Thirty-nine years ago today, The Smiths fetched up in Cork for the first time and played a storming, head-bending set at the old Savoy complex on Patrick Street. The band’s history with the city, and the impact of that show, are covered in detail elsewhere on this site. So its especially disconcerting that this weekend... Continue Reading →
OUR FAVOURITE SHOPS
Joe Healy and Ciarán Ó Tuama are important documentarians who have now become regular go-tos for anoraks, buffs and collectors. In dipping into the collection of stills and Super 8 videos they took around the streets of Cork city from the late 1970s onwards, and publishing digitized versions of that work on-line, they’re doing God’s own work for those of us who grew up during the decades when successive governments often forget that we existed. Their photos and film clips, many of which capture the heart or cardo of the city, are increasingly valuable resources to social historians and their work.
KEN O’DUFFY: SING THE SONGS
From his work with Light A Big Fire in the 1980s to the three excellent elpees he made with Saville the following decade, Ken O’Duffy has long been a favourite writer and performer of ours. As he prepares to launch another solo album, we’ve asked him to pen a piece about the record, ‘Sing The... Continue Reading →
DAVID GRAY: FOR THE BIRDS
On the afternoon of the second of his two recent live shows at the National Concert Hall in Dublin, David Gray encountered a couple of long-time fans who’d travelled up from the sticks for the occasion. Despite its billing as a full performance of his most recent elpee, ‘Skellig’, the pair had a request of... Continue Reading →
SHOW SOME CONCERN
Brian Reddin’s recent television documentary, ‘How Ireland Rocked the ‘80s’, was a fond, archive-driven spin through the decade in which emerging new groups could be routinely found in every townland and village of the country. For the record, I commissioned ‘How Ireland Rocked the ‘80s’ for RTÉ and was the editorial representative across it. This... Continue Reading →
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