Chrisie Hynde, The Undertones and Thin Lizzy Speak Volumes At Vinyl Day 2

The second day of Dublin’s inaugural Vinyl saw your correspondent in the front row for a highly-anticipated encounter between broadcaster John Kelly, and Scott Gorham of Thin Lizzy fame. John commenced proceedings by recounting the night his life was changed for ever by Thin Lizzy performing in his home town of Enniskillen – where incidentally Scott’s great-grandfather was born.

Kelly an obvious Lizzy-phile knew exactly the right questions to ask to extract various compelling yarns from the guitarist, including a blow-by-blow account of his audition for Lizzy after which he quipped he only got the gig because he had great hair; Phil’s approach to songwriting credits; and the real truth behind how ‘live’ Live and Dangerous actually was – according to Scott, there were only a few overdubs!

Next we hot-footed it to The Baroque Chapel where Paul McLoone was grilling fellow Undertones Michael Bradley and Damian O’Neill. It being a Vinyl festival, McLoone had brought along a selection of Undertones 7 inches and albums to discuss with his bandmates. Artwork, songwriting and more were chewed at, over an engaging hour which also revealed John O’Neill’s love of Mars Bars and tea; the re-recording of Here Comes The Summer to make it 1 min 43 secs instead of a paltry 1 min 39 secs; plus the identity of the real Perfect Cousin! To finish off the session Damian spoke about his excellent new solo album and Michael Bradley read an extract from his wonderful tome Teenage Kicks.

Mick Heaney held court in The Great Hall, where Ed Piller and Martin Freeman of Sherlock, Game Of Thrones and more fame discussed their shared love of mod culture. Albums, fashion and the mod aesthetic were dissected, with Heaney steering the chat expertly. When quizzed on Ireland’s contribution to the genre, Ed Piller enthused about his love for The Blades – Paul Cleary’s ears must have been burning.

One of the nice things about about Vinyl is that – due to the compact nature of the venue – a spectator can bump into a hero or heroine at any given moment. So when I spied Chrissie Hynde, the lovely Victor Van Vugt was only too happy to provide an introduction. When she looked at me, coldly it seemed, through her famous fringe, I knew I must have made a fatal error.

Ms Hynde then – how shall I put it? – declined to have her hand shaken or to have a picture taken (to the great amusement of fellow Hot Press-er Pat Carty, who was sitting nearby). Undefeated, I picked up my shattered fangirl heart and offered it to Tracey Thorn, who could not have been more gracious, friendly and happy to pose, for what I’m sure was her hundredth photo of the day.

And so to The Great Hall where Pete Paphides had been charged with melting the heart of the ice queen Hynde – a task he undertook with great aplomb. The first segment was driven primarily by revelations contained in her recent memoir Reckless, but Hynde also opened up about the challenges of being a woman in the music industry and paid warm tribute to her fallen Pretender bandmates James Honeyman Scott and Pete Farndon.

And so to day three...