must. Adrienne Murphy poses the questions and offers some answers
A recent survey revealed that highly sexed women are far more likely to want a bit of same sex action than highly sexed men. Anne Sexton- who falls effortlessly into the highly sexed category!- recalls that it was the feel of her girl lover's skin that was the most striking aspect of her first lesbian encounter. Once she relaxed, however, it was an experience to remember.
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
Gloria Steinem was 65 last month; Germaine Greer was 60; Jill Johnston was 70. There are some who will not understand the resonance of this roll-call of veterans they are doubtless too busy poring over the latest edict of the Catholic Church, which holds that maturbation is not always a sin. Ho-hum. Listen up wankers, while I tell you how it was when real women strode the earth.
One of the most disturbing developments in the Middle East over the past number of years has been the rising number of female suicide bombers. Colm O’Hare talks to Barbara Victor, the pulitzer prize-nominated journalist who examines this alarming trend in a compelling new book, Army of Roses.
There may have been a time when Irish women were under the thumb of the Church- a state of affairs that was reflected in our collective attitude to sex. But in 2005, as the results of the new Durex survey show, we have taken control of our own sexual destinies-with absolutely no apologies to men!
Having survived invasion, war and the repressive taliban regime, Fatana Gailani is continuting her courageous fight for equality for women in Afghanistan. Phil Udell hears her story.
Apologies if it seems like a bit of an obsession, but – for women in particular – foreplay is such an important part of good, satisfying sex. Here, then are some top tips on how best to ignite the passions of the woman you lust.
It ought to be one of the happiest moments of a woman's life – and for many it is. But for some women the birth of a child can be a traumatic, invasive and distressing event. Author Naomi Wolf tells Fiona Reid about the blues of the birth
Many inadequacies and injustices are coming to light in the practice of birth in Ireland. In the first of a two-part investigation, Adrienne Murphy explores the issues surrounding human reproduction, and the growing desire among women for the right to have natural births. Pix: CAthal dawsoN.
Over 2,000 Northern Irish women leave the province every year to have abortions elsewhere usually in England. STUART BAILIE examines the many anomalies in the law on this subject, and talks to some of the people fighting to change it.
The Shamcocks did! Well, it is if you’re one of eighteen women – lesbians all – who’ve decided that it’s time to throw off the shackles and bring a new form of alternative entertainment to the highways and byways of Ireland. Prime mover Jude Cosgrove talks to Danielle Brigham.
Over the past decade, Irish society has been transformed, with so called 'foreign nationals' now comprising 10% of the population. So what do they-and the women among them in particular- think of life in Ireland? Is there a risk that the explosion of anger among second-generation immigrant communties in France in recent weeks might be repeated here?
Despite predictable criticism from certain quarters, Sarah McLachlan’s vision of “a celebration of women in music” has made the touring Lilith Fair one of the hottest tickets in rock in 1998. Tim Perry reports.
Filmed in a manner that its target admirers will no doubt describe as ‘sumptuous’, François Ozon’s curious French musical-cum-murder-mystery, though typically stylised and shallow, utilises its formidable cast of established Gallic screen divas to impressive effect.
Nationalism is still alive and well at least on the walls of toilets. Then again, football and genitalia seem just as popular. Last issue, we looked at the writing on women s walls; this time STEPHEN ROBINSON finds out what men are scrawling in their own convenience. Pics: Paul Connell
Let us now praise famous women. 2003 was the year of the female condition in all its most gorgeous and gruesome. Sure, the boys – and men – acquitted themselves admirably, but this year oestrogen overload didn’t necessarily equate with PMT (Pro-Minstrel Attention).
Mary Bannoti, Ireland's goodwill ambassador for the United Nations population fund, visited Afghanistan in March. Here, she records some lasting impressions of a place at once brutal and beguiling, and describes her often moving encounters with men, women and children, many still in refugee camps in Pakistan, who are struggling to return home and rebuild their lives.
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
Abortion hasn t gone away, you know; rather it s Irish women,
some 6,500 a year, who have to do the travelling while, back home,
the pro-life movement continues to insist that It Can Never Happen Here. TONY O BRIEN of the Irish Family Planning Association believes it s
well past time tht we got to grips with a problem whch, time and again, has dominated public debate while leaving women in the
throes of crisis pregnancy to fend for themselves.
Interview: Siobhan Long. Photography: CATHAL DAWSON
They called them the Magdalen Laundries, where fallen women were sent to atone for their sins. There, thousands of Irish women were imprisoned, often for life. They worked for nothing, literally like slaves, and they died. And then one hundred and twenty-three of them were dug up with the approval of the Catholic Church.
Report: Gerry McGovern
We are going to spare you all the obvious puns about going back to basics, catching this particular fish in the raw or even the irrefutable truism that fins ain t what they used to be. But as you can see from the accompanying pictures, there is something particularly vulnerable about people when they re naked. Dropped by Atlantic Records, stripped of all the corporate support, funding, and of course bullshit this is how An Emotional Fish stand before the public, on the launch of their independently-produced Sloper album. Not that either the band or lead singer are without the support of people who matter. Ger is photographed with his wife Lorraine . . . Interview: Colm O Hare.
Lee Dunne is reputed to be the most banned author in Europe and, by his own reckoning, has slept with over 1,000 women. You could says he’s got a story or two to tell.
She is a passionate advocate of social justice for women and a dreamer, who achieved extraordinary insights through use of the shamanic drug, ayahuasca. Isabel Allende talks to Hot Press
Actor Peter Mullan first achieved mainstream success with his brilliant leading role in 1998’s My Name Is Joe, for which he received a best actor award at Cannes. His latest project concerns the abuse of young women by the Catholic Church in the Magdalen Sisters, which he wrote and directed
Seventeen years after his second book was banned and he lost his teaching job, John McGahern's reputation as one of Ireland's most gifted writers has been underlined by the critical acclaim accorded his latest novel That They May Face The Rising Sun. Yet McGahern remains a somewhat enigmatic personality, tending his farm, refining his prose and observing a vanishing world from his Leitrim home. "The rather nice thing about writing is that it makes everything else a pleasure,' he tells Hotpress
The family courts have traditionally favoured women over men when deciding issues of child custody. Adrienne Murphy discovers that fathers are fighting back.
Overnight success was a long time coming for American novelist Lionel Shriver, whose breakthrough book, We Need To Talk About Kevin was her seventh novel. Here she talks about a life-time of struggle, unsympathetic women, her blistering tennis novel Double Fault – and how she is coping with the pressures of sudden literary fame.
Helena Mulkerns catches up with the charming Dublin-based chanteuse on a tour of East Coast college campuses, and finds a wilfully free spirit at ease with her sexuality – if not with the industry’s categorisation of such guitar-wielding women.
It s a story that has it all. Fame, drink, women, politics. Even death threats and The Mob. In a special retrospective feature JOE JACKSON explores the myth, and the reality, of THE RAT PACK, the original reservoir dogs.
EDDIE IRVINE is Ireland s leading sporting playboy. The Grand Prix driver is a multi-millionaire whose taste for the extravagant runs to owning a private jet, a yacht and around ten cars. Here, the ladies man of Formula One talks to NIALL STANAGE about sex, drink, drugs, rock n roll oh, and driving.
Watching David Bowie on television recently one couldn't help but think of Neil Hannon. Not that he is a musical "chameleon"—to use the phrase most often applied to Bowie—but he does seem to be a person more comfortable presenting to the world a series of ever-changing poses designed to conceal rather than reveal his "real self", as in vocally situating himself somewhere between Barry White and Prince on the magnificent Charge, or satirising—while still relishing—his role as the eponymous sexist hero in Becoming More Like Alfie. Strangely enough, Neil confesses that he was thinking something similar while watching Bowie being interviewed
Columnist Kevin Myers called her “our pretty little she-shinner” but an unimpressed Mary Lou McDonald insists that her party is actually run by a group of formidable women. She also reveals that she believes Gerry Adams when he says he was never in the IRA, defends Sinn Fein’s fund-raising, discusses the release of Jerry McCabe’s killers, and names her least favourite irish politicians. plus: the newly elected MEP’s views on drink, drugs, music, media, religion, and more.
With the demise of his former band, In Tua Nua, the future may not have looked too bright for Martin Clancy. Now, however, with the critically acclaimed Serious Women project under his belt, and a key role in the Advanced Technology College, the forecast is looking good. Interview: Colm O’Hare
You wanted the best, you got GENE SIMMONS. Here, the motormouth frontman of KISS, the world s greatest showband, talks about sex and women at length (quelle surprise), discusses his Jewish heritage, explains why Kierkegaard and Nietzsche obviously never got laid, and announces to an increasingly bemused JOE JACKSON that he Gene, that is possesses the world s smallest penis.
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.
In the last issue of Hot Press, Olaf Tyaransen shared his confessions of a single Irish male. This time around, Adrienne Murphy offers one woman s perspective on love, sex and the pursuit of happiness.
KATHRYN BIGELOW is one of the few women directors to break through the glass ceiling in Hollywood. What’s more, she makes action movies of a kind not normally associated with ‘girls’. The release of her latest meisterwerk, The Hurt Locker, an extraordinary movie about the activities of a US Army bomb disposal unit in the war in Iraq, sees her being tipped as a contender come Oscar season next year.
The Government recently launched its National Anti-Racism Awareness Programme under the slogan "Know Racism". JACKIE HAYDEN talked to the Chairman of its Steering Committee, JOE MCDONAGH
John Walshe talks to Irish rugby captain and Munster stalwart Keith Wood ahead of the most important game in Munster s history, and hears his views on the media, sex before a game and his love for bellybuttons and pregnant women.
Pictures: DECLAN ENGLISH
"To tell you the truth, I don’t see myself as being all that interesting or attractive." that being so, Colin Farrell must be one of a very few who doesn’t. Dublin’s latest superstar, famous for cussing, bedding women and (lest we forget) acting, has been inescapable in the gossip columns in recent months. But how much is truth and how much fiction? In this candid interview with Tara Brady, he talks about drink, drugs, football, fame, hype, luck, romance and – in his latest box office winner The Recruit – working with Al Pacino
Positivity is their mantra, classy is their byword and their mission is to become the biggest and best pop group on the plant. With their jam in the point date looming SYLVIA PATTERSON goes on the road with DESTINY'S CHILD and hears a tale of self-empowerment, vision and that collision between cleavage and christianity
It isn't long since the Irish Minister for Justice, John O'Donoghue, signed a treaty with the government of Nigeria, which would facilitate the repatriation of asylum seekers from that country, whose applications had been turned down by the authorities here
A comparison with Afghanistan is instructive
The illustration by David Rooney in the last issue of Hot Press, depicting a priest marturbating, was offensive not just to the clergy but also to women. At least that's what one caller to Joe Duffy claimed. It got us thinking as we prepared the Hot Press Women's Issue (though not, we have to say, for very long....)
Set over a 24-hour period in Tehran, the film deals with the lot of seven women who have found themselves on the wrong side of the law, and thereby on the fringes of Iranian society
TRAPPED IN a slow motion nightmare, I listen transfixed to the daily reports from a courtroom in Preston in Lancashire. Each day, a few more minutes are added to our knowledge of the last hours of Jamie Bolger's life, the five-year-old who was abducted and killed by boys who are still children themselves.
“Rick Astley, Glenn Medeiros, Shakespeare…” – the beauty of a MJEX record is that you know that it’s going to do something different. This has gone beyond a question of ‘Irish’ hip-hop, the duo make great records full stop and ‘All The Other Girls’ is no exception, a rap track about women that is neither offensive, clichéd, tiresome nor afraid to wear its heart on its sleeve.
Do men want sex without ‘feeling’? Are women genetically programmed to want sex to ‘mean’ something? Or, to put it another way, is there really any difference between the genders when it comes to the issue of casual sex?
Sheep, shite and desolation. It was to get away from all that, that a group of women camped overnight on Sliabh na mBan and had a discussion which resulted in the formation of the Irish Countrywomen's Association.
While Thomson’s wispy vocals dominate, the other three women also take turns on the lead and team up for lovely choral arrangements reminiscent of Gaelic mouth music.
Men love blowjobs (and would you blame them?). But not all women love giving them. So what do you do if you partner is a little bit on the reluctant side? Here, Anne Sexton offers a special Eight Step Guide to helping the object of your sexual desire the learn to love going down.
Women aren’t used to rejection – and so they often react badly if a bloke chooses not to do the horizontal mambo with them. In fact they have been known to react violently!
Just because older women have a bit of experience under their belts doesn’t mean they have a license to start fondling twenty-something blokes when they're on the town.
There's been an upsurge in the number of women searching for the perfect vagina. It is one of the growth areas of the cosmetic surgery industry. But surely we’re better to love our bodies as they are?
Silent Grace, the new movie about the hunger strikes and dirty protests by women in armagh prison, brilliantly confounds expectations. Tara Brady meets its director Maeve Murphy
Boy George brought androgyny to Toy Town and made every gel wish he was their teddy-bear. Annie Lennox proved that women could take the harder part. Otherwise, Brit-pop melted down to pills and soft-soap.
It is what most men lust after, and more than a few women too. But how many of us really know what the vagina looks like, and how best to give the women we have sex with, the greatest pleasure possible?
President Mary McAleese recently travelled to Saudi Arabia and spoke at a conference at which apartheid against women was practised as a matter of routine. In doing so, she unwittingly promoted the mercenary strain that seems to dominate every Irish stance on international affairs right now.
So stunningly awful and perversely enjoyable that it virtually qualifies as a must-see, Brokedown Palace is a hilariously incompetent women-in-prison drama which will do well to last more than a week at the 'plexes, so you might have to wait for the video.
Read an interview with David Berman of Silver Jews - and then listen to 'Tennessee', from new opus Bright Flight, an ode to a dream state with an unlimited supply of "club soda" and "hot middle-aged women"
Sexual freedom is a wonderful thing. But it isn’t just about saying ‘Yes, yes, yes, yes, yes’. Men – and women – have to understand that ‘no’ means just that…
Part of the first wave of feisty, in-your-face 1990s women singer songwriters that also included Alanis Morissette, Sheryl Crow and Meredith Brooks, the openly lesbian Sophie Ballantyne Hawkins struck gold with the affecting hit, ‘Damn, I Wish I Was Your Lover’.
Playing a thief mistaken for an actor playing a detective (you’d have to be there), Downey Jr. hooks up with caustic gay detective Perry (Kilmer) and a hooker with a heart of gold (Monaghan) to discover why the corpses of beautiful women are turning up with alarming regularity.
Based on the novel of the same name, but incorporating material from three further short stories, Factotum recounts Chinaski’s alcohol addiction, his loose women and his chequered employment history.
I was listening to a TV discussion of sexuality the other night when one of those women comedians with a sharp line in anti-man routines said, "The trouble with men is that they can't control their penises", which was maybe the hundredth time I'd heard the same point made by the same sort of person but the first time it ever occurred to me that, as a matter of fact, it's true.
Liquor, women, drugs and killing. This is how the Supersuckers sum up the subject matter of their songs. Comprising a singer called Eddie Spaghetti, guitarist Dan 'Thunder' Bolton and a personage known as The Dancing Eagle on drums, expect a band who don't take themselves all that seriously.
What happens when two women who are friends decide that they both want the same man? It can get very messy – but there may be a very tasty solution indeed if you use your imaginiation.
Seka/Sister is a marathon collection of 22 songs from a plethora of artists (both well known and obscure) in aid of a women and children's refuge in Croatia.
Seka/Sister is a marathon collection of 22 songs from a plethora of artists (both well known and obscure) in aid of a women and children's refuge in Croatia.
Throughout his career, Freud was particularly intrigued to learn what women wanted. If only he could have lived to see The Sisterhood Of The Travelling Pants.
Unfortunately, it may mean the US getting into a huddle with "rogue states" but the important business of keeping women and gays in their place has seen the creation of an unlikely Islamic-Christian alliance
The cars are fast, the hero is video-game superhuman and the women are slutty. Indeed, everything right down to the shoes gets fetished in this splendidly trashy affair which sees Jason Statham’s unflappable driver embroiled in some nonsense about a child kidnapping.
A Frenchman in the throes of severe male menopause who ends up happily employed as a prostitute for rich, snotty, powerful women... it sounds like a bad misogynistic joke, but believe it or not, The Escort has enough laddish charm and sheer good nature to more than offset any potential offence.
Sex toys for women are in vogue, with lots of very interesting and sexy options on the menu. But for blokes - well it's a little bit harder to find the prize.
Senile old men, feline old women, pillars of society, killers in search of notoriety and *a guy wearing plastic antlers [who] presses his bum against the glass.* Times may change, empires may rise and fall, but the characters who populate Nick Cave's world remain as lunatic as ever.
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.
Although Ireland's comedy community is heavily dominated by male figures, women like Carol Tobin have overturned the notion that women are intrinsically unfunny.
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.
Most women love sexy lingerie almost as much as men do – but getting it as a gift for your girlfriend can be a potentially hazardous business. On the other hand, if you strike the right note, the rewards can be overwhelming...
ANDY DARLINGTON reflects on how the role of women-in-rock has changed from making tea and sandwiches for the boys to demanding – and more often than not gaining – access all areas.
Though soaked in the musical culture of Southern California, female-fronted indie quartet Saucy Monky say there’s an undeniably Irish strain to their music.
The first arrests have taken place in Britain as a
result of a new form of direct action against genetically
engineered plants. ADRIENNE MURPHY, herself an active opponent of GE, reports.
Pro-life campaigners have been celebrating the closure of one of the few organisations in Northern Ireland which provided information on abortion. NIALL STANAGE gets the other side of the story.
The Department Of Justice has denied asylum to Elizabeth Onasanwo and her four children, who are due to be deported back to Nigeria, where the two girls - Bolu aged 6 and Christina aged 18 - will face female genital mutilation, a traditional practice frequently resulting in death
As a pregnancy counselling agency in receipt of state funding, Life would appear obliged to offer non-judgemental advice to its clients. But does the organisation retain what is an essentially anti-abortion stance? Imogen Murphy investigates.
Hearts In Armor is the latest album from Trisha Yearwood, the most hotly-tipped of the new breed of female artists shaking life into country music. It looks set to better the success of her million-selling debut. Report: Oliver P. Sweeney
When she learned that she had a fatal illness, the British feminist writer Jill Tweedie was much comforted by her friend Jon Snow, the Channel Four television news presenter.
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.
When it comes to selecting a condom for that steamy sexual encounter, the revolutionary Avanti leaves Mr Fred Brewster s Geronimo in the ha penny place. Report: adrienne murphy.
Forget Beirut as a byword for urban warfare, the Lebanese director of Caramel, Nadine Labaki, is looking towards the future through the lens of a beauty salon.
‘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.
Playing a character "full of loneliness and happiness" proved something of a challenge for actress Marie Bunel in the Oscar-nominated French film The Chorus. But as she tells Tara Brady, working with director Christopher Barratier helped her discover that acting can be much like using an instrument.
He's familiar to Northern listeners as a super-smooth middle of the road DJ. But in his misspent youth as a guitarist, Gerry Anderson lived a life of rock and roll abandon.
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.
WITH THE Spank, sorry, Bank Holiday Weekend upon us, we thought you d be interested in a magazine that enables you to get the most out of your leisure time.
Top British stand-up DONNA McPHAIL takes time out from doing the dishes to discuss sexism in comedy, being pissed and England's World Cup prospects.
Token man: BARRY GLENDENNING.
In the second part of her investigation into the issues surrounding childbirth in Ireland, ADRIENNE MURPHY speaks to Jo Murphy-Lawless, author of a compelling book on obstetrics.
Ed Byrne has just finished a smash-hit series of concerts at Dublin’s Olympia Theatre as part of his hundred-date tour but those who are missing him already can tune into the new Network 2 show Just For Laughs which finds him wearing his TV presenters’ hat. and shades.
We should be asking questions about Catholicism's warped teachings on sexuality, rather than wasting time on John Charles McQuaid's alleged homosexuality, writes NELL McCAFFERTY.
Choosing a contraceptive method you can be comfortable with will not only prevent pregnancy and/or disease but will also give your love life a boost as you feel more confident
Quite what the establishment will make of mark begley s photographic work remains to be seen, but it s sure to raise a few eyebrows. paul o mahony talks to a man intent on kicking down the walls.
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.
One more time with feeling, Tanya Sweeney pays her respects to sex and the city, a television show which had a profound impact on sex, fashion and female singledom. and we haven’t entirely seen the last of Carrie and co. either…
IBEN HJELJE, the female lead in the new film of Nick Hornby s acclaimed High Fidelity, is the best thing to come out of Denmark since Hamlet.
Interview: CRAIG FITZSIMONS
We see the reports on television and hear the voices on the radio but the brutal adrenaline-charged reality of the rioting in North Belfast can only be fully understood if you're in the thick of it. Gerry Ryan Show reporter Brenda O' Donoghue briefly was.
THEY LOVE CHOCOLATE, HATE SUPERMODELS AND THINK THE BEST WAY TO COMBAT RACISM AND SEXISM IS TO JUST GET UP ON STAGE AND PLAY. NIALL CRUMLISH DISCOVERS
THE PURE POP DELIGHTS OF THE VOODOO QUEENS.
All-girl rap duo Yo! Majesty are the hottest thing in hip-hop but that's not to say they're the best of mates. Shunda K explains why she's peeved at both her record label and partner in rhyme.
Technology has changed the way in which prostitution works in Ireland – and both the Gardai and organisations like Ruhana are struggling to cope. Meanwhile, Irish sexual mores are also changing.
Under the direction of Joe Devlin, the Focus Theatre has taken on an impressive range of projects – not least two plays that tackle burning contemporary issues. Devlin tells us how he’s been carrying on the Focus tradition.
The latest radio listenership figures suggest that the once embattled Today FM is finally emerging as a credible national alternative to RTE. In the third of a four-part series, Jackie Hayden breakfasts - as do more Irish radio listeners than ever - with morning-show helmsman Ian Dempsey
Closer, with its explicit language and nudity is one of the most controversial plays to grace the stage of Dublin's Peacock Theatre. Here one of its stars, ALI WHITE talks about her role
Well, it sure as hell beats having sex with your enemies! But is there not a risk of ruining a beautiful friendship? Not if your fuck buddy understands the rules of this particular kind of attraction…
The gate’s current production of Pygmalion reverses the chauvinistic aspects of both film adaptations. Actress Jeananne Crowley explains how george bernard shaw got his feminist groove back.
Joe Jackson talks to Peter Hanly, currently starring in the Pulitzer Prize winning play Dinner With Friends, which explores the minefield of contemporary conjugal relationships.
englebert humperdinck s legendary career stretches over the past 30 years. Now, however, it s reinvention ahoy! as he releases . . . a dance album. adrienne murphy meets The King Of Romance and is told she has a beautiful handshake .
SIOBHAN LONG meets RON HYNES, writer of Sonny and hears him talk about Paul Simon, Donegal and the lack of support for artists in his native Newfoundland.
THE WAR between the sexes certainly seems to be dominating Dublin stages these days. In The Mai at the Peacock, the male character is slowly marginalised, and in Refugees at the Eblana, the man exists only as an object of mockery, whose prick has been removed by his wife’s knife.
THE WAR between the sexes certainly seems to be dominating Dublin stages these days. In The Mai at the Peacock, the male character is slowly marginalised, and in Refugees at the Eblana, the man exists only as an object of mockery, whose prick has been removed by his wife’s knife.
Following John Waters’ article on fathers’ rights in the last issue of hotpress, Ivana Bacik responds to his criticisms of herself and feminism in general.
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
Anna Nolan first shot to fame as one of the stars of the original Big Brother. A lesbian, guitar-playing ex-nun, she has gone on to make an impact as a TV presenter in the UK. Now, she's about to make her Irish debut
Growing up in Sheffield, The Long Blondes’ Kate Jackson was sick of boring indie bands. So she decided to put together a group with a little more glamour about it.
Well done, Desmond! Most people in Ireland will be well aware of the controversy which has erupted following the speech which Archbishop Desmond Connell of Dublin gave recently concerning the church s teaching on contraception
In 1988, HP journalist Joe Jackson interviewed the then Lord Mayor, Ben Briscoe. His homophobic opinions in the resulting article in Hot Press sparked an argument in the letters section of the Irish Times, to which Dermod Moore, then unaffiliated with Hot Press, contributed his thoughts. Here's the letter in full.
FANS OF this column have complained that in my preview of the Dublin Theatre Festival, in the last issue of Hot Press I paid only lip service to the "most prestigious and biggest show on offer," the RSC's production of Shakespeare's A Winter's Tale (Gaiety Theatre).
Dubliner Anita Thoma was arrested in New York city on St Patrick s Day last while protesting against the ban on gays and lesbians taking part in the city s parade. Stephen Robinson reports.
If I Should Fall From Grace is the most intimate portrait of SHANE MacGOWAN yet. CRAIG FITZSIMONS meets the director of the critically acclaimed biopic, SARAH SHARE.
Controversy is already swirling around the forthcoming Abbey Theatre production, Barbaric Comedies. JOE JACKSON finds out what it s all about and talks to one Irish actress who decided against appearing in the play
IN HIS interview elsewhere in this issue Michael D. Higgins points out that there is little to be gained from indulging in discussions about a Dublin/the rest of Ireland divide. However it would be fatuous to deny that while Dublin slept coiled inside smug self assurance in terms of its pivotal role in relation to the arts, regional areas such as Galway gradually became more vibrant centres of cultural life, in many ways.
CATHY DILLON chats to Dubliner JIMMY SMALLHORNE, writer and director of 2by4, an acclaimed new film charting the lives of young gay Irish immigrants in New York.
Ahead of her appearance at a huge charity fashion show in Dublin, the supermodel talks mountain-climbing, modelling, smoking and U2.
By OLAF TYARANSEN.
Finns can only get better as dodgy England World Cup songs, credibility-destroying Coke ads and blood-spurting Eurovision entrants star in our C.I.N. music special.
With her own debut album, Eleanor McEvoy, one of the stars of A Woman s Heart , has come out of the folk closet and revealed herself to be a real rocker feedback, distorted guitars and all. Interview: Colm O Hare.
It's been 33 years since Belfast girl Ruby Murray topped the UK charts with 'Softly Softly'. Since then, the female singers from the North have rarely scored internationally. Dana last hit the top 50 in '79. Newry stomper Clodagh Rodgers wowed Eurovision in '71 with her hot pants and a rendition of the oompah crowd-pleaser 'Jack In The Box'. And, er, that's about
Sebastian Barry's new play Hinterland concerns the reflections of a former Taoiseach and his failed relationship with his family. Joe Jackson asks director Max Stafford-Clarke if the story is based on anyone in particular
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
Self-styled sex siren Diablo Cody has moved into the mainstream with the acclaimed, Oscar-nominated Juno. What’s more, the movie is so good, she might just prove to be a winner.
Tara Brady talks to Julie Brocquy, producer of Osama, the acclaimed Afghan film which tells the story of a young girl forced to disguise herself as a boy to survive life under the Taliban regime.
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 was one of the first Irish comedians to make an international breakthrough in the ’90s. And now Ed Byrne is going from strength to strength with an entirely new show. He talks about the role class plays in his work and talks about the time he was accused of misogyny.
It’s been a while since we’ve heard from quirky popsters Alphastates but that’s not because they’ve had a massive falling out. Rather, their lead singer lost her voice and then they suffered a sudden lack of confidence. But now they’re back, with perhaps their finest record yet.
Seth Rogen is one of the team of stoners behind a string of comedies that have generated a billion dollars at the box office. Pineapple Express is the latest.
Which is a rather cryptic way of introducing an interview by Joe Jackson with Brian Kennedy on his distaste for the macho ethos of rock and his admiration for fellow Belfast troubadour Mr. Morrison.
Author and environmentalist JUDITH HOAD has stood fast against the modern gods of progress and profit. But, as concerns about GM technology grow, it becomes ever-more important that voices like hers are heard. By ADRIENNE MURPHY. Pic: Cathal Dawson
While half-hearted attempts are made to clamp down on prostitution, there is a thriving prostitution business in Ireland that is widely advertised on the internet
Anybody can do sex, drug's and rock 'n' roll; precious few can capture the experience in prose. With her powerful first-person novel Brass, 26-year-old Helen Walsh has done just that.
Jim Corr-endorsed four-piece Karrier have wowed the Dublin indie circuit and supported Pink at Malahide Castle. Now, the band are looking to make a big impact with their debut album.
Three years ago this month, MICHAEL HUTCHENCE s body was found in a Sydney hotel room. Now, his mother PATRICIA GLASSOP and half-sister TINA HUTCHENCE have written a book about their memories of the singer s life and the bitter legal battles which followed his death. They spoke to NIALL STANAGE
"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
She’s an acclaimed novelist – but Emar Martin is fast earning a reputation as a visual artist also. As her latest exhibit opens, she talks about moving between the two media
Ireland has gone mad for sex toys. Blokes, women, married, single, gay, straight and any and every combination of the above – they’re all indulging as though there were no tomorrow. But what are the hottest tickets in the country’s most successful sex emporia? We sent Tanya Sweeney to find out.
They are young, smart and full of self-belief. Their ambitions are boundless, their talents rich and varied. For a generation of young Irish women, the world is awash with possibilities.
From actors to musicians, models to politicians, women are redefining what it means to be female and Irish. Their role-models are women who have achieved greatness, who have made us sit up and pay attention. Not content to bask in someone else’s glories, they believe every woman should aspire to be the best at what they do.
These are the women for whom second best is an anathema. They are the future. To introduce the Hot Press-selected crew: Tanya Sweeney and Louise Hodgson.
For many women, health is the most important issue of 2005. So what can we do to stay in good shape? Karen Ward (Holistic) and Paula Mee (Nutrition) offer their advice.
Softly spoken off stage and complete lunatics on it, Kila have torn up the rulebook with their wantonly eclectic mix of styles. music, inner anger, revolutions and, er, women who cure warts are all discussed, as the band’s Colm O Snodaigh talks to Peter Murphy.
After a lengthy silence, TRICKY is back with an impressively upbeat new album. But the man himself still insists on going against the grain. Here he talks about his aversion to celebrityhood, his dislike of the music biz, his fondness for Bryan Adams and Bono, and how he copes with the terrible burden of having hundreds of women who want to have sex with him. Interview: OLAF TYARANSEN
SINEAD O Connor has said that she will continue with her music career, despite having been ordained a priest in Lourdes by a bishop of the rebel catholic Tridentine church.
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.
In 1996, Liam Fay wrote the definitive a to z of weird sexual practices for Hotpress. We raid the archive to present a selection from that much larger work
For the indigenous peoples of Central America, peace does not always mean prosperity. Nowhere is this more true than in Guatemala, where even ten years after the end of a brutal civil war, the wounds remain raw.
US Stand-up Emo Phillips is one of the star attractions at this year's Murphy's Kilkenny Cat Laughs festival which takes place from May 30th-June 3rd. Stephen Robinson is amused
It isn’t what it used to be – which makes it all the more important that Workers Rights should be properly protected. Some say that the Lisbon Treaty will help in that respect. Others profoundly disagree. We asked a representative of both sides to make the case for voting Yes and No...
Liverpudlian Comedian Brendan Riley visits Dublin and Galway in April. but sharp-eyed soap-addict Stephen Robinson thinks we've seen his face before...
With the new Outhouse Centre as its nucleus, South William Street looks set to become the cultural and economic hub of Dublin s gay scene. adrienne murphy reports.
Maggie Gyllenhaal has ridden out controversy and kept her private life to herself while carving out an impeccably cool career in Hollywood. No wonder all the girls fancy her.
A special interview from the Hot Press archives, first published in 1985: Minister for Women's Affairs Nuala Fennell talks feminism, sex and contraception with HP editor Niall Stokes.
TB, malaria, AIDS and infections of every sort flourish in the mud-huts of Kenya and Tanzanis. John Donnellan travelled to witness the appalling conditions.
“I was clearing out some boxes recently and I came across these sketches I must have done when I was about six. I had scribbled in bright crayon across the page ‘Swimwear Collection’, and had drawn these bright yellow stick insect figures with big heads"
Fresh from the success of THE DIVINE COMEDY in the Hot Press Readers Poll, NEIL HANNON drops his guard(s) for some candid talking on love, sex, aesthetics and the whole damn thing. Interview: JOE JACKSON
Since writing her book The Morning After: Sex, Fear And Feminism, author Katie Roiphe has been subjected to an unprecedented level of private and public vilification for her outspoken views on rape. Here, she talks to Liam Fay about the growing complexity of sexual politics in the States.
Pix: Cathal Dawson.
Kill Bill is widely seen as a vehicle for director Quentin Tarrantino to express his deep-seated fascination with his favourite leading lady, Uma Thurman. But the character of The Bride – the super-deadly vixen played by Thurman in Kill Bill – is based on the blood-thirsty heroines of a bevy of B-Movies with which modern cinema’s most deadly talent is obsessed. So, as Kill Bill 2 hits the screens, we ask who are these foxy ladies, and what makes them such ruthless killers?
We’ve tipped them for success in the past, and now, with a New Year upon us, Laura Izibor, Dirty Epic’s SJ Wai and Fight Like Apes’ MayKay are set to sweep all before them.
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
Not content with her million selling success with Destiny's Child, Beyonce Knowles has just released a solo single 'Work It Out' from the Austin Powers - Goldmember soundtrack and is shortly to release a debut solo album
The indie director's female lead of choice (I Shot Any Warhol, The Addiction), Lili Taylor is perfectly cast as a Liquored Up Fuck Machine in Bent Hamer's screen adaption of Charles Bukowski's classic Factotum.
Wilde's most famous play has been given a daring make-over. One of the stars, Tadhg Murphy, explains why Wilde would have appreciated an all-male version
Irish film-maker BILL HUGHES has just completed a documentary on the past 100 years of homosexual life in Ireland. ANGELA McGOLDRICK met him to talk about the programme, and his own experience as a gay Irish person.
SEX, HUMOR And Truth it proudly proclaims on the cover and, sure enough, Hustler is almost as famous nowadays for upholding the Fifth Amendment as for what the porn world so sensitively titles hamburger shots.
WHAT motivates a writer to consign words to page? By what method do they arrive at their chosen subject matter? Is the writer more or less a voyeur than those who read their scribblings?
“The stakes go up every season,” she reflects. “When I first sold to a Japanese store I was over the moon. I would have taken off my socks and shoes and sold them"
Unheard of a year ago, the astonishing Cansei de Ser Sexy are one of the hottest indie outfits in the world. With an acclaimed debut album to their credit, the Brazilians bring their twelve legged groove machine to Dublin for BudRising Winter.
The Dublin-born editor of Marie Claire, one of the world's most successful magazines, answers to charges that her title promotes hypocrisy, air-headedness, sexism and sycophancy. remarkably, she doesn't throw troublesome Hotpress out of her office
BBC 4 & 6, Gardener's Question Time, The Guardian crossword... comedian Colin Murphy's Belfast home is a veritable hub of bacchanalia. Photos by Amberlea Trainor.
John Seymour, who died on September 14th in Pembrokeshire, was one of the foremost figures in the self-sufficiency movement. Here his friend and fellow activist Adrienne Murphy pays her respects.
A new book gives vivid voice to Irish women's experience of abortion. Here we publish Michele s story a harrowing account of the circumstances in which termination became one woman s choice.
Tori Amos has rocketed to international prominence with her album "Little Earthquakes", but behind the public success story lies the private trauma
of a young woman who was raped at the age of 22. In an uncompromisingly honest interview with Joe Jackson, Tori talks about that terrible experience, it's lasting scars and how her music has helped to set her free again.
For one day only, ADRIENNE MURPHY’s boyfriend GAVIN HARTE decided to go where Dustin Hoffman had gone before in Tootsie, and metamorphose into a woman – with the help of the staff at a Phibsboro establishment that specialises in such radical makeovers. How did it look? What did it feel like? And – most importantly – was his corset too uncomfortable? Pix and images: MICK QUINN
From playing tiny club gigs to serenading Wembley, songstress Tara Blaise has travelled a great distance in a short time. And the journey is only just beginning.
From that piano-ballad cover of ‘Smells Like Teen Spirit’ to her new-found fascination with Gnostic texts, Tori Amos has remained one of the most compelling and enigmatic solo artists of the past ten years. Here, she fills Peter Murphy in on the intriguing background to her latest album, The Beekeeper, her reasons for relocating to the bucolic splendor of Cornwall, and the difficulties of maintaining artistic integrity in the face of corporate profiteering. Oh, and beekeeping, of course.
Scratch the skin of any Irish chick-lit queen and you’ll find a history of depression, alcoholism, low self-esteem and late blooming – especially if that novelist’s name is Marian Keyes. One of this country’s biggest selling fiction writers, Keyes talks about how she freed herself from poverty-stricken theocratic 1980s Ireland, took a leap of faith and found her voice in print. Not to mention M&M withdrawal, Cecelia Ahern, neo feminism and Anthony Kiedis. Interview: Tanya Sweeney. Photography: Cathal Dawson.
The hostage crisis in Beslan, which ended last week in terrible carnage, has brought the conflict in the former soviet union into sharper focus than ever before. the emerging picture is a chastening one, as the prospect of a descent into chaos looms ever larger.
Despite the beliefs of many misguided Americans, paula cole has no intention of giving up her singing career to look after a macho cowboy. colm o?hare feels neglected.
Never mind Cradle of Filth and their “Jesus Is A Cunt” t-shirts, if it’s real, honest to Beelzebub offensiveness you’re after look no further than Norwegian death metallers Gorgoroth who’ve been charged with blasphemous obscenity following a particularly boisterous gig in Poland.
He's shot U2 and Madonna and numerous nudes, formulated an "aesthetic of the dick", published the perfect magazine and, most recently, hit the headlines for endeavouring to make the Queen of England look "really fresh". He's Rankin Waddell, co-founder of Dazed And Confused and probably the most renowned fashion, music and pop culture snapper on the planet
WELL. It’s here again. The shopping, the stamp-licking, the mad social whirl, the parties, the receptions, the reunions, the idiotic games, the enforced cheerfulness . . .
The violent life and death of the Florida prostitute Aileen Wuornos, who was executed in 2002 for a string of murders, is the subject matter of the debut film feature monster by Patty Jenkins. Craig Fitzsimons talks to the writer-director about the controversial, Oscar-winning movie
Billed as the publishing event of the century, Crossing The Threshold Of Hope by Pope John Paul has already netted its author an advance of $10 million and is currently topping bestseller lists the world over. LIAM FAY wades through this extra helping of papal bull and comes to the conclusion that His Holiness is now, certifiably, as crazy as a shithouse rat.
Still most famous in this part of the world for ‘Gangsta’s Paradise’, la rapper Coolio has certainly kept himself busy in the eight years since that hit. Movies, charity work and an appearance on Open House are all in a day’s work for the artist formerly known as Artis Leon Ivey Jr.
SHOW ME a poster bearing the entwined silhouettes of two angular dancers accompanied by the words "Tango", "Sultry sensuous passion" and "Direct from Argentina" and the outcome is fairly inevitable.
He directed a young Tom Cruise in Cocktail and inadvertently unleashed 'Don't Worry, Be Happy' on an unsuspecting world. For his latest project director Roger Donaldson returns to his roots in the antipodes words.
Over the past ten years – no, make that twenty! – Irish society has undergone a transformation, casting off the shackles of the moral authority imposed by the church and embracing a more open, experimental and, let’s face it, downright horny attitude to sex and sexuality. The momentum towards change has been accelerated by significant advances in health care – not to mention the media environment – so that we are now more up for it than ever before.
Already established as a major star in Ireland, and with a healthy and growing following internationally, it looks increasingly likely that we have a major world star on our hands.
40-Year-Old-Virgin star Steve Carell offers our film critic a space on his warm throne and regales her with tales of all-boys’ schools and playing Ricky Gervais’ American equivalent in The Office.
As many as 12% of Irish people are happy to have sex without even getting to know their prospective partner's name first. That's just one of the fascinating statistics to emerge in a Durex Sex Survey, commissioned to mark National Condom Week.
Her novels have charmed millions of readers around the world, but in Ireland she remains best known as the Taoseach's daughter. As her third book is published, Cecelia Ahern talks about success, politics and how her parents' separation coloured her thoughts on love and marriage.
There is a political dimension to what most development agencies refer to simply as ‘famine’. Here mary van lieshoUt of Oxfam outlines the critical issues which must be confronted if the brutalisation and exploitation of the developing countries is to be adequately addressed.
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
Young, hungry, professional film crews and equally young, beautiful and professional actors. What’s the Irish film industry come to? Just ask Speed Dating stars Nora Jane Noone and Hugh O’Conor.
Action movie sweetheart and FHM-proclaimed second sexiest woman on the planet Jessica Biel gives us the lowdown on upcoming period rom-com Easy Virtue... and nothing else.
Caitlin Murphy's darkly comic new play imagines the relationship between Joyce's daughter and Beckett's wife, one which would have been fraught with tension and sexual jealousy
Gardai and other authorities are giving greater attention than ever these days to the issue of ‘drug driving’. But the culprits may not always be who you think…
Tanya Donelly star of the upwardly flying Belly, wouldn't sleep with Robert Redford for a million dollars and she wouldn't throw her knickers at Tom Jones. But she is engaged, believes in the concept of marriage - and is on her way to Sunstroke. Interview: Andrew Darlington
Credible clothing at an affordable price, dressing up Pulp and remodelling Tony Blair as a transvestite it s all in a day s work for wayne hemingway of hip fashion label red or dead.
Interview: Olaf Tyaransen
RAP BAND Niggers With Attitude, who once sang the song 'Burn Hollywood' would be more than pleased to hear of the success of the Irish Film Centre which came to Dublin's Temple Bar Area a year ago.
With her own debut album, ELEANOR McEVOY, one of the stars of 'A Woman's Heart', has come out of the folk closet and revealed herself to be a real rocker - feedback, distorted guitars and all. Interview: COLM O'HARE
The Miss Ireland competition is in its 45th year. Liam Fay went along to the Burlington Hotel final to come to (metaphorical) grips with the assets of Miss Irish Sun Newspaper, among others.
He found the experience deeply embarrassing. Pix: Colm Henry.
Having conquered Africa, Youssou N’Dour is now turning his attentions to the rest of the world. With Eno, Peter Gabriel and Wyclef Jean all singing his praises, Sam Healy reckons it’s only a matter of time before he has his evil way with us
She’s acted in big screen Joyce adaptations and appeared in hip-hop cinema. Now Irish actress Fionnula Flanagan is set to enter the major league, following her turn in the acclaimed – and Oscar nominated – Transamerica.
No-one could contemplate using a headline like that in Hot Press unless of course it was to sum up an article about Howard Stern, the New York DJ who credits himself with having invented the concept of penis jokes on radio. Tape: craig fitzsimons.
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.
Second generation Irish-American LIZ CARROLL is one of the best fiddlers around. She spoke to SIOBHAN LONG about her album, the importance of the session
and Chicago. Picture: Declan English
Second generation Irish-American LIZ CARROLL is one of the best fiddlers around. She spoke to SIOBHAN LONG about her album, the importance of the session
and Chicago. Picture: Declan English
Second generation Irish-American LIZ CARROLL is one of the best fiddlers around. She spoke to SIOBHAN LONG about her album, the importance of the session
and Chicago. Picture: Declan English
As host of her own show on Network 2, CLARE McKEON is no stranger to controversy. Here she talks frankly to OLAF TYARANSEN about abortion, drugs, motherhood and her legendary temper.
Niall Stokes: With this record you took on responsibilities as a group which were significantly greater than had been the case before, in terms of shaping the record, being involved in production. How did that affect the process?
Notorious in her native China for her sexually graphic novel Shanghai Baby, Wei Hui looks sure to upset the authorities even more with her next literary outing. Fiona reid meets the controversial young author.
photography: cathal dawson
A straight-talking Swede renowned her famously candid – and frequently highly controversial – personal web-blog, European Commission Vice President Margot Wallstrom is not your typical Eurocrat. On a recent visit to Dublin, she took time out to talk to Hot Press about Tony Blair, George Bush, the Irish and the Swedes’ mutual love of alcohol, Bertie Ahern, Charlie McCreevey’s accent, Bono and Bob Geldof. And she even taught us a few Swedish swear words. Interview by Jackie Hayden. Photography by Liam Sweeney.
KIM HOLLAND makes films, Collectors Only films. She is also a former Jehovah s Witness. PAUL O MAHONY reports from The Netherlands on a liberation struggle with a difference.
Author and columnist Candace Bushnell, who has been dubbed the Sharon Stone of journalism , on love, sex, drugs, drink and the dark underbelly of high society from New
York to Dublin.
We are going to spare you all the obvious puns about going back to basics, catching this particular fish in the raw or even the irrefutable truism that fins ain’t what they used to be. But as you can see from the accompanying pictures, there is something particularly vulnerable about people when they're naked. Dropped by Atlantic Records, stripped of all the corporate support, funding, and of course bullshit, – this is how An Emotional Fish stand before the public, on the launch of their independently-produced Sloper album. Not that either the band or lead singer are without the support of people who matter. Ger is photographed with his wife Lorraine . . . Interview: COLM O’HARE. Pix: MICK QUINN.
His plaintive violin playing will be familiar to fans of The Frames and Swell Season. Now Colm Mac Con Iomaire has finally gotten around to recording a solo album.
Watching racist bullying on Celebrity Big Brother was horrific, argues Hot Press’ very own Shilpa, but that shouldn’t mean we need to become PC fascists.
Discussing her private life has become a national pastime, but it hasn’t stopped Charlotte Church from developing some very commendable rock’n’roll habits. Ed Power forgives the 19-year-old for standing him up, and discovers a young woman very much in control of her own destiny.
Plans for a film based on the life of Republican figurehead and Labour party founder James Connolly have received a boost with SIPTU agreeing to help finance the project.
Niall Stokes: People would make an assumption that since The Corrs have sold millions of records, you ve already got it made. Does it feel like that to you?
Those who limit themselves to the traditional man-on-top position during sex are missing out on the fun and excitement that a little sexual experimentation can provide. For the more adventurous a little research can help you see a whole new side of your partner
Halloween is just around the corner. But do we celebrate it in a way that is fundamentally prejudiced and hostile? MELISSA KNIGHT argues that it's time we understood the reality of Witchcraft and Goddess worship.
When Patti Smith came up with Rock N Roll Nigger in the 70s, she marked herself out as one of the most articulate and confrontational performers of her generation. On the eve of her visit to Ireland, the High Priestess of American Punk Poetry talks to Peter Murphy about art, music, the people she s lost and why she ll never give in to political correctness
WITHOUT A shadow of doubt, the figures revealed in the Hot Press/Classic Hits 98FM survey will give politicians, priests, lawyers, legislators, educators and gardai pause for thought.
The Gardaí have been accused of beligerant and heavy-handed tactics in their closing down of a Galway dance party. STUART CLARK hears both sides of the story.
I’ve been driving in the west. Out there beyond the water margins of Yang Shang-Po, aka Oughterard, after which the landscape shifts into something quite different from that which has gone before.
The Eskimos have a hundred names for snow, the Irish a thousand ways to describe the weather, and Dermond Moore has at his disposal innumerable methods of evoking the many qualities of loneliness. In his first book Diary of a Man, is culled from a decade of Hot Press Bootboy columns, but it also hangs together as a string of depositions filed from the heart of exile and - that great literary theme so beloved of everyone Shakespeare to Dostoevsky- isolation.
Enjoying parallels with works as diverse as Chekov’s Three Sisters and About Adam, Very Heaven looks set to be another success for dublin’s focus theatre. Joe Jackson talks to the show’s director, Bairbre Ni Chaoimh
CRAIG FITZSIMONS speaks to young Irish director DAMIEN O'DONNELL, whose debut feature East Is East takes a controversial look at Pakistani immigrant culture.
With a new novel Eclipse published to universal acclaim, the enigmatic Irish writer emerges from the deep gloomy cavern he inhabits to discuss art, sex, love, hate, humour, death and the battle of the sexes. Interview: JOE JACKSON.
Portraits of the author: CATHAL DAWSON
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.
Yes readers, it s that time of year again when TOM MATHEWS hacks his way through the vin and verbiage of dear old Galway town for the cuirt festival of literature.
Sex And The City star Kim Cattrall is back on our screens in John Boorman’s The Tiger’s Tail, a dark satirical comedy planets away from her role as the kit-shedding Samantha.
Broadcaster and journalist PADDY O GORMAN has outraged the medical establishment with his view of AIDS as a gay virus . He defends himself to STEPHEN ROBINSON, while NOEL WALSH and MICHAEL CRONIN of Gay Community News put their side of the argument.
Once a rock’n’roll performer in his youth, CONOR McPHERSON has now graduated into one of Ireland’s brightest theatrical and literary talents. Still only in his mid-20s, he’s already written the screenplay of the acclaimed Irish thriller I Went Down, as well as several acclaimed plays, This Limetree Bower and his latest effort The Weir. Here, he talks to JOE JACKSON about the mixed reception he’s received from Irish theatre critics, and the influence of rock music on his work.
She's never been one to pull her punches but even by her standards, Mary Coughlan's latest album is a rollercoaster. Here, she talks about a life of love, loss, pain and redemption.
Not content to let other country stars record her songs and keep her in massive cheques for the rest of her life, gretchen peters has decided to do a little performing and touring of her own. Interview: colm o'hare.
tomais o saoire is an Irish immigrant living in New York. He is also HIV positive. This is his heartrending story a tragic tale which includes brushes with alcoholism and depression. Tape: DYLAN FOLEY.
Musical trends come and go but the blues continues to thrive. In Ireland, the scene is now stronger than ever. With her reputation growing internationally, Mary Stokes talks about her role as a performer - and her friendships with numerous blues legends. Oh, and Van Morrison's birth sign!
Christy Dignam of Aslan has never been one to pull his punches and, as a result, controversy has dogged the band with every new public utterance. Now as their debut album Feel No Shame nestles at the top of the Irish charts, in an in-depth interview he attempts to set the record straight, on his attitude to U2, poverty, drugs, groupies, his personal life and the macho implications of the band s image and music. Sceptical Eye: Cathy Dillon
With her stinging one-liners and droll, deadpan delivery, JO BRAND has established herself as the Queen of British comedy. In the run up to her Dublin appearance, she talks about men, booze, cakes and Gary Bushell to LIAM FAY, and explains why she would eventually like to become an MP.
This year there is one striking feature of the Dublin Theatre Festival which would suggest that the Capital’s two key theatres are not making too much of an effort for the event.
The Mexican-Canadian Dark Angel starlet Jessica Alba gets all grown up with a lasso and leather bra in the Rodriguez/Tarantino directed film adaptation of Frank Miller's neon noir Sin City.
spirit walker - the story of how three Essex boys met two Paddies with attitude and released a five-minute
ballad as their debut single. peter murphy has the details.
Sean O’Reilly, whose superb Watermark hit the shelves recently, has been hailed as one of the most important new voices in Irish fiction. So why has more widespread success eluded him to date?
“All men are bastards” Country star trisha yearwood firmly believed – until she met the one who would become her husband. Here, she talks to Joe Jackson about how her marriage to Robert Reynolds of The Mavericks has changed the way she looks at the opposite sex. She also discusses her rivalry with LeAnn Rimes, and the darker side of the Nashville country ’n’ western scene.
Pix: Cathal Dawson
Rough Magic, one of Ireland’s outstanding theatre ensembles, returns with a production of Shakespeare that examines the battle of the sexes in Ireland.
She has the bearing of a 19th-Century aristocrat but, face to face, Keira Knightley is nobody’s princess. Here she talks about starring in Pirates Of The Caribbean: At World's End and explains why, for her at least, it really is time to jump overboard from the franchise.
At the tender age of seventeen, Dubliner Sinéad O'Connor packed up Ton Ton Macoute, packed her bags and headed for London. Two years on she's had a few close shaves, recorded with the Edge and is on the verge of seriously launching her career with an album in January. Interview: Molly McAnailly Burke.
You may not be aware of this – but you, dear reader, are living in one of the most romantic places on earth. That’s according to countless writers and readers of romantic fiction, for whom Ireland and the Irish are bywords for commercial success. On St. Patrick’s Day, a US publishing company will publish Emerald Enchantment, an anthology of all things green, red-haired and romantic. New York-based tara mccarthy, seeking insight into the tragic history of her own romps in the hay with Irishmen, assesses its contents – and has little difficulty separating fact from fiction.
Illustration: MIKEY CROTTY
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.
It may be that she will forever be associated with the Zipless Fuck, but if her new book, Of Blessed Memory, takes off like Fear Of Flying, erica jong could yet become synonymous with another hot erotic scenario, The Three Slipperies. Still creating controversy after all these years, the author talks feminism, Judaism, rock n roll, fashion and but, of course sex, with Joe Jackson.
Pix: cathal dawson
Never met a dyke he didn t like! Joe Jackson boogies the night away with Zrazy, one of Irish music s most determined combos. 1993 saw this radical lesbian dance due release their debut album in the face of widescale indifference from the national media and here they tell of their struggle to assert their music and sexuality against overwhelming odds.
At the age of 20, kathryn harrison embarked on a full-blown sexual affair with her own father an incestuous relationship which the acclaimed author has now chronicled in detail in her latest book, The Kiss. joe jackson meets the woman who has been attacked as a mercenary slut wanting to capitalise on shock value .
Pix: colm henry.
It’s a rare thing indeed to hear an Irish lesbian speak openly and frankly about her life, lusts and loves. Gay writer, EMMA DONOGHUE, however, is one of the first of a new and more confident generation. At twenty-four, she has already produced a prodigious body of work ranging from drama to cultural history to her just-published first novel, Stir Fry. In the process, she has emerged as a proud and powerful voice for hundreds of young lesbians in this country. Interview: LIAM FAY. Pix: COLM HENRY
After years when her triumphs were in danger of being masked by her tribulations, DOLORES O RIORDAN is back in defiantly upbeat form. She talks to STUART CLARK about confidence, critics, Calvin Klein and her confirmation-size breasts ! Pics: MICK QUINN.
She’s a mouthy young Londoner who knows how to strum a guitar and isn’t afraid to diss ex-boyfriends in song. Just don’t call Kate Nash the new Lily Allen.
He may not always be the critics darling, but BERNARD FARRELL remains one of Ireland s most popular and successful playwrights. Here he talks to JOE JACKSON about his regard for theatre and everyday heroes, and his contempt for snobs, suits and Celtic Tiger Ireland. Pics: Cathal Dawson
He may not always be the critics darling, but BERNARD FARRELL remains one of Ireland s most popular and successful playwrights. Here he talks to JOE JACKSON about his regard for theatre and everyday heroes, and his contempt for snobs, suits and Celtic Tiger Ireland. Pics: Cathal Dawson
He may not always be the critics darling, but BERNARD FARRELL remains one of Ireland s most popular and successful playwrights. Here he talks to JOE JACKSON about his regard for theatre and everyday heroes, and his contempt for snobs, suits and Celtic Tiger Ireland. Pics: Cathal Dawson
He may not always be the critics darling, but BERNARD FARRELL remains one of Ireland s most popular and successful playwrights. Here he talks to JOE JACKSON about his regard for theatre and everyday heroes, and his contempt for snobs, suits and Celtic Tiger Ireland. Pics: Cathal Dawson
He may not always be the critics darling, but BERNARD FARRELL remains one of Ireland s most popular and successful playwrights. Here he talks to JOE JACKSON about his regard for theatre and everyday heroes, and his contempt for snobs, suits and Celtic Tiger Ireland. Pics: Cathal Dawson
First she learned to pout - then she learned to kick butt. from Revlon to Resident Evil, Milla Jovovich explains how a girl from the Ukraine conquered the world. In Prada boots, of course
She started as a model, carving out a successful career and living the celebrity lifestyle in the full glare of the cameras. With a well publicised stint on reality TV in LA behind her, she is now one of the hottest properties in British television.
Is there a technique to picking up a member of the opposite sex – or does it just happen? Feeling that he could do with a little bit of help in that department, journalist Neil Strauss hooked up with a cult community of Pick Up Artists and set out to learn the secrets of the trade. With all those Christmas parties looming, his advice might just come in handy.
Never met a dyke he didn’t like! Joe Jackson boogies the night away with ZRAZY, one of Irish music’s most determined combos. 1993 saw this radical lesbian dance duo release their debut album in the face of widescale indifference from the national media and here they tell of their struggle to assert their music and sexuality against overwhelming odds.
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
She has spent her life being defined by the men around her - as daughter of Arthur Miller and wife of Daniel Day Lewis. With the release of her big screen adaptation of her novel, The Private Lives Of Pippa Lee, Rebecca Miller proves that she is very much her own woman.
The new installment in the Narnia franchise, Prince Caspian, is burdened by huge commercial expectations. But the film's director, Andrew Adamson, is not letting the pressure get to him.
It’s a good life being a FUN LOVIN' CRIMINAL. You get to party at your own club in Dublin, chill out in Maui, dress like "an irish soccer hooligan" and watch astral television in germany. All this and you’re a nice guy too. HUEY MORGAN tells FIONA REID about life on the town
From child actress to Emmy and Oscar-winning veteran, Helen Hunt exhibits Streep-like intelligence and versatility. She's now about to make her directorial debut with Then She Found Me.
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.
Denounced by the Christian right in America and the Catholic church in Italy but championed by rockers as diverse as Marilyn Manson and Led Zep’s John Paul Jones, Diamanda Galas is unlikely to be hollywood’s flavour of the month as she rips into the oscar-winning Monster
We are currently going through the Golden Age of Sexual Freedom. But there are dark clouds on the horizon with the increase in STDs on the one hand and the resurgence of fundamentalist religion in different guises on the other. So will our children become the New Puritans? This is the third and final part in a special three part series.
American singer-songwriter SHAWN COLVIN explains that her fourth and latest album A Few Small Repairs is about more than just her recent marital breakdown. Interview: JOE JACKSON
LAURYN HILL s debut album, The Miseducation Of Lauryn Hill was the fastest selling album ever by a female artist in the United States. What s more it s just garnered her five Grammy Awards, confirming her status as one of American music s most important new icons. OLAF TYARANSEN went to London to hear the singer talk frankly about success, motherhood, the future of The Fugees and her father-in-law, Bob Marley.
Could a serial killer be behind a rash of disappearances in Dublin and neighbouring counties over the past two decades? And might the murderer now be behind bars? Craig Fitzsimons untangles a dark and disturbing tale and wonders whether the truth of what happened will really ever become known.
Tommy Tiernan's latest concert tour contains tales of masturbation, marathon running and marauding donkeys. Stephen Robinson visits the land of Tiernan Og
Charlotte Bradley has worked as a successful actress since her early twenties. Now, however, her leading role in About Adam may make her a star.
Interview: Stephen Robinson
No, they’re not Jack White’s extra-curricular band. Rather, The Racketeers are long time veterans of the Irish scene with shades of Nick Cave and Johnny Cash in their darkly fascinating sound.
A chick-flick with attitude, a delicious comedy that’s become a phenomenon in the States, and a journey into the hellish world of teen girl bullying – there are plenty of good reasons why Mean Girls is one of the movies of the year.
People are dying on the streets of Dublin. Sometimes it’s a result of the lethal cocktail of homelessness and drugs. For others, it’s just that the wear and tear catches up with them. In a country awash with money, will no one give these outsiders an even break?
Droll blue-hearted seamsters The Sewing Room are back with a new album, Sympathy For The Dishevelled, which will make us laugh and cry simultaneously. Interview: Nick Kelly.
Cockney football pundit Tony Cascarino recently paid a visit to the Ballydung abode of potty-mouthed puppets Podge and Rodge. Here both sides reflect on the historic get-together.
The seedy, destructive side of gambling is the subject of Declan Lynch’s new book. He talks about his nine month immersion in the world of spread bets and games of chance – and the sobering lessons he learned
It's been a year of momentous upheaval throughout the planet. Wars have flared up, governments have fallen and the hole in the ozone layer has continued to grow. Inside the global y-fronts, however, was where the real cut and thrust of 1994 was going on. A cross-legged Liam Fay reports on twelve months which have seen a huge increase in the rate of worldwide castration and which prove beyond any doubt that the penis is not mightier than the sword.
Raised in India and hailed as an heir to Tori Amos, singer-songwriter Nerina Pallot is set to break big in 2007. Just don’t ask her about her appearance on kids’ television.
Lesbian singer-songwriter CATIE CURTIS doesn t care much for the mainstream. She talks to SIOBHAN LONG about sexuality, Lilith Fair and success in a parallel universe .
WELL, I dunno about ‘London Beat’. How does ‘Surrey Beat’ strike you? The implausible horror of moving home now but a dim memory, I can sit back and survey my new manna. It’s a whole different universe out here, believe you me.
Speaking recently to bands involved in the IMRO Showcases it became quite apparent that there was one major question on most minds, whether to look for a record deal or go the independent route and release their own records on their own label.
BREASTS. To have or not to have, and if so, to what extent? This particular, shall we say, philosophical debate has been raging - and I use the term advisedly - across all areas of the British media, from glossie to broadsheet.
With her new movie The Heart Of Me having just hit theatre, acclaimed english actress Olivia Williams here discusses her breaththrough role in The Sixth Sense and what it takes to succeed in hollywood. words Tara Brady
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.
Tori Amos’ new album, the acclaimed Scarlet’s Walk, was inspired equally by her joyous pregnancy with daughter Natashya and the tragedy of September 11, which led the singer-songwriter on a musical quest to discover the true soul of America
And our wombs. Under the cloak of so-called free trade agreements, and using genetic engineering as a weapon, a small number of corporations are not only seeking to control and exploit the global market they have also begun to establish a patent on life itself.
Report: Adrienne Murphy
Forget Liam and Nicole and Pete and Kate, the hottest rock 'n' roll couple in town at the moment are The Subways' Charlotte Cooper and Billy Lunn. The female half of the duo tells Ed Power about the highs and lows of making beautiful music together.
WEEK AFTER week I try to remain the right side of well-mannered when some myopic PR person or director phones and says "There's a play coming up in the blah-blah-blah theatre and it's got great music that'll really appeal to your readers."
The case for and against Holocaust Revisionist and Nazi apologist DAVID IRVING being allowed to speak on a public platform in Ireland. For: GERRY McGOVERN. Against: EAMONN McCANN
Frazer Guided Melodies
TARNATION may make soundtracks to cinematic desert scenes but there s more to Paula Frazer s beautiful songs than a fistful of spaghetti western themes. Interview: Nick Kelly.
Over the hills and far away, Chumbawamba come out to play! They get knocked down. But they get up again. They get dropped by Indie One Little Indian, and then get signed up by Capitalist major EMI. Then the Tub-Thumpers Anonymous go on to score the most unlikely hit single of 1997. So what now for Alice Nutter and her chums? ANDY DARLINGTON reports.
Over the hills and far away, Chumbawamba come out to play! They get knocked down. But they get up again. They get dropped by Indie One Little Indian, and then get signed up by Capitalist major EMI. Then the Tub-Thumpers Anonymous go on to score the most unlikely hit single of 1997. So what now for Alice Nutter and her chums? ANDY DARLINGTON reports.
Critically-acclaimed novelist LISA ST AUBIN DE TERAN's latest book, The Hacienda, is a gripping
autobiographical account of how she and her daughter escaped from a tyrannical, insane
husband in deepest Venezuela.
Interview: ADRIENNE MURPHY.
Pic: Cathal Dawson
At last, now it can be told, is that First Cut really the deepest? Andy Darlington explores the phenomenon of skin versus skinless when it comes to living with genital mutilation.
At last, now it can be told, is that First Cut really the deepest? Andy Darlington explores the phenomenon of skin versus skinless when it comes to living with genital mutilation.
NIALL STANAGE talks to a six-months-pregnant DEIRDRE O NEILL of JUNKSTER, and hears all about the band s forthcoming album, sharing a studio with Axl Rose, and her reactions to journalistic brickbats.
Having been catapulted to fame by their debut, the knives came out for GARBAGE with the release of Version 2.0. But their crifical mauling has only served to bring the band closer together. PETER MURPHY saw them triumph at The Point, and spoke to SHIRLEY MANSON about fame, performance and one-night stands.
For a few dizzying months in 2007, New Young Pony Club were London’s pre-eminent ‘it’ band. But despite a Mercury Music Prize nomination, commercial success never quite arrived. Now they’re regrouped and planning another full-frontal assault on the pop universe. Singer Tahita Bulmer talks about the personal traumas that coloured their new record and explains why they’re not angry with La Roux for stealing their electro-pop thunder.
Hard-drinking cinematographer Christopher Doyle's latest film, Gus Van Sant's dark drama Paranoid Park, saw him make a rare excursion Stateside, but he certainly hasn't curbed any of his excesses
Few things faze gary louris and marc perlman, the original members of the jayhawks. In fact, their only regret is that they don t have breasts. Interview: Peter Murphy.
John Banville places himself among some of the century’s most celebrated and notorious figures, in a frank interview which sees one of Ireland’s most revered and controversial writers musing on the raging battle between high art and popular culture, not to mention the war between the sexes . . . Tape: Joe Jackson Pix: Cathal Dawson
In Zaire, Irish journalist David Orr stumbles upon a village massacre, part of a horrific epidemic of tribal slaughter which the country's authorities seem in no rush to end.
When the Dixie Chicks came out against the Iraq war, they were accused of being "un-American”. Colm O’Hare hears how the country rebels survived their own desert storm
ave Fanning: We just played "Wild Things Run Free" (sic) and as you say yourself you are "back in the harness". Now, except for the vocals would it be a fair assumption to call the music on the new album pop with a rock steady beat?
Kele Le Roc is poised for major pop success. Adrienne Murphy met her at Childline 99, and talked to her about the music buisness, finding her own voice and, er, the Kids from Fame. Pics: Cathal Dawson
In late 1990, shortly prior to her election as President of the Republic of Ireland, MARY ROBINSON gave the following interview to this magazine, which we reproduce here as a Hot Press Greatest Hit to mark the occasion of her retirement from the office. It turned out to be a clear and definitive statement of her manifesto, which she ended up carrying out virtually to the letter. At the time, it was described as the longest suicide note in political history , by the Irish Press seven years on, her comments make interesting and often provocative reading. Tape: LIAM FAY.
Over a pint of lager, Amanda talks about her debut novel, kissing girls, losing her virginity and explains why it's hard to find a straight man in Dublin.
