In their pomp – and they did have a regal period physically draped in ermine – The Sultans of Ping released three albums using three different versions of their handle. That aside, they’ve never had issues with the question of identity: they’ve long known what they are and, maybe more importantly, what they are not.... Continue Reading →
BERNIE TAUPIN: WORDS MATTER
Colm recently reviewed ‘Scattershot: Life, Music, Elton and Me’, written by Bernie Taupin, for the literary section of The Irish Examiner. We’re glad to be able to re-publish a version of that piece here. Bernie Taupin, the British-born lyricist, and songwriter, has spent the last twenty-five years on a large ranch in California, breeding and... Continue Reading →
GET THAT MONSTER OFF THE STAGE: THE MOVIE
In this guest post, writer, broadcaster and lecturer Paul McDermott explains the background to his documentary, Get That Monster Off the Stage, which has now been given a full visual treatment. Ciarán Ó Tuama has turned Get That Monster Off the Stage, my old radio documentary about Finbarr Donnelly and his bands Nun Attax, Five... Continue Reading →
IAN McGARRY’S JAZZ ODYSSEY
One of the more despairing aspects to this collection of random pieces about music and the Irish music industry is the constant spectre of death. The Blackpool Sentinel has endured for almost ten years now and, when we first started imposing on your patience, little did we imagine that we’d be dealing with so much... Continue Reading →
THIS IS ’30’: NO DISCO, DONAL DINEEN AND CORK, 1993
Thirty years ago, tonight, long after the watershed, I was in a suite in the old Jury’s Hotel on Cork’s Western Road with a handful of colleagues from work. We’d been out that evening to mark the broadcast of the fruits of our recent labours, a music television clip show that was about to set... Continue Reading →
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