Leave it to Mr. O Brien

LAST YEAR Tony O Brien exchanged the womb-like comforts of Independent Newspapers for the glamorous world of PR with Fleishman-Hillard Saunders as their Director of Public Affairs.
Across the previous two decades, a period of great expansion in the Irish music industry, O Brien reported from the front line of the Irish music media as a music correspondent, seeing and meeting top international acts and providing a receptive ear or two for young Irish bands eager for their first line of copy.
As a news journalist with The Irish Independent and Evening Herald (and later as the group s Environment Correspondent) he covered the notorious Beef Tribunal, the Stardust Tragedy, the Kerry Babies Inquiry, countless General Elections, and the visits of Mandela, Reagan, Clinton and Prince Charles among many other momentous events. His news work took him to the fjords of Norway and to the top of the chimney in Sellafield.
All of which was the ideal preparation for this interview about his musical adventures.

JACKIE HAYDEN: What s the difference between the attitude of national newspapers to music now compared to 20 years ago?
TONY O BRIEN: Back then most papers had only a weekly pop column. Music rarely made the front pages except for the death of a star or someone drunk on an airplane or Bob Geldof shouting his mouth off. Now music gets high-profile daily coverage. Big events like Lisdoonvarna and Slane meant that rock and pop music in Ireland had to be taken seriously. The successes of The Boomtown Rats and U2 meant that even non-music journalists began to take it seriously as a business.
I remember being backstage after U2 played Madison Square Garden in New York for the first time in 1985 and Bono was puzzled as to why the media wanted to know how much the band earned, where they were living, who their girlfriends were and non-music stuff like that. I told him it was because U2 had moved from the music columns onto the front pages.
Has this change been a good thing?
Actually, more recently it s got to the ludicrous situation where gossip columnists get better access at the big shows than the music journalists. That was a major gripe for me. But overall, the changes have been positive, especially in encouraging and aiding Irish acts, and I would like to think that people like myself, Joe Breen in the Irish Times and others helped to improve the coverage and standing of Irish music. Getting the Indo to regularly review concerts was a big step.
Were they easily convinced?
Not always! In the summer of 85 I tried to persuade them to cover Live Aid on the grounds that it was a major international event and the brainchild of an Irishman.
But the media was expected to pay for tickets, something unheard of even today. When I broached the subject with a News Editor, his reaction was volcanic. If they think we re going to pay a hundred pounds to cover their fucking concert, they ve another fucking think coming! Thankfully, editor Vinnie Doyle was more clued in and a cheque was couriered across London the next day!
How has the job itself changed?
In lots of ways. There are more record releases, more concerts, more stories to be written. The newspapers have woken up to the relevance of music and are giving it more coverage. The fans themselves, particularly the Boyzone variety, are insatiable. But there are downsides too. In The Independent especially, the colour writer has taken precedence in covering the big gigs. I found myself confined to a few paragraphs to describe Oasis at Pairc Ui Chaoimh or REM at Slane, but the colour writer got a half-page above me to talk about who was there and who was wearing what!
But has it affected the way music journalists approach their writing?
There s been a big change in the style music writers use. My approach was to tell people whether the act was any good or not, what songs they played and any other relevant information, because I believe that s what the readers, especially those who couldn t make the concert, want. But nowadays it s a more opinion-based approach.
Do you think this is a good thing?
It s good when the opinions expressed are genuine and relevant and open-minded. But there are some journalists who seem to think that their job gives them a license to air their own small-minded prejudices and has nothing to do with informing their readers. It s quite childish really, but they seem more concerned about impressing their mates than actually helping the reader. Maybe it s because few of them are trained as journalists in the real sense.
What about the old adage that rock journalists are really failed musicians?
In my case it s true! I played guitar in my own band in my native Wexford but it didn t work out. I actually managed to forget the words of one of my own songs during a very rare gig. However, I did turn in some memorable performances in the Tops of the Town with the People Newspapers! At least I claim I did!
Was that your only contact with music back then?
Oh no, I was always a music fan and travelled to festivals in England. I saw Free unveil All Right Now . A gang of us would hire a mini-bus to travel to shows. My first ever concert was Jethro Tull in the National Stadium in 1969 when the admission was 17/6d!
While working as a reporter with The Wexford People I was involved in organising the over-ambitious Wexford Festival of Living Music with the likes of The Chieftains, Rick Wakeman with The Strawbs and John Peel as the compere who insisted on calling me a leprechaun. That was the first time Paddy Moloney and The Chieftains played to a rock audience. The bank manager who gave us the money retired soon after!
I also was involved in one of the country s first mobile discos and promoted a show headlined by Horslips. Their manager Michael Deeney demanded #10 for a support act called Captain America. I refused until he threatened that Horslips would not go otherwise. I later discovered that Captain America was Chris de Burgh!
So you didn t think Chris de Burgh was worth ten quid?
Yeah! Chris told me later he never even got the tenner! It was around then I got involved with Billy Roche who was still a folky. After I moved to Dublin in 1978 he asked me to manage his band. We got loads of radio and TV work and publicity and brought out two singles. We did a demo for Stiff Records but nothing came of it and you yourself contributed to our misfortune by turning him down when you were a big noise at CBS. If I have a major regret, it s that Billy didn t achieve the success in music he deserved, although he s done very well as a playwright and actor.
So you had failed at a wide range of things before you went into journalism?
(laughs) You could say that! I started as a journalist with The Wexford People and moved to The Independent in 78, and started a weekly column in The Herald called Vocals , my first real contact with the big business side of music.
So you arrived just in time to get invited on all those junkets all over the world. Did you enjoy all that?
You d have to be a dull sort not to enjoy being flown to places like the USA to see people like U2 or Billy Joel or Prince, getting lots of free drink and the best food and the best hotels. It s been a great experience, getting to Moscow, Berlin, New York, Oslo, Budapest, Paris, Vienna and so on.
Were any of the trips less than pleasurable?
There were a few. I went to the opening of a new HMV store in London and although we d had a really long day our hosts didn t bother to feed us, so we went off in very bad humour to a restaurant at our own expense! On another occasion MCD brought us to see a display by performing horses in Wembley Arena! Some of us didn t make it back for the second half of the show and our host was less than pleased.
Then there was the time in Moscow when a bunch of us went over to see the Bolshoi Ballet. Feeling a bit peckish we couldn t even find teabags, the Coke machine was empty and, in the morning, the promoter, not one our decent Irish types, checked out early so there was a dispute over who was to pay for our breakfasts.
Food seems to have been very important to you?
I have indeed dined for Ireland but, seriously, if you re taking people overseas, and expecting a favourably write-up, it s a smart PR move not to starve them! The less you have to worry about these things the more you can concentrate on your work. Too many promoters, record company people and others feel they are doing you an enormous favour and that you shouldn t complain.
So what was the best trip?
U2 s Madison Square Garden debut in 1985 was easily the best. We were extremely well looked after. It was the start of U2 breaking big in America and it was very emotional to be Irish at that gig. It was then I realised how important they were going to be. Live Aid, of course, was also such an historical event. I still have my I Was There T-shirt!
But if you re a full-time journalist and you re three days away somewhere then your editor expects a lot of usable material, so you have to stay alert and not be seduced by the local delights or whatever. Sometimes you have to write several different stories for different editions, all with separate deadlines. In fact the review of U2 at Madison Square Garden for the country edition of The Irish Independent was written before the concert from a call-box in Macy s Department Store because of the time difference problem.
Shame on you. But apart from the feeding problems, what were the lowlights?
(pauses) The drownings at Slane. It s hard to write enthusiastically about an exciting gig and cover a tragedy as well. It puts a dampener on it and you have to reflect that in your coverage. That day I had to write a front page news story, an inside news piece, a review and a news analysis piece on why young people behave like this, using a telephone in Henry Mountcharles s castle over which I had to battle with Joe Breen of the Irish Times and Charlie Bird of RTE.
Any odd encounters with the stars? Did you ever fuck up for Ireland?
Quite a few of both! I was a rookie reporter on The Herald one quiet Saturday when my boss told me that Oliver Reed was in the Gresham Hotel and to go and interview him. I tried to, only to end up terrified when Reed launched himself off his barstool, grabbed me in a bear hug and kissed me sloppily on the cheeks! In contrast, more recently I had a pleasant chat with Brad Pitt backstage in The Point.
I asked Elkie Brooks if she would like to be back in the charts only to be told that s a stupid question to ask anyone . Cher had a go at me when I commented on her appearance. Then there was Alanis Morissette, one of the weirdest I ever met, and Shane MacGowan, whom I tried to interview but couldn t understand a word! I didn t use either piece.
Michael Stipe, he s another weird one. I held Annie Lennox s beer backstage while she took off her braces before going back on for a Eurythmics encore. At the airport during Bruce Springsteen s arrival I asked him the traditional stuff about Ireland and all I got was a grunt for every question, whereas when I did the same with Garth Brooks he was extraordinarily polite and called me Sir . I did a telephone interview with Celine Dion too. She actually called me back and apologised when the line broke down. One of the last interviews I did was with The Monkees and that was a laugh.
What was the worst gig you had to cover?
Probably The Shadows in The Point. John Denver was excruciatingly boring too. The last concert I reviewed was the new Genesis at The Point and that was crap.
Did you tell your readers it was crap?
I always found it a delicate balance trying to give my own personal response and respecting the views of the fans who loved the show. But, to my personal cost, I ve written that bands were crap. The next day the phone lines would buzz and letters would fly in to the editor with the usual stuff, asking was I at the same concert they were at and so on.
How did you find Irish record companies to deal with?
You re just trying to get me into trouble! Over the years I ve made some very good friends in the industry, including record companies. But a lot of record company people have a lot to learn about dealing with the media. Their limit seems to be supplying records to DJ s in 2FM and keeping them happy, but they go blank when it comes to the print media. They want you to write about their acts, yet begrudge you the CD and are often inefficient at providing the photos and info you need to give their acts coverage.
Come on, name the guilty parties.
Jesus, you don t give up! (pauses) Some of my worst relations were with EMI and some of my best with Virgin. People like Lynn Fitzgerald were faultlessly efficient.
I hope you didn t upset any of them by anything you wrote.
Afraid so. I was taken off Warner s press list because I gave an album a bad review. It s funny, young bands can take the most horrific pasting and just carry on, but some of the mandarins in the record companies can t handle any kind of criticism. They seem to think the Press should just quietly do their bidding.
What other bad memories do you have of PR people?
It s annoying when someone with absolutely no judgement tells you they have a front page story which inevitably turns out to be something that won t make the paper at all.
It s been a constant bugbear that so many involved in music publicity don t have a clue about how the media, particularly newspapers, work. You try to cover a major outdoor rock event and the promoter mightn t even bother to provide telephones or somewhere to sit out of the rain.
There have also been times when publicity people denied such and such a story, only for you to hear Gerry Ryan confirm the details exclusively on the radio soon after. I ve been asked why I hadn t written something when it had run three days previous! Anyone involved in the publicity business should at least read the papers.
So what ll you miss?
I certainly won t miss the hassle involved in covering concerts, especially outdoor events, or dealing with record companies and some promoters. Anyway, I ve seen just about all the top acts, Michael Jackson, Springsteen, Prince, the Stones, REM, Oasis, Blur and so on. It became a chore having to go out on a wet night to cover some band I d no interest in and I felt it was time to move on.
But it was a fantastic experience and I ll miss the music scene in general, and the free CDs. Lots of people have been very good to me and I hope I ll remain friends with a lot of people in the business.
But as I ve moved into one of Ireland s top PR companies I ll still be involved with the media and I ll be able to use the experience I gained in music and in environmental and mainstream news reporting. And besides, the music industry needs plenty of PR advice as you well know! n