Hot Press Annual December 2020

THE ESSENTIAL ALBUMS, MOVIES, TRACKS + BOOKS OF THE YEAR

2020: THE YEAR IRISH WOMEN TOOK A STAND TOGETHER (At Christmas) LOCAL RADIO IN IRELAND

Bringing Light In The Darkness

ANNUAL 2021

Miley Cyrus • Bob Geldof Johnny Marr • Phoebe Bridgers Damien Dempsey • Angela Scanlon Yungblud • Donal Ryan • Niamh Campbell + RTÉ’S BRIAN O’DONOVAN In Washington

IRISH

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HARMONY

IRELAND €6.95 U.K £5.50. ITALY €8.95 GERMANY €9.95

ALL THE YEAR'S CONTROVERSIES, PHOTOS, POLITICS, QUOTES + MORE

LOOK 2020 IN THE EYE AND PREPARE TO SAY GOODBYE. THIS CHRISTMAS, THE PIRATE QUEEN’S FIGHTING BACK! Let Grace O’Malley capture the festive season as she raises a flag and dreams of a great New Year

#BELIEVEINGRACE

WWW.GRACEOMALLEYWHISKEY.COM

A N N UA L 2021

Contents 9

IN IT TOGETHER

They were never in disharmony, but coming together under the Irish Women In Harmony banner has underlined just how talented our female musicians are – and raised a huge amount of money for Covid-hit charities. Tanis Smither and Lucy O’Toole meet queenpin RuthAnne and some of her fellow ‘Together At Christmas’ singers.

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ONCE YOU ALT. POP YOU CAN’T STOP

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EVERYTHING’S GONE GRIAN

Whether hanging with The 1975, getting near-namesake Phoebe Waller-Bridge and Paul Mescal to respectively direct and star in her new video or earning a clutch of Grammy nominations with her Punisher album, Phoebe Bridgers is a worthy recipient of our Female Artist of the Year.

There was some seriously tough competition, but Fontaines D.C. have bagged themselves the coveted Hot Press Album of the Year to go with their own Grammy nod. Find out who joined them in the Top 50.

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WHEN THE GOING GETS WEIRD, THE WEIRD TURN PRO

His 3Arena gig had to be put on ‘hold’ but nothing could stop Youngblud making a complete cult of himself this year. The Doncaster doyen of all things dark checked in with Paul Nolan.

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MILEY INFLAMMABLE

We knew somebody would save rock ‘n’ roll, we just didn’t know it would be Miley Cyrus who never mind ‘11’ (that’s just for boys) turned it up to ‘12’ this year! Ed Power shows his appreciation for her flamethrower of an album.

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VIEW FROM THE SUMMIT

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UP AROUND THE BENDS

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A POGUES GALLERY

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YOU CAN QUOTE ME ON THAT

There was a whole lot of love in the Zoom as Ailbhe Reddy, Celaviedmai, Gemma Bradley, Malaki and Bob Geldof shot the Hot Press Christmas Summit breeze with Stuart Clark.

Lucy O’Toole is all ears as Donegal singer Rosie Carney explains why she spent a goodly part of lockdown recording her own sumptuous version of Radiohead’s masterpiece.

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Rock ‘n’ roll sharpshooter Julien Temple tells Stuart Clark why making his Crock Of Gold: A Few Rounds With Shane MacGowan documentary was both a joy and a royal pain in the ass.

Paul Nolan rounds-up the remarkable things said to Hot

Press during an even more remarkable year.

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TURN AND FACE THE STRANGE

That man Nolan is at it again as much-garlanded author Donal Ryan tells him how he got through lockdown, and why it’s bottom of his to write-about list.

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LOCAL RADIO FOR LOCAL PEOPLE

LOCKDOWN BUT NOT OUT!

Talking of rising to the occasion, 120 of Ireland’s brightest young musical things took part in the Hot Press Lockdown Sessions Y&E Series. We doff our headphones to them all!

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YEAR OF THE PIG

The good, the bad and the Boris Johnson all feature as The Hog casts a steely eye over 2020 – and gives us an idea of where we’re heading.

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All material © Hot Press 2020. All rights reserved.

WASHINGTON BULLETINS

That headline is especially for Clash fans! Stuart Clark gets on the transatlantic blower to Washington where RTÉ’s man at the White House fills him in on Trump, Biden and the other wild vagaries of American politics.

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Kate Brayden and Lucy O’Toole travel (virtually) from Wexford to Donegal in appreciation of the talk show hosts who rose to the Covid occasion – and then some!

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88 CREDIT WHERE IT’S DUE

EDITOR: Niall Stokes // GROUP PRODUCTION EDITOR: Mairin Sheehy // GROUP DEPUTY EDITOR: Stuart Clark // COMMISSIONING EDITOR: Jess Murray // ART DIRECTION: Eimear O’Connor DESIGN: Karen Kelleher // PUBLISHING DIRECTOR: Duan Stokes // CONTRIBUTING EDITOR: Paul Nolan // IN-HOUSE WRITERS: Lucy O'Toole, Tanis Smither, Kate Brayden // ACCOUNTS: Shaun Oscar Taylor // VIDEO & CONTENT PRODUCER: Rowan Stokes // ADVERTISING SALES MANAGER: Catherine Madden // MARKETING CONSULTANT: Mark Hogan MARKETING ASSISTANT: Danielle Ronan // ADVERTISING EXECUTIVE: Jake Dodd // CONTRIBUTORS: Ingrid Angulo, Pavel Barter, Pat Carty, Roisin Dwyerm Jackie Hayden, Stephen Keegan, Sean Lipicar, Shamim Malekmian, Eamonn McCann, Roe McDermott, Edwin McFee, Peter McNally, Ed Power, David Rooney, Dermot Stokes, John Walshe, Bill Graham 1951-1996 // CHIEF PHOTOGRAPHER: Miguel Ruiz ADDITIONAL PHOTOGRAPHY: Glen Bollard, Indie Caldwell, Danni Fro, Conor Heavey, Zoe Keating, Colm Kelly, Peter O’Hanlon // ILLUSTRATION: David Rooney // COVER SHOTS: Miguel Ruiz

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An album of recordings from The Superior Sessions 2020 will be available from December 18th, with all proceeds going to Minding Creative Minds – A 24/7 support service for people in the music industry and creatives.

PROUD OF OUR HERITAGE, QUALITY & SERVICE www.thorntonpianos.ie

THE MESSAGE NIALL STOKES EDITOR OF THE YEAR

WHAT A DIFFERENCE A CATASTROPHIC YEAR MAKES

2020 will long be remembered as the time that the live music industry in Ireland was brought to its knees. Suddenly musicians – and those who work with and for them – were left bereft of income, and in many cases hope. After some serious lobbying, the crisis was acknowledged by Government and a beginning was made to the challenge of filling the cavernous financial gap created for far too many.

While there is a long road still to travel, this might be the best possible moment to make the push to fully develop an industry that has too often been left to muddle its own way into the future.

H

as a year ever seemed so long? Or so brutal?

On the run-in to the publication of the Hot Press Annual this time last year, we were feeling buoyant. Why wouldn’t we be? It was the end of a tough year. But it was one which had provided a lorry-load of reasons to be cheerful.

In particular, the Irish music industry seemed to be in rude good health. Fontaines D.C. were our cover stars. They had delivered the Hot Press Album of the Year in the widely acclaimed Dogrel. I was getting ready to travel down specially to Mike The Pies in Listowel to see them in action in the most intimate setting imaginable for a band on the cusp of world domination.

There was a hum of anticipation for what 2020 might bring. Across the musical spectrum, Irish artists had been exceeding expectations.

Festivals had been packed. The live scene was flourishing. If that momentum could be carried through into the new year, then come summer, we’d see a greater number of Irish acts than ever before being afforded main stage status.

There were major social and political problems to be dealt with: homelessness, addiction, a housing shortage, extortionate rents, a health system in a state of permanent collapse, the ongoing failure to meet environmental targets, the obscenity of direct provision, the looming impact of Brexit – and plenty more besides. But there was a general election on the way. Every political party was putting policies in place to address some or all of these core issues.

We were entitled to break occasionally into a smile. The portents were favourable enough to accentuate the positive: things can only get better. And they will. You might even have been able to sing it.

The economy was booming. Unemployment was at an all-time low.

With lots of cash available, this was a moment when any prospective new Government’s hands might be forced; when genuine good might, to one extent or another, be written in advance into the outcome of the election.

Of illusions, we harboured none. Nothing would happen unless it was fought for. On balance, however, a feeling of optimism did not seem entirely misplaced. As the Van song says: “Let’s enjoy it while we can/ Help me share my load/ From the dark end of the street/ To the bright side of the road…”

With smart thinking and hard work, that’s where we’d be heading. Or so, in a euphoric moment, one might have imagined.

BLOWN TO SMITHEREENS When the first rumbles about a coronavirus emerged from China in January 2020, people barely batted an eyelid. My antennae twitched, but not seriously. There had been novel viruses before – SARS and Ebola sprang to mind – about which the World Health Organisation had become extremely agitated. In July 2019, they defined an outbreak of Ebola in the Democratic Republic of Congo as a world health emergency.

Ebola was deadly, with an average of 50% of all cases resulting in mortality. In parts of Africa, infected people died in shocking numbers.

We saw harrowing images on the evening news. But it didn’t touch us here. And subsequently, it appeared to have been effectively contained.

Gradually, the threat softened. Initial concerns dissipated. A vaccine was created. The disease hadn’t taken hold in Europe or the US. The crisis receded. Nothing to see here. Move on. Why would this fresh coronavirus be any different?

But it was.

For a start, it became clear pretty quickly that it was highly infectious. No one knows for sure where it started or how but it was first identified – and probably originated – in China. Neighbouring countries were at immediate high risk. So too were places that traded heavily with China, especially if that necessitated travel back and forth.

Italy was one such. A world leader in fashion and design, a lot of its products are manufactured in China. Cases were identified there. It quickly escalated into an epidemic.

The bat was out of the bag.

The number of infected people was growing fast wherever cases were identified. Having had experience with SARS, they were better in Asia at imposing quarantine, and putting test and trace regimes, designed to limit the spread of the virus in place. Europe was woefully unprepared. So too, it would become clear, was the rest of the world.

I remember watching the news before the first case had been identified here in Ireland and the hope flashing through my mind that our island status might protect us. That we might be a lucky exception.

That was a forlorn ray, soon eclipsed by the inexorable progress of a silent, deadly enemy. The World Health Organisation declared a global pandemic. The virus had arrived in Ireland. The numbers were rising. The Ireland .v. Italy Six Nations Championship game

“Across the musical spectrum, Irish artists had been exceeding expectations.”

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THE MESSAGE

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THE MESSAGE

ENTITLED TO HOPE That was the beginning of April. This is December and it isn’t over yet, not by a long shot. Nine months on, however, we can now talk openly about the colossal damage inflicted, and the totally unjust, unequal nature of it. The early mantra was that we were all in this together. In practical terms, it was very different. For some, the monthly paycheques rolled in as normal. For others, the cupboard was suddenly bare.

Globally, it is probably true that aviation has taken the biggest hit. Our of the blue, it was as if planes had fallen from the sky.

What had seemed like a permanently booming sector went into a nosedive. It wasn’t just a game-changer. It was armageddon time.

Long-established companies bit the dust. Pilots started a new life as Deliveroo riders. You could agitate for a return to normal. But the virus was still raging. Freedom became just another word. Travel was off the agenda for most.

The damage inflicted on the live music, arts and events industry – and more specifically on musicians, performers, comedians, actors and others who get up in front of crowds to sing, dance, talk and throw shapes – may have been less immediately visible, but it was equally profound.

It was as if the air had been completely sucked out of the room. Privately, in houses and flats and apartments all over Ireland – and similarly in countries across Europe, Asia, Africa, the US, South

“Yesterday I knew where I was going. Today I have no idea.”

America, Australia – musicians were gasping for breath. So were sound engineers. Lighting designers. Stage managers. Agents. PR whizzes.

Tour managers. Roadies. The whole menagerie of live music business animals.

Their plans were in shreds. Income that had been factored in was gone, never to be regained. For whole segments of society, things were still spinning more or less as normal – but in this particular world within a world it was mayhem in slow motion. How do you pay the mortgage or support a family with nothing coming in?

It was genuinely hard to get your head around it. Or to know how to respond. Yesterday I knew where I was going. Today I have no idea.

People were made redundant. Some businesses had to close their doors completely. It was a fucking disaster for musicians. A travesty. A nightmare. It is a freelance business, to a large extent, but normally, you feel that your destiny is – more or less – in your own hands. But this was different. Your livelihood was being taken away from you by diktat from on high. An order issued by someone whose income was unaffected. The injustice of it rankled. Anger mounted.

Tours were cancelled. Album launch dates put back. Money lost.

Hope too. There were no other doors to knock on. Some people wanted to curl up in a ball in the corner, or go to sleep and never wake up.

It affected the biggest stars on the planet; the aspiring new acts ready to come bursting through; and everyone in between, of every 008 HP. AN.21

vintage, type and stripe: the guy who sings in the local bar three nights a week and earns a decent crust as much as the individual artist or band on their tenth album who’ve seen better days but are still entitled to hope that there are future, bigger paydays in the offing.

People were dazed and confused for so long it wasn’t true. But, of course, it was.

DEPENDENCE ON THE MARKETPLACE In Hot Press, we assessed the picture. Had the understanding and support of staff and contributors. Set about doing different things.

We published monthly rather than fortnightly. Began the Lockdown Sessions that turned into the Y&E Series. Under that banner, we did 120 gigs supported by the newly expanded Department of Tourism, Culture, the Gaeltacht, Sport and Media. It was a brilliant journey that underlined for us – and for anyone who tuned in – the phenomenal depth of talent that exists in Ireland right now.

We published a very special issue celebrating the 25th Anniversary of the sad death of the greatest Irish guitar player of them all, the legendary, and greatly missed, Rory Gallagher. And we embarked on a very different adventure, bringing together 75 Irish artists to record videos of Van Morrison songs, as a way of honouring the man from East Belfast who had blazed a trail for contemporary musicians from the island of Ireland, earning a deserved reputation as one of the greatest songwriters of the modern era along the way.

The President of Ireland, Michael D. Higgins participated, recording ‘Rave On John Donne’ with musical backing from the man who created Riverdance, Bill Whelan. Some of the performances, and the accompanying videos, were (and are) astonishingly good. I don’t want to name names here, because everyone participated equally in what was a marvellously uplifting act of solidarity and of celebration.

We wanted to create something enduring by which the year might be remembered. It is there now for posterity on the Hot Press YouTube channel – a colossal statement not just about the genius of Van Morrison, but also about the extraordinary calibre of Ireland’s contemporary artists, musicians and performers.

And yet we could see all around us the extent of the havoc being wrought by the lockdown. Gradually, people in the live music space began to get organised. The economy was not as badly hit as the economic forecasters had predicted. Money was – and is – cheap to borrow. Ireland is regarded as low risk. The new government, formed by Fianna Fáil, Fine Gael and the Green Party had figured out that extensive supports were essential to prevent the complete collapse of a huge range of businesses.

The live music industry made its case. Musicians made theirs. If the first item on the agenda in every organisation in Ireland is the split, this was no different. Separate groupings got stuck in and made diverse arguments, with varying emphasis. The government was listening.

As the Minister with responsibility for the arts, culture and tourism, Catherine Martin was listening too. Funds were made available. There was nothing that could ever compensate for the loss of purpose, or for the time stolen by the pandemic – but an important step had been taken. A precedent set. The arts, and music in particular, are of huge national importance – not just creatively, and as a form of artistic expression, but also as an employer, and as a driver of wider economic activity and growth.

It is an essential part of how we sell ourselves – how we present an attractive picture of Ireland – to the world. It is at the heart of what we are. That now was, at last, being recognised.

The initiatives which were funded, and the decision-making

VAN BY NORMAN SEEFF

was cancelled. There were grumbles aplenty. That’s a bit much isn’t it!

The then-Taoiseach, Leo Varadkar, announced a St. Patrick’s Day like no other.

And then everything was cancelled. We went into lockdown. Bars, venues, restaurants and pubs were shut. Events, festivals, gigs were put on hold. Infection rates went up anyway. It had got into nursing homes. That was a complete fuck-up. The general view seemed to be: the less said the better. Deal with it.

At first, very few people grasped what was happening.

How long do you think it’s going to last? Hundreds of times, people asked me. I asked others in turn. A month. Just long enough to suppress the virus. Maybe six weeks. EP will be fine. We’ll have gigs back in September. The truth was that everyone was winging it. No one had a clue.

The body count grew. And plans were blown to smithereens. Every sort of plan.

processes, have since been the subject of considerable controversy. Long-standing fault-lines have been exposed.

The emphasis within the Department of Tourism, Culture, the Gaeltacht, Sport and Media was to act quickly. There is no doubt that they got that part of the equation exactly right. They needed to minimise bureaucracy. It was important to come to decisions quickly. A lot of activity has been enabled through the different schemes they put in place, where otherwise an entire industry would have remained frozen. They put money into a significant number of musicians’ pockets.

For everyone involved at a higher level of decision-making it was a learning experience, in unfamiliar country. These were pilot schemes. This much we can say for sure. Senior public servants are very conscious of the importance of getting the mechanisms right.

But that takes time.

The State is used to dealing with subsidised areas of the arts and culture. What’s indisputably positive is that the old distinction as to what might be worth supporting has been challenged; and that popular music is no longer seen as an industry that must be condemned entirely to the control of, and dependence on, the marketplace.

We need to build on that.

My 2020

WELL-HONED POLICY MAKING As a first step, it would help if the decision-makers within Government – and within the public service – were given honest and well thought-out feedback on this year’s scheme, to enable them to make the best possible decisions in terms of how the next round of supports should be dispensed.

Every year, organisations that give grants – whether it is the Arts Council, the BAI, Enterprise Ireland or the Film Board, to take just a few examples that impinge directly on the arts and culture sector – have to make desperately difficult decisions, which mean that some people feel left out. That is in the nature of these processes.

However, prejudice and discrimination should have no place in that. All sectors of the industry – and of the art and craft of music – should be treated equally. Blue sky thinking should be encouraged.

But no one should be excluded simply because there is a perception that they are unfashionable or don’t fit some imagined masterplan of what will sell. The musician in the corner of the bar who had been earning a reliable €500 a week for his or her work – but who has been sitting idle all year as a result of Covid-19 – is part of the picture. It is an extreme example but it illustrates a point.

In the past, a snooty view of the arts had dismissed popular music as low brow or commercial. All the money went to classical or opera. In Hot Press, we have always known that this is wrong. We have consistently made the case that contemporary music should be afforded the same importance as film. That it should be supported and nourished. That ways should be found of encouraging its development as an industry. That Ireland can – and should – be turned into a Mecca for musicians, producers, songwriters and more. That if we keep the best at home, and attract top professionals and businesses to the island, we can make Ireland one of the great global centres for music production, songwriting, film music and more – and that this will benefit musicians and crew at every level.

In this regard, new opportunities have been created by Brexit.

We are well placed to make big strides over the coming ten years, starting now, in all forms of popular culture – including television and other branches of the media, as well as music. If, that is, we have the vision and pursue it effectively.

It may seem like – in fact it is – a strange note on which to end any meditation on what has been the roughest, toughest, most debilitating year for the arts – and for music in particular – since I first strapped on a guitar to make a noise many moons ago. But I still believe that with the right kind of engagement, smart thinking and well honed policy-making, the coming years can be the most creative, productive and economically rewarding ever, for music in Ireland.

Remember the mantra that we heard when Covid-19 first arrived on these shores? We’re all in this together. Let that be the real guiding principle from here on and we can move mountains.

Joy Crookes Musician

Your Hero of 2020?

My cat Diego Villain of 2020?

Priti Patel Best Personal Moment?

Learning how to do my own salon nails Best Movie or TV show?

Fleabag

Best thing you saw online?

Three Non Blondes Your hope for next year?

Liberation from the shackles of a pandemic

Best record?

Haiyu - Mariem Hassan

What tickled your funny bone?

My partner’s rendition of a body roll dance move

Best book?

Girl Woman Other Bernadine Evaristo

• Joy Crookes' latest single 'Anyone But Me' is out now

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My 2020

SIX OF THE BEST FROM HOTPRESS.COM Streaming Of A White Christmas From Alanis Morissette’s reimagining of John and Yoko’s ‘Happy Xmas (War Is Over)’ to Kodaline’s brand spanking new ‘This Must Be Christmas’ with a detour to take in Ms. Partons’s A Holly Dolly Christmas, we’ve all the best 2020 cool Yule tunes online!

Go Wild In The Country Permanently prize-winning author and former Hot Press contributor Kevin Barry treats us to a rakish reading from his latest That Old Country Music collection, which just happens to be the Hot Press Book of the Year (look, he's done it again!)

Plus, you can press 'rewind' on Pat Carty’s recent interview with the rock ‘n’ roll-inclined Limerick scribe.

On The Sesh!

Limerick R&B force of nature Michelle Grimes; Dublin-based purveyors of superior alt. pop Siights; George Hutton, the Anúna man who’s now flying solo; and guest star Gavin James are among the Hot Press Lockdown Sessions Y&E Series acts whose brilliant performances are available for your playback pleasure on our Insta .

Hit That Perfect Beat Boy/Girl “A clandestine agent in the development of rock ‘n’ roll.” That’s Casey Rae explaining in his new William S. Burroughs And The Cult Of Rock N’ Roll tome how Tom Waits, Lou Reed, Kurt Cobain, David Bowie and Joe Strummer, to name just a handful of his disciples, drew inspiration from the American author’s stream of (un)consciousness.

That man again, Pat Carty, takes a deep-dive into one of the music books of the year.

The 12 Hot Press Interviews of Xmas Slip into something comfortable, dim the lights and luxuriate in some of the finest HP chinwags from this most remarkable of years.

Here Comes 2021!

It’ll be straight in, lots of kissing as we embrace the New Year with more gusto than we’ve ever embraced a New Year before. We’ll be making a couple of extremely important announcements – don’t worry, they’re all good! – and generally looking forward to kicking C*%id into touch.

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Damien Dempsey Singer /Songwriter Your hero of 2020?

Sister Stan of Focus Ireland.

Villain of 2020?

Dustin the Turkey - he owes me a tenner.

Best Personal Moment?

Boris Johnson showing Ulster Unionists what a lying sack of gick he is.

Best Movie or TV show?

Barbarians, which is on Netflix, and about the Roman Empire in Germany.

Best record?

In Waiting by Pillow Queens, an anthemic masterpiece that’s given me the music orgasm or tingle neck, and I can’t wait to hear it live at their next show and sing along to it like there’s no tomorrow.

In Waiting, Pillow Queens

Best thing you saw online?

The Zoom chats and sing-alongs I had with family and friends when it was dangerous or impossible to see each other.

Your hope for next year?

People don’t go back on the cocaine and that they turn their phones off for an hour or two a day or more, and remember what’s truly important, and to keep life sparing and simple.

What tickled your funny bone?

Trump encouraging us to bang up bleach, and all his medical staff racing to report afterwards ‘please do not inject bleach’ - shit for brains.

• You can catch Damien Dempsey's Christmas livestream show on December 23rd, plus 2021 Irish tour dates in Dublin, Belfast and Drogheda. Watch Damien Best book?

Dempsey perform from Pearse I’ve just finished Adrian Station as part of Iarnród Goldsworthy’s Vindolanda trilogy Éireann’s Station Sessions about the Roman on Focus Ireland's YouTube Empire in Celtic Britain. channel.

MAD H AT T E R 2021

NICOLA COUGHLAN Actress

Who would be the last person you would invite to your birthday party?

Donald Trump.

Who would be the first person you would invite to your birthday party?

My best friend Meadhbh, who’s been my best friend since I was seven years old.

Favourite saying?

To thine own self be true.

Favourite record?

The one I probably listen to the most even if it’s uncool is the Hamilton original soundtrack.

Favourite book?

The Psychopath Test by Jon Ronson.

Favourite film?

The Royal Tenenbaums.

FAVOURITE SAYING? TO THINE OWN SELF BE TRUE.

Favourite author?

Jon Ronson.

Favourite actor/actress?

Judi Dench.

Favourite musician?

At the moment it’s Chloe X Halle.

Most embarrassing moment of your life?

I try not to get embarrassed because life’s too short, what’s the point?

If you weren’t pursuing your present career, what other career might you have chosen?

I’ve always been fascinated by the art department on set. I love that level of detail and research, and I love making things with my hands.

Biggest thrill?

Getting a job that I’ve wanted for a really long time.

Favourite food/drink/stimulant?

Prosecco and anything with garlic in it.

Biggest disappointment?

Probably just the opposite. Getting rejected, which is a big part of acting. I always try and let myself have the disappointment, then move on because you can’t dwell.

TV programme?

My favourite comedy of all time is Arrested Development and at the moment I’m really into Succession and Euphoria.

Your concept of heaven?

Just being around the people I love. I love having people in my home and just laughing and talking and drinking wine.

Favourite TV personality?

Rylan. He’s just a total delight.

Your concept of hell?

Loneliness and not being able to be around the people I love.

Favourite item of clothing?

A really cool coat with a nice fluffy collar.

Most desirable date?

Someone who makes you laugh.

Favourite method of relaxation?

You can’t beat a bubble bath.

What would be your dying words?

The butler did it.

Greatest ambition?

I would love to act until the day I die.

Period of history you’d most like to

have lived in and why?

The '70s. They had great music, hair and clothes.

If you weren’t a human being which animal would you have chosen to be?

I would definitely be a koala, and that’s not so much that I’m choosing it – I’ve just been told that by so many people.

If you were told that the world was ending tomorrow morning, how would you react/what would you do?

I would go back home and cuddle my nieces and nephews.

Your nominee for the world’s bestdressed person?

I was always obsessed with MaryKate Olsen when she was at NYU. Favourite term of abuse?

Feck off.

Biggest fear?

Open water.

Humanity’s most useful invention?

Indoor plumbing.

Humanity’s most useless invention?

Fidget spinner.

• Nicola Coughlan stars in Bridgerton out December 25th on Netflix.

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C O V E R S T ORY

2020

THE YEAR IRISH WOMEN IN HARMONY TOOK A STAND TOGETHER For a long time, women had been forced to play second fiddle in the music industry. Now, however, things are beginning to change for the better. Inspired by ace songwriter RuthAnne Cunningham, the sisters have been doing it for themselves with Irish Women in Harmony. First, the 30-plus strong supergroup took a marvellous cover of the Dolores O’Riordan-written ‘Dreams’. Then came ‘Together At Christmas’ – a song that is already well on the way to becoming an Xmas classic in its own right. It was, without a doubt, the Irish music story of the year 2020.

BY TA N I S S M I T H E R PHOTOGRAPHY: MIGUEL RUIZ

First row (L-R): Fia Moon, Laoise, Soulé and Una Healy.

Second row (L-R): Emma Langford, Aimée, Faye O’Rourke (Soda Blonde) and Erica Cody.

Third row (L-R): Ailbhe Reddy, Sibéal, Lyra and Stephanie Rainey.

Fourth row (L-R): Roe, Moya Brennan, Tolü Makay, RuthAnne and Áine Cahill.

Fifth row (L-R): Saoirse Duane, Caoimhe Barry & Karen Cowley (Wyvern Lingo), Melina Malone, and Sophie Doyle Ryder Sixth row (L-R): Lenii, Mia Fitz & Toni Etherson (Siights), Eve Belle and Kehli.

W

hen RuthAnne The Cranberries – one of the most successful female Cunningham songwriters ever to come out of Ireland – was the assembled icing on the cake.

Irish Women in The track was recorded in the middle of Ireland’s Harmony – a first Coronavirus lockdown. Musicians couldn’t supergroup of epic congregate in a studio for a session. Instead, proportions that RuthAnne divided up the lines in ‘Dreams’, sending saw many of the them out to each artist individually. They, in turn, leading ladies in Irish music, from Clannad’s Moya sent back a recording of themselves singing their Brennan, Imelda May and Una Healy through to allotted lines into (quite literally) whatever kind of Wyvern Lingo, Soulé and Erica Cody, team up for a machinery they had to hand. RuthAnne was left with cover of The Cranberries’ smash hit ‘Dreams’ – she a dilemma: how could she create a radio-worthy song had no idea what she was letting from a bunch of laptop and iPhone herself in for! recordings?

Nor did she – or any of the 30One thing was certain: she plus artists involved – have any wasn’t going to fail for want of “TO BE THE SOLE inkling just how successful it would trying!

PRODUCER AS A be.

If it was a daunting challenge, It was a classic example of the singer, songwriter, and now WOMAN WAS A people pitching in because it producer was certainly up for it.

CHALLENGE THAT I seemed like the right thing to “With my records, there’s always WAS REALLY HAPPY do, rather than from any personal been a man involved in their TO BE A PART OF.” ulterior motives. For a start, it making,” RuthAnne confessed to was making a statement about Hot Press around the time of the Irish female talent: look, here’s a original release. “For me to be platoon of women singers, all of the sole producer, as a woman, whom are capable of delivering something brilliant. was a challenge that I was really happy to be a part It was a musical message that had the empowerment of. I didn’t want everyone to sound the same, but I of women among its essential purposes. wanted it blended.”

It was also about raising money for hugely It’s now clear that she needn’t have worried. deserving causes in a time of escalating national Working like a demon in the studio, and using all the crisis. The particular importance of Safe Ireland was guile she has developed over the course of a hugely underlined with the release of figures confirming successful songwriting career, she got the voices that there had been an upsurge in complaints about working together. Editing the video, meanwhile, was domestic violence during the pandemic. Normal akin to painting the ceiling of the Sistine Chapel. fund-raising activities were virtually impossible for With so many different sources to be drawn on and charities at the time. RuthAnne reealised that Women meshed together, lighting and colour-coding had In Harmony could step into the breach. Doing so to be dealt with in painstaking detail. But it worked with an iconic song written by Dolores O’Riordan of magnificantly.

HP. AN.21 013

IRISH WOMEN IN HARMONY

U N A H E A LY

RUTHANNE CUNNINGHAM

“NOW THAT WE’RE HOME MORE THAN EVER, WE NEED TO PROTECT THE KIDS OUT THERE, AND LET THEM KNOW THAT THEIR VOICES CAN BE HEARD.”

AIMÉE

The finished video is one of those special artefacts that delivers a powerful emotional hit, derived in part at least from the marvellous diversity of the voices, the faces and the expressions it brings together – and which it, in a quiet, subtle way, celebrates.

S E T- U P I N M Y B E D R O O M One Late Late Show performance and over a quarter of a million euro raised for Safe Ireland later, RuthAnne Cunningham found herself contemplating what the next step might be. They’d had a massive hit. The vibes were really good. It would be important not to spoil that success in any way. Then she had a light-bulb moment. A Christmas single might just make the perfect followup. But only if they had the right song and could execute it in a similar style and spirit.

“Irish Women In Harmony needed a Christmas song,” RuthAnne laughs down the line from her home. And who better to write it than RuthAnne herself? It was towards the end of summer that the idea crystallised.

“My fiancé is also a songwriter,” she explains, “and we’d been talking about the type of Christmas song everyone would need this year. It was really hot at the time, and I woke up one morning at 8am, in August, and the idea had just fallen into my head.

“I sat up really quickly, and was like, ‘Wait. Has anyone done a song where they use famous lyrics from other Christmas songs?’ So I started writing down the choruses of all these Christmas songs, and I woke my fiancé up and I started singing it to him, and he started doing it with me.”

Then came the elevator pitch to her fellow Irish Women In Harmony members. There were fewer phone calls and texts reqauired on this occasion...

“We first found out about ‘Together At Christmas’ when we were doing the Late Late Show performance for ‘Dreams’,”

014 HP. AN.21

THE CRANBERRIES

Una Healy smiles. “She was explaining to us how it came about – the songwriting element of it. It was really clever how it was all put together, with references to well-known songs, so it’s instantly familiar – yet very original with the melody, the feeling and the sentiment. It’s a beautiful song.”

With social distancing still in effect, it was clear from the outset that‘Together At Christmas’ would – like ‘Dreams’ – have to be largely recorded at home. Fascinatingly, ‘Dreams’ had spurred many of the artists to up the ante, in terms of the home recording equipment available to them.

“It’s true,” Una Healy says. “A lot of people are investing in home set-ups and studios now, so they can get their vocals down from home – especially for working on demos.”

“With ‘Dreams’, it was just one of those things that got done,” says Erica Cody. “There were no ifs or buts. Everyone came through with their parts really quickly, and obviously, RuthAnne did so well with producing the whole thing and sending us all our individual parts. Actually, it may even have happened quicker this time around. It’s all been very smooth sailing.”

Soulé had always been used to working with the Diffusion

LENII

IRISH WOMEN IN HARMONY

E R I C A C O DY

KEHLI

SOULÉ Socially distanced at the Hot Press offices, November 2020: Fia Moon, Erica Cody, Sophie Doyle Ryder, Ruth-Anne Cunningham, Emma Langford, Moya Ní Bhraonáin, Sibéal, Stephanie Rainey and Aimée.

production team.

“I never wanted Irish Women In Harmony to be about one “‘Dreams’ was new for me,” she confides, “in terms of or two members, or to have the same people all the time,” recording at home and using my own studio set-up in my RuthAnne says. “Because there are so many of us, and everyone bedroom. I enjoyed the process though, because I learned how has their solo projects. to add and stack vocals. With ’Together At Christmas’, I knew “This whole thing was meant to raise awareness for what to do and what not to do.” meaningful causes, and to highlight the talent of Irish artists,”

she adds. “I want everyone to have a chance to be in the A R E VO LV I N G D O O R P O L I C Y community. Even though we don’t have Aimée was also an original member of the some of the girls from ‘Dreams’ on this song, IWIH clan. For her, Irish Women In Harmony they’re still in the text group. They’re involved “EVERYONE’S is much more than just a group of people even if they aren’t singing. I wanted to keep SUPER SOUND... she sings with. It is a collective of friends and expanding, and to have a revolving door peers, who can share information, ideas and policy”.

IT’S JUST GREAT. insights.

For the Christmas single, it was importat WE ALL HAVE OUR “I was buying new studio equipment a few for RuthAnne to open up the floor to other OWN PROJECTS, weeks ago,” she smiles, “and I was able to women, who hadn’t had the opportunity to SO IT WAS VERY inquire in the group ‘Has anyone used this, participate in ‘Dreams.’ Lenii is one of the new RELAXED THIS what do you think?’ It’s a great space to be members of the group, and the up-and-coming able to get advice from each other.” star from Cork – who recently did a powerful TIME AROUND.” “It’s been a lonely industry for women,” Hot Press Y&E Series Instagram gig – jumped she adds. “For me, anyway, up until this past at the chance to join ‘Together At Christmas’. year. But, now, to be able to have a group of “Women are under-represented in so many women in all different spots on the industry spectrum has been parts of the music industry,” Lenii says, “and are often made to invaluable.” believe we’re in competition with each other. So it was class to This sentiment is echoed across the board, by different see a spotlight on talented Irish women working together.” members of the Irish Women In Harmony troupe.

“There’s a weird stigma around getting a bunch of female B I G G E R T H A N A L L O F U S artists together,” Erica says. “Everyone thinks there will be loads Finding the right causes to work with was important to of drama, when that isn’t the case at all. We can work together RuthAnne – and it was for the rest of the Irish Women in just as well as men can. The Irish Women In Harmony projects Harmony collective as well. The proceeds from ‘Dreams’ went have been really efficient and super-quick. There’s been no to Safe Ireland – the track has thus far raised over €250,000 for hassle. the charity. For ht3e follow-up, RuthAnne and the gang thought “If it had been stressful, it wouldn’t have gone on this long,” spreading the wealth was necessary, with online donations and Erica adds. “Everyone’s super-sound... it’s just great. We all proceeds from texts going to ISPCC Childline, which supports have our own projects, so it was very relaxed this time around. children under 18 in crisis.

RuthAnne said, ‘Anyone who wants to do the Christmas single “For children, Christmas can be a very exciting time, but also can, and anyone who doesn’t want to, doesn’t have to’. But a very scary one, if things aren’t great at home,” Una Healy they’re still very much part of the group.” says. “And now that we’re home more than ever, we need to HP. AN.21 015

IRISH WOMEN IN HARMONY

I M E L DA M AY

So, what classic Christmas songs get Irish Women in Harmony in the Christmas spirit?

RUTH-ANNE: “Christmas is my favourite time of year. I feel like it’s very predictable to say Mariah Carey, but I actually think my favourite is ‘Have Yourself A Merry Little Christmas’. I used to sing the Vanessa Williams version at the National Concert Hall every year with the orchestra, so that’s really special for me.”

LOAH

UNA HEALY: “‘Fairytale Of New York’. I just love it. It makes me feel so good everytime I hear it. A good Christmas song is timeless – like Mariah Carey’s ‘All I Want For Christmas’, which is such a beautiful song as well.”

LISA HANNIGAN

protect the kids out there, and let them know that their voices can be heard. It’s all about supporting that. Having kids myself, I’m so protective of them.”

“One of my favourite parts in participating in this project,” says KEHLI, another new member of the troupe, “was being able to give back to people that need our help in these tough times.” .

“Especially this year, people are feeling so isolated,” Lenii adds. “And with the lockdown, there has been an increase in domestic violence. So it’s extremely important that the ISPCC and Childline have the resources to make sure every child is taken care of.”

“We’re still working with Safe Ireland, and all the revenue from ‘Dreams’ continues to go to Safe Ireland, forever,” says RuthAnne of the switch-up. “We just felt like we wanted to help as many charities as we could.

“We did not expect this to turn into such a thing,” she smiles. “Where it’s gone has become so special. It’s so much bigger than all of us.”

G I V I N G S O M E T H I N G B AC K THROUGH MUSIC RuthAnne’s 8am lightbulb moment has turned out to be a winner. ‘Together At Christmas’ is the perfect antidote to the prevaziling bleakness of these 016 HP. AN.21

dark times, with the pandemic making it more difficult – and in some cases impossible – to see family and friends over the Christmas holidays. It’s got an abundance of heart – and accompanying the single is a beautifully-shot video, full of snow (and complete with Love, Actually-inspired cue card lyrics).

“I was able to go into the studio to be there for part of the video,” says Una. “I was delighted to get in the car with my letter, and to be able to get out of Tipperary!

“It was like my day-pass up to Dublin!” she laughs. “It was all very Covidfriendly. We went in one at a time, and it was a lovely little set-up, with the fake snow.”

The single also features 18 tween girls in a children’s choir.

“That’s my favourite part of the video, when the kid’s choir starts singing,” laughs Soulé. “It was so cool having those kids participate. It’s something they’re going to remember when they get older. It also makes me happy that we’re able to raise money for such a good cause as Childline – and to give something back through music.”

And so say all of us...

• ‘Together At Christmas’ is out now. Text ‘CHILDHOOD’ to 50300 to donate €4 now.

KEHLI: “‘Fairytale Of New York’ is my all time favourite. Having traditional music in a famous Christmas song exposes people to Irish music culture in a beautiful way. I also love the character aspect to the song.”

LENII: “Ella Fitzgerald’s ‘Let It Snow’. It’s such a classic, and one that was always playing at Christmas when I was small. It just gives me a really cozy, safe feeling. I even listen to Ella singing Christmas songs during the summer if I need a boost (laughs).”

AIMÉE: “Why didn’t you prepare us for this?! (laughs). For me, it’s often less about the song and more about who’s singing it.

But I love ‘The Christmas Song (Chestnuts Roasting On An Open Fire)’.”

ERICA CODY: “Oh my god! That’s so hard.

It’s not Christmas until Mariah Carey sings, in my opinion, but... I think my top 3 would be: (1) ‘All I Want For Christmas Is You’; (2) Wham’s ‘Last Christmas’ and (3) ‘Have Yourself A Merry Little Christmas’.”

SOULÉ: “It’s going to have to be the Destiny’s Child version of ‘The 12 Days Of Christmas’. Beyoncé and Michelle killed that version. The way they remade it was amazing.”

Even just a few short weeks after its release, it’s clear that with ‘Together At Christmas’ Irish Women In Harmony have a classic Christmas song of their own.

My 2020 D A W S O N S T. O ’ C O N N E L L S T.

Will Butler Musician

Your Hero of 2020?

George Floyd’s family Villain of 2020?

Gotta go with Trump on this one Best Personal Moment?

Making it through the spring Best Movie or TV show?

Palm Springs Best record?

Shamir, Shamir Best book?

The Mirror and the Light Best thing you saw online? (streamed gigs/

PALM SPRIN

GS

trending topic/ something that caught your attention) Patti Harrison’s Instagram Your hope for next year?

Sweet sweet government money for everyone who needs it What tickled your funny bone?

That drawing that guy did of the birds with human butts • Will Butler’s new album Generations is out now on Merge Records

TOWERRECORDS.IE HP. AN.21 017

ALBUMS OF THE YEAR

2020

A

s the debate about the state of rock continues to rage, Ireland has emerged as the centre of a major revitalisation of the form. Leading the way are the all-conquering Fontaines D.C., who this year consolidated the success of their acclaimed debut Dogrel with their magnificent second album A Hero’s Death.

Landing the coveted Hot Press Album Of The Year gong, the album was another compelling exploration of modern life. Illuminated once again by frontman Grian Chatten’s clever and poetic wordplay, the record added dreamy psych textures to the Fontaines’ patented post-punk format. Hitting number 2 in Ireland and the UK, A Hero’s Death was a substantial hit around Europe and also landed a Best Rock Album nomination at the Grammys.

Elsewhere, the landmark moments kept coming from the boys, as they received the nod of approval from everyone from Johnny Marr to Yungblud, and saw Aidan Gillen make a guest appearance in the video for the A Hero’s Death title-track. Not to mention that already-legendary appearance with Joe Duffy on Liveline! It all confirmed Fontaines’ place as one of the zeitgeist-defining bands of the moment.

As ever, the HP Top 50 provides ample evidence of the extraordinary depth and richness of the Irish music scene, with top 10 placings for maverick singer David Keenan; alt-rockers Pillow Queens; acoustic merchants The Scratch; and hip-hop sensation Denise Chaila, who also made one of the year’s defining musical appearances on The Late Late Show.

Meanwhile, veteran garage-rock supremos The Strokes land the number two slot with their returnto-form offering The New Normal, and there’s also a strong showing from LA indie star Phoebe Bridgers, who firmly maintained her upward trajectory with the stunning Punisher. Rounding out the top 10 are Taylor Swift’s atmospheric folklore, Bob Dylan’s typically epic Rough And Rowdy Ways and Fiona Apple’s extraordinary Fetch The Bolt Cutters, widely regarded as a career highlight for the US singer.

Of course, that’s just the tip of the Top 50 iceberg, which also boasts more homegrown goodness from acts as varied as JYellowL and Bitch Falcon; art-pop gems from Gorillaz, The 1975 and HMLTD; another barnstormer from Bruce Springsteen; phenomenal offerings from Run The Jewels, HAIM and Childish Gambino - and much, much more.

More than ever, it was a year when music provided us with comfort, solace, escape and joy. Here’s to more unforgettable music next year - and maybe, just maybe, a return to live action. To quote one of the 20th century’s most revered songwriters, wouldn’t it be nice...

018 HP. AN.21

1

2

A HERO'S DEATH

FONTAINES D.C.

6

7

3

4

TOP 10 ALBUMS

5

1. FONTAINES D.C. A HERO'S DEATH PA R T I S A N R E C O R D S

2.THE STROKES THE NEW ABNORMAL (RCA

3. PHOEBE BRIDGERS PUNISHER DEAD OCEANS

4. DAVID KEENAN A BEGINNER’S GUIDE TO BRAVERY RUBYWORKS

5. PILLOW QUEENS IN WAITING PILLOW QUEENS RECORDS

6. TAYLOR SWIFT FOLKLORE REPUBLIC 7. DENISE CHAILA GO BRAVELY RICHARD DUMAS

NAROLANE RECORDS

8. BOB DYLAN ROUGH AND ROWDY WAYS COLUMBIA

9. THE SCRATCH COULDN’T GIVE A RATS RIGHT UP YE

10. FIONA APPLE FETCH THE BOLT CUTTERS EPIC

8

9

10 HP. AN.21 019

ALBUMS OF THE YEAR

11-50 11. Run The Jewels RTJ4 (JEWEL

21. Childish Gambino 3.15.20

RUNNERS/BMG)

(RCA)

12. Bruce Springsteen Letter To

22. Tricky Fall To Pieces (FALSE

You (COLUMBIA)

IDOLS)

13. The 1975 Notes On A

23. Jarv Is Beyond the Pale

Conditional Form (DIRTY HIT)

(ROUGH TRADE RECORDS)

14. JyellowL 2020 D|Vision

24. Gorillaz Song Machine,

(JYELLOWL RECORDS LTD)

Season One Strange Timez

15. Bitch Falcon Staring at

(GORILLAZ PARTNERSHIP / PARLOPHONE)

Clocks (BITCH FALCON/RECKLESS)

16. Moses Sumney Græ

25. Sault Untitled (Black Is) (FOREVER LIVING ORIGINALS)

(JAGJAGUWAR)

17. HAIM Women in Music Pt. III (COLUMBIA)

18. Laura Marling Song For Our Daughter (CHRYSALIS RECORDS / PARTISAN)

19. Dua Lipa Future Nostalgia (WARNER RECORDS)

20. Joshua Burnside Into The

Depths Of Hell (JOSHUA BURNSIDE RECORDINGS)

26. Lianne La Havas Lianne

La Havas (WARNER / NONESUCH

31. Idles Ultra Mono (PARTISAN) 32. Angel Olsen Whole New Mess (JAGJAGUWAR)

33. Ailbhe Reddy Personal

History (FRIENDS OF THE FAMILY)

34. The Streets None of Us Are Getting Out Of This Life Alive (MIKE SKINNER / UNIVERSAL)

35. Rina Sawayama Sawayama (DIRTY HIT)

36. Caribou Suddenly (CITY SLANG)

37. Nealo All The Leaves Are

RECORDS)

Falling (DFL RECORDS)

27. Tame Impala The Slow Rush

38. Megan Thee Stallion

(CAROLINE)

28. Roisin Murphy Roisin Machine (SKINT)

29. The Coronas True Love

41. Kelly Lee Owens Inner Song (SMALL TOWN SUPER SOUND)

42. Bright Eyes Down in the

Weeds, Where the World Once Was (DEAD OCEANS)

43. The Boomtown Rats Citizens of Boomtown (BMG)

44. Jess Williamson Sorceress (MEXICAN SUMMER)

45. Mary Coughlan Life Stories (HAIL MARY RECORDS)

46. Jack Garratt Love, Death & Dancing (ISLAND / UNIVERSAL)

47. HMLTD West of Eden (LUCKY NUMBER MUSIC)

Good News (1501 CERTIFIED

48. Ásgeir Bury The Moon

ENTERTAINMENT)

(EMBASSY OF MUSIC / ADP)

39. Matt Berninger Serpentine

49. CFIT Vs. Gravity (NOËL

Prison (CAROLINE)

Waits (SO FAR SO GOOD)

40. Lucinda Williams Good

30. Ciaran Lavery Plz Stay, bb

TIGERS)

Souls, Better Angels (THIRTY

DUPLAA)

50. Beabadobee Fake It Flowers (DIRTY HIT)

(SOFT GUT RECORDS)

ALSO HIGHLY RECOMMENDED...

ALEX GOUGH Forever Classic (ALEX GOUGH) ALICIA KEYS Alicia (RCA / SONY) AOIFE NESSA FRANCIs Land of No Junction (BASIN ROCK) ARVO PARTY Love Above All (ARVO PARTY) BIFFY CLYRO A Celebration of Endings (14TH FLOOR RECORDS LTD) BLEEDING HEART PIGEONS Stir (HLYM RECORDS) BOLDY JAMES & STERLING TOLES Manger On McNichols (SECTOR 7 G) BURNA BOY Twice as Tall (ATLANTIC / BAD HABIT / SPACESHIP RECORDS) CHARLI XCX How I’m Feeling Now (WARNER / ASYLUM) DALAI LAMA Inner World (GADEN PHODRANG FOUNDA020 HP. AN.21

TION)

HAZEY HAZE Is Mise (PX MUSIC)

DELUSH The Journey to Zero (WELCOME TO THE NEW WORLD)

HILARY WOODS Birthmarks (SACRED BONE RECORDS)

DRAKE Dark Lane Demo Tapes (OVO / REPUBLIC RECORDS) EMMA LANGFORD Sowing Acorns (EMMA LANGFORD)

HUDSON TAYLOR Loving Everywhere I Go (RUBYWORKS) J HUS Big Conspiracy (BLACK BUTTER LTD)

LETHAL DIALECT LD50 Part 3 (LETHAL DIALECT)

(THE OCELOTS)

THE LOST BROTHERS After The Fire After The Rain (BIRD DOG RECORDINGS)

SILVERBACKS Fad (CENTRAL TONES)

MAC MILLER Circles (WARNER) MALAKI Chrysalis (MALAKI)

EVE BELLE Inbetween Moments (RUBYWORKS)

JACK L Streamed Best of the Lockdown Sessions 1 (INDEPENDENT)

MARGO PRICE That’s How Rumours Get Started (MARGO PRICE / LOMA VISTA)

EVERYTHING EVERYTHING Re Animator (INFINITY INDUSTRIES / AWAL)

JACKNIFE LEE The Jacknife Lee (SLOW KIDS RECORDS)

MARILYN MANSON We Are Chaos (MARILYN MANSON / LOMA VISTA)

FIACHNA Ó BRAONÁIN Winter Sun (RAVEN PRODUCTIONS)

JANET DEVLIN Confessional (INSOMNIA MUSIC RECORDS)

FLEET FOXES Shore (FLEET FOXES / ANTI)

JEALOUS OF THE BIRDS Peninsula (ATLANTIC RECORDING CORPORATION)

FUTURE ISLANDS As Long As You Are (4AD)

KEAN KAVANAGH Dog Person (SOFT BOY RECORDS)

GLASS ANIMALS Dreamland (WOLF TONE)

KODALINE One Day At A Time (B UNIQUE RECORDS UK / RCA)

MURA MASA R.Y.C. (POLYDOR / UNIVERSAL) NEIL YOUNG Homegrown (SILVER BOW PRODUCTIONS) NINE INCH NAILS Ghosts VI Locusts (THE NULL CORPORATION) THE OCELOTS Started to Wonder

R.S.A.G Chroma (RECKLESS)

SLOMOSA Slomosa (APOLLON RECORDS) TIM MINCHIN Apart Together (NAVEL ENTERPRISES PTY / BMG) VERNON JANE The Ritual Of Love Making (VERNON JANE / AMS) WE MARCH Fight or Flight (WE MARCH) WILEY The Godfather III (WILEY) WILLIE NELSON First Rose Of Spring (SONY MUSIC) YUNGBLUD Weird! (LOCOMOTION / INTERSCOPE)

2 0 2 0

DENISE CHAILA BY COLM MOORE

Y E A R

30. Fontaines D.C. - NO 31. Carrie Baxter - LOVE ME BETTER 32. Nils Frahm - FUNDAMENTAL VALUES 33. James Vincent McMorrow with Kenny Beats - I SHOULD GO 34. Declan McKenna - THE KEY TO LIFE ON EARTH 35. ASH - DARKEST HOUR OF THE NIGHT 36. Open Mike Eagle - DEATH PARADE 37. Beabadoobee - CARE 38. Revelino - THE ONLY ONE ALIVE 39. Chance The Rapper - THE RETURN 40. CMAT - RODNEY

T H E

26. Bicep featuring Clara La San - SAKU 27. Sorcha Richardson - THE STARLIGHT LOUNGE 28. Agnes Obel - BROKEN SLEEP 29. Bon Iver - PDLIF

O F

21. David Keenan - SUBLIMINAL DUBLINIA 22. Christine and The Queens PEOPLE, I’VE BEEN SAD 23. Ciaran Lavery - 31 24. Gorillaz - MOMENTARY BLISS 25. God Knows - WHO’S ASKING? SOUTHWEST ALLSTARS REMIX

T R A C K S

11. Charli XCX - PINK DIAMOND 12. Saint Sister featuring Lisa Hannigan - THE PLACE THAT I WORK 13. Malaki - SOMEONE LIKE YOU 2 14. Bob Dylan - I CONTAIN MULTITUDES 15. Inhaler - WE HAVE TO MOVE ON 16. Frank Ocean - CAYENDO 17. Lucy McWilliams & Malaki - FAIR PLAY 18. The Strokes - ODE TO THE METS 19. Run The Jewels - OOH LA LA 20. Somebody’s Child - LOVE THAT SOUND

/

1. Denise Chaila - CHAILA 2. The Strokes - BAD DECISIONS 3. Fontaines D.C. - A HERO’S DEATH 4. Pillow Queens - LIFFEY 5. Fia Moon - XX 6. Cardi B featuring Megan Thee Stallion - WAP 7. CMAT - I WANNA BE A COWBOY 8. Billie Eilish - THEREFORE I AM 9. Phoebe Bridgers - KYOTO 10. James Vincent McMorrow - GONE

P R E S S

2020

H O T

TRACKS OF THE YEAR

41. Taylor Swift feat. Bon Iver - EXILE 42. Joy Crookes - ANYONE BUT ME 43. Kojaque - SHMELLY 44. Cosha - BERLIN AIR 45. The Streets - WHERE THE F*&K DID APRIL GO 46. Emma Langford - BIRDSONG 47. Foy Vance - THANK YOU FOR ASKING 48. Janet Devlin - CONFESSIONAL 49. Moses Sumney - CUT ME 50. Pele & Rodrigo y Gabriela ACREDITA NO VÉIO HP. AN.21 021

FOLK ALBUMS OF THE YEAR 1. Bob Dylan- Rough and Rowdy Ways (COLUMBIA) 2 . Laura Marling - Song For Our Daughter (PARTISAN /

20. Shirley Collins Heart’s Ease

CHRYSALIS)

GATE RECORDS)

3. Phoebe Bridgers Punisher

22 The Mountain Goats Songs for Pierre Chuvin (MERGE

(DEAD OCEANS)

4. Sharon Shannon The Reckoning (KATA SONGS) 5. The Lost Brothers After The Fire After The Rain (BIRD DOG RECORDINGS)

1

2

6. Adrianne Lenker Songs (4 AD) 7. Ronan Furlong The King of Leaves (THOROUGHBRED MUSIC) 8. The Remedy Club True Hand True Heart (HIGH FLYING DISC RECORDS)

9. Lucinda Williams Good Souls Better Angels (HIGHWAY 20 RECORDS)

10. Taylor Swift Folklore (REPUBLIC RECORDS)

11. Sufjan Stevens The Ascension (ASTHMATIC KITTY RECORDS)

3

4

12. Luka Bloom Bittersweet Crimson (BIG SKY RECORDS) 13. Fleet Foxes Shore (ANTI-) 14. Gillian Welch Boots No. 2: The Lost Songs Volume 1 (ACONY RECORDS)

15. Angel Olsen Whole New Mess (JAGJAGUWAR) 16. Neil Young Homegrown (REPRISE)

5

5

17. Sons of Southern Ulster Sinners and Lost Souls (HANGING TREE) 18. Liffey Light Orchestra Lekeila (LEGAL RECORDS) 19. Shane O Fearghaill Born From Tradition (SAD OPERA ENTERTAINMENT)

022 HP. AN.21

(DOMINO)

21. Niamh Regan Hemet (BLACK

RECORDS)

23. Martin Simpson Home Recordings (TOPIC) 24. Ben Reel The Nashville Calling (B.REEL RECORDS) 25 Steve Cooney Ceol Ársa Cláirsí (SHEE MUSIC) 26. Brigid Mae Power Head Above The Water (FIRE RECORDS) 27. Varo Varo (VARO RECORDS) 28. Eilís Kennedy So Ends This Day (INDEPENDENT RELEASE) 29. Tyler Childers Long Violent History (HICKMAN HOLLER RECORDS)

30. The Microphones The Microphones in 2020 (P.V. ELVERUM & SUN)

LIVE ALBUM OF THE YEAR Mick Flannery – Alive (Live from Cork Opera House 2019) (ROSALEEN RECORDS)

BOX SET OF THE YEAR Christy Moore – The Early Years 1969-81 (UNIVERSAL MUSIC) LIVE BLUES ALBUM OF THE YEAR The Mary Stokes Band – Comin’ Home COLLABORATION OF THE YEAR Eleanor Shanley & John Feeley – Cancion de Amor

S E L E C T E D B Y PA U L N O L A N

DANCE & ELECTRONIC ALBUMS OF THE YEAR

PHOTOGRAPHY SIMON CECERE

2

Heaven To A Tortured Mind Yves Tumor (WA R P)

3

Shall We Go On Sinning So That The Grace May Increase?

The Soft Pink Truth

2.

3.

4.

5.

6.

7.

8.

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(T H R I L L J O C K E Y )

4

Wuddaji - Theo Parrish

5 6

Suddenly Caribou (C I T Y S L A NG)

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The Passion Of Special Interest

8

What’s Your Pleasure?

Jessie Ware (U N I V E R S A L)

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Suite For Max Brown Jeff Parker

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(S O U N D S I G NAT U R E )

Sign Autechre

(WA R P)

(N I G H T S C H O O L / T H R I L L I NG L I V I NG)

(I N T E R NAT I ONA L A N T H E M )

Roisin Machine Roisin Murphy (M I C K E Y M U R P H Y ’S DAUG H T E R L I M I T E D)

10.

Augustus Muller (NUDE CLUB)

Of all the questions prompted by Covid, “What the fuck are we going to do now that we can’t see the Boy Harsher gig in Dublin this year?” may not have ranked near the top, but it was still one of the major live disappointments of 2020 for Irish electronica fans.

Comprised of Massachusettsbased duo Jae Matthews and Augustus Muller, Boy Harsher’s 2015 EP Pain - discovered by many of us via the random recommendation of a YouTube algorithm - was too good to be true. Underpinned by the kind of subversive S&M aesthetic that made Berghain - and the Berlin techno underground - the group’s spiritual home, it was a virtually perfect mix of NIN-style icy industrial, Death In Vegas-like dark techno and gritty post-punk.

The 2019 album Careful was the full realisation of Boy Harsher’s artistic vision: a coldwave masterpiece that had an unexpectedly affecting ending courtesy of the closing title track, a stunning electro ballad. Though we didn’t receive a follow-up this year, Muller did treat us to another dark delight in Machine Learning Experiments, a magnificent assemblage of minimalist dark techno and eerie soundscapes.

For good measure, the album also doubled as the soundtrack to a brace of films by Four Chambers, a collective specialising in “magical realist porn” - exactly the sort of move we expect from out-there techno geniuses. That Boy Harsher Irish show, when it does eventually happen, is going to be fucking epic.

H OAT L P B R UE M SS S O/ F A TL HB EU MY SE AO RF 2T 0H 2E 0 Y /E AD RA N 2 C 0 E 2 0

1

Machine Learning Experiments -

HP. AN.21 023

A YEAR IN THE LIFE OF PHOEBE BRIDGERS Through a difficult 12 months, many of us have found solace in American star Phoebe Bridgers’ by turns brooding and uplifting LP, Punisher. A deserved winner of the Hot Press Female Artist of the Year title, the singer talks about Grammy nominations, the strange effects of fame – and why Normal People made her happy and sad at the same time.

INTERVI EW: ED POWER PORTRAIT: FRANK OCKENFELS

024 HP. AN.21

FEMALE ARTIST of the YEAR

F

rom her apartment in Los Angeles, Phoebe Bridgers bids Hot Press good afternoon. Or, if you’re many time zones away, good morning. Whatever the line of longitude, it’s clearly been a pretty good 2020 for the indie singer, whose Punisher was one of the year’s most acclaimed records and who has followed up that success with four Grammy nominations and now the Hot Press gong for Female Artist of the Year .

As it happens she was in this part of the world over the summer to shoot the video to her new single, ‘Saviour Complex’. It was filmed on a grainy beach in Scotland, with her near-namesake Phoebe Waller-Bridge directing and Normal People’s Paul Mescal starring (alongside a melancholic Chihuahua). The really big bombshell dropped in the vid, however, is that Bridgers can drive a tractor.

“I was sent a lot of different tractor samples,” she laughs. “And I’d never driven stick shift. The car situation over there, I just can’t do it.”

For all her accomplishments, it’s clearly been a strange 2020 for the 26-year-old native of Pasadena. Punisher was released bang in the middle of lockdown. Later, LA was an epicentre for the Black Lives Matters protests. And then came the American Presidential election and the very slow ousting from office of a certain Orange Ogre.

“Surreal, unprecedented… it’s all those things. I think that if I hadn’t put out a record this year, I don’t know what I’d be doing. I’m trying to take stock and appreciate things. I was starting to get pretty road-weary. At the start of the year I was in New York on a press trip. And I was like, ‘fuck’, I forgot how hard parts of this are.”

Bridgers has become famous quite quickly.

However, she certainly isn’t an overnight arrival. She was playing in Ireland as far back as February 2017, when she opened at the BGE Theatre, Dublin for Conor Oberst. She and Oberst were back here in 2019, with their Better Oblivion Community Center project.

Around that time her name began trending for reasons not directly related to her music. She spoke to the New York Times in an exposé of behaviour by Ryan Adams, headlined, “Ryan Adams Dangled Success. Women Say They Paid A Price”.

Bridgers had touched on the subject previously, when talking to the Daily Telegraph. “A mutual friend in LA was like, ‘Ryan would like you’. He really was just trying to get me recording and trying to get Ryan to hear me, but Ryan was like, ‘Let me see a picture of her’,” she said in 2018.

She and Adams “ended up hanging out all night and recording a song together called ‘Killer’”, she told the newspaper. “Then, a couple of weeks later, he was suddenly trying to hook up with me. I was super-down and had just broken up with my high-school boyfriend.”

“In the weeks that followed, Adams’s attention turned obsessive and emotionally abusive,” the New York Times piece reported.

“He began barraging her with texts, insisting that she prove her whereabouts, or leave social situations to have phone sex, and threatening suicide if she didn’t reply immediately.” In July this year, Adams apologised for his “harmful behaviour”.

“It’s been a lot of emotional labour, but I’ll gladly take that on

for the most part,” she told Hot Press’s Lucy O’Toole last June.

“After the article about Ryan came out, I had these people from my past reaching out, and people who were in completely different situations, saying, ‘Oh my god, thank you for saying something’. I got tagged in a couple of things that were like, ‘I called out my abuser because I saw that article – thank you’. It’s just a ripple effect, and I hope to normalise it.”

“I’ve had people get called out for inappropriate behaviour around me,” she says now. “And I’m like, ‘oh shit... I’m at a level where it’s probably not advantageous for people to fuck with me’.

Whereas, when I was 20, Ryan Adams… I was just a kid playing in Pasadena.

“He came to one of my shows once and I was literally playing for five people. And one of them was my mom. I don’t think he thought it would really go anywhere if he was horrible to me. Or that I had anybody to really talk about it to.”

She knows these sort of people are still out there. It’s just that they won’t mess with her now, because of who she is.

“I’m like, ‘damn… I’m not going to be able to spot [them] as easily. Because people are putting their best faces on for me now.”

In addition to the Hot Press Female Artist of the Year accolade, Phoebe has received four Grammy nominations. The Best Rock Performance category is all-female for the first time: in addition to Bridgers, it includes Fiona Apple, Haim, Grace Potter, Brittany Howard and Adrienne Lenker’s Big Thief.

“I think nobody wants to get in trouble,” says Bridgers of the all-female list. “So I think that being represented…it’s about time, I guess. But also, it’s great. If the social tide is putting pressure on companies to recognise people in that way. I don’t really care what it is. I don’t care if it’s pandering. I think it’s awesome.”

Bridgers may have been locked-down for much of 2020. Nonetheless she has seen history on her doorstop. Over the summer, LA was swept by Black Lives Matters protests. And then came the Presidential election. Afterwards Bridgers fulfilled her promise that, in the event of a Biden win, she would cover ‘Iris’ by Goo Goo Dolls (Maggie Rogers duetted).

“In LA we live in a liberal bubble. But a lot of the administration here is still really backwards. It was nice to watch the community rise up. I went to a couple of different marches. At one, mothers shared stories of their kids being murdered. The details were so harrowing., I can’t believe they weren’t on the news [previously].”

Going back to the Normal People TV series – she’s a massive fan. So what is it about two miserable teenagers in Sligo that spoke to someone half a world away?

“I read the book when I was making my record. It was Phoebe Waller-Bridge who convinced me to watch the series. I was so depressed after finishing the book. I thought the show was going to depress me too much. And it did, it really did. But Paul and Daisy [Edgar-Jones] being so human and funny, in real life, pull you out of the depressive episode of it. You fall for these characters being real and out in the world. The universal thing for me is that it’s about how miscommunication can cause years of pain. All you want the whole time is for them to sit down and talk about how they actually feel. And they just have too much pride.”

“I’M AT A LEVEL WHERE IT’S PROBABLY NOT ADVANTAGEOUS FOR PEOPLE TO FUCK WITH ME.”

• Punisher is out now

HP. AN.21 025

E B L L I W E THER

BLUD

C U LT A R T I S T o f t h e Y E A R

Punk icon Yungblud is about to go stratospheric with his barnstorming second album, Weird. He talks about reflecting the strange tenor of the times, personal turmoil, attending Black Lives Matter protests, writing about sex and drugs – and why Dave Grohl has described him as the future of rock and roll.

Interview: Paul Nolan LIVE PHOTOGRAPHY: MIGUEL RUIZ

A

bona fide cult hero to Gen Z punks, 23-year-old Dominic Harrison – aka Yungblud – is set to ascend to another level with his sophomore outing Weird, a blistering collection of emo-tinged alt-rock. Yungblud looks every inch the youthful tearaway when Hot Press catches up with him over Zoom, with the singer sporting his familiar look of spiky hair, lock-chain necklace and Korn t-shirt.

Sometimes, though, even rebels without a cause have to move house.

“I’m moving into my new place in London here,” explains Yungblud in his strong Yorkshire tones. “I’m surrounded by boxes!

It’s a bit weird but it’s alright. Like, it’s stressful as fuck, but I think once you tour the world and put out an album, you can deal with stress like that. (Laughs) Really, the moving in is fucking easy!”

Weird is certainly an appropriate album title for these unprecedentedly strange times. How has 2020 been for Yungblud so far?

“It’s been a fucking mental year,” he acknowledges. “I’m not gonna pretty that up. But I’ve felt so connected to my fanbase, and I always work well when I’ve got something to kick against. My whole fuckin’ life, when I’ve got something to kick against – that’s when I thrive. And I’ve had a fuckin’ lot to kick against in 2020.

“With this album, I really wanted to express the idea that just because we can’t talk to each other right now, it doesn’t mean we can’t feel each other. People were saying to me, ‘Alright, Dom, I think we should push the album back, because these are unprecedented times.’ And I was like, no, fuck that. My fanbase has been waiting for this record. It’s been the craziest year ever, and I wanted to write an album that said,

‘Forget about the pandemic.’ I wanted to make something for the weirdest years of our lives.”

The title also references the tumultuous time Yungblud experienced following the release of his 2018 debut, 21st Century Liability, which earned him an intensely devoted army of fans. Sudden fame and a series of personal crises took their toll, and the singer wanted to reflect that chaotic period on Weird.

“I have such faith in my generation, because we are defiant and don’t want to be divided. We want to defy the oppression and the hate.”

“The past 18 months were the craziest time imaginable,” nods Dominic. “It was like a fucking movie. I nearly lost me mum in a car accident, and we blew up really quickly – so quickly, I was like, ‘What the fuck?’ There were people outside the hotel, there was people outside my house, do you know what I mean? At the airport, there’s a fuckin’ camera following you around.

“I fell in love and that was all over the internet. Then I went through a break-up and it was the same thing. We were on tour and it was just insane – I still felt depressed even though I’d got everything I wanted. It was like, ‘Everything just feels fucking weird.’”

Ultimately, the animating spark for Weird arrived following Yungblud’s triumphant show at Brixton Academy.

“When we played that gig,” he reflects, “I remembered that two years earlier, I was sharing a two-bedroom flat with a couple of guys from my band. We had a bucket for the damp and there were fucking live wires exposed all over the place. If we touched those, we were dead as fuck. Adam, the guitar player, lived in the living room, which was also the kitchen.

“We’d watch videos of the Foo Fighters and Kasabian playing Brixton Academy and we’d think, ‘If we could just get there, it’ll all be alright.’ Fast forward two years and there I am, onstage at Brixton Academy. Amidst the chaos, I just feel this silence in my head. I almost grew up two years in 20 minutes.

“But the sheer sense of community was amazing. When you come to a Yungblud show, there’s no single. It’s not like, ‘Oh, this song is big on radio.’ It’s more like, this is the fucking experience of your life. And I couldn’t sleep. Like, who fucking sleeps after Brixton Academy? So at about half-four in the morning, I wrote the lyrics to the song ‘Weird’: ‘I’ve got Jesus on my mind / Don’t wreck your brain, it’s gonna be alright / What a weird time of life’”.

For Dominic, the song crystallised the concept for the album: it would explore where his generation was at socially, culturally and psychologically.

“I knew it was gonna be a very fucking British album about the weirdest years of our lives,” he notes, “in terms of sex, drugs, identity, love, heartbreak, depression, anxiety. It’s literally gonna be a series of Skins within an album. That moment was the catalyst.”

Yungblud also shares his generation’s desire for social change. Earlier this year, HP. AN.21 027

“Punk ain’t just safety pins. Rosa Parks was a fucking punk: ‘Fuck you, white man, I’m not gonna fucking stand up for you.’”

along with his ex-girlfriend, pop superstar Halsey, he attended a series of Stateside Black Lives Matter protests. Remarkably, both had prepared to be medics in advance, with first-aid kits, to provide emergency assistance to protestors shot by “nonlethal” rubber bullets. Subsequently, Halsey thanked Yungblud on Twitter for running “exposed in front of rounds being shot to drag wounded people to safety without even thinking twice.

“Obviously it was very scary, cos it’s a real fuckin’ thing,” says Yungblud, “but it was also incredible. Because it was insane to see the amount of people coming out from all different walks of life, risking their health for what is right. This is why I have such faith in my generation, because we are defiant and don’t want to be divided. We want to defy the oppression and the hate.

“We can smell the bullshit a mile away. Everyone was there for simply what was right. The black community are not seen as equal, and we’re not gonna fuckin’ stop fighting until that stigma is a distant memory in the history books.”

A good start, of course, was Joe Biden giving Donald Trump 028 HP. AN.21

the boot from the White House – Trump’s pathetic ongoing attempts to cling to power notwithstanding. Yungblud was ecstatic with Biden’s victory, posting a clip to social media of himself with his top off, running around and cheering.

“That was a big fat fuckin’ step in the right direction,” he enthuses. “Dude, I’m speaking to a lot of young people right now. They’re excited that America did that, and that the vote was swayed by young people and the black community. It inspires people – they’re hitting me up from Poland, the UK, Ireland saying, ‘We have a voice in our next election. If the young people in America did it, we can do it.’ Everyone’s going, ‘Oh fuck, if we vote, things change.’”

Getting back to matters musical, Yungblud enjoyed another landmark moment during the MTV Europe VMAs in November. Before his spectacular performance – which saw him descend from the roof of the Camden Roundhouse, wearing angel wings, to perform ‘Cotton Candy’ and ‘Strawberry Lipstick’ – he received a glowing introduction from no less than Dave Grohl, who said, “You’re about to see why I think rock and roll is not dead. Ladies and gentlemen, the

C U LT A R T I S T o f t h e Y E A R

Baying for Blud: giving fans their money’s worth in Vicar St. unstoppable force – Yungblud!”

“I love MTV and I’m very grateful, but fuck the award!” laughs Dominic. “For Dave Grohl to say that he believes rock and roll ain’t dead right now because of what we’re doing, it nearly made me fuckin’ cry man. That guy is literally the reason I picked up a guitar. All I gotta do now is meet Mr fucking S from School Of Rock; have dinner with the fuckin’ Gallaghers when they’re talking again; and sit down with Johnny Rotten, and tell him to stop being a fucking twat and supporting Trump. And then rock and roll history is made – we’re sorted!”

Had you he Grohl before?

“I’d met him at festivals, but I know what people are like; at festivals you sometimes have to be a bit polite or whatever.

But for him to say that was ridiculous, crazy.”

What were the Foo Fighters songs that made him pick up a guitar?

“I remember seeing the video for ‘The Pretender’ when I was really young,” says Dominic. “My dad took me to see them at the iTunes festival in the Roundhouse, and when I got to see that song live, it just completely fucking redefined how I wanted to do music. The custom-made Gibson Dave plays; the band; Taylor slapping the fucking drums and hitting them so wildly… it was insane.

“Of course, I’d also see the live clips and watch Sonic Highways and shit. And then remembering he was in fucking Nirvana was just mindblowing to me.”

Did you get into Nirvana as well?

“Yeah, absolutely. Nirvana amplified my aggression in music, that’s why I love them.”

Apart from the music, Yungblud also has a very strong visual identity, with the likes of Johnny Rotten and Keith Flint a clear inspiration to his look. Were there any other big influences in that regard?

“Definitely Vivienne Westwood man, I’m obsessed with her,” he raves. “I’m also obsessed with Kurt, The Clash, Marilyn Manson, Lady Gaga, David Bowie. And yeah, definitely Keith Flint and the Pistols. People forget about Steve Jones when they think about the Sex Pistols, but I

loved his look. I think Steve Jones was the glue that held that band together.

“Sid was obviously the fucking reckless punk, heart-throb and lost spirit. Rotten was the intelligent, almost Richard III, Hunchback Of Notre Dame figure. And Cook was a fucking rock star in his fuzzy jumpers. But I love Steve Jones man – he was like a cowboy.”

It’s amazing how influential the dystopian sci-fi aspect of Westwood’s punk aesthetic continues to be. Indeed, one of the most iconic movie characters of the 21st century, Heath Ledger’s Joker in The Dark Knight, drew considerable visual inspiration from ’70s punk, with Cobain-style grunge chic also in the mix.

“It’s just about freedom, that’s what punk represents,” says Yungblud. “Punk ain’t just safety pins and people bashing the shit out of their instruments. Rosa Parks was a fucking punk: ‘Fuck you, white man, I’m not gonna fucking stand up for you. It’s not right.’ That’s punk.”

As well as the grittier textures, there is also a notable pop sensibility to Youngblud’s output.

“I love melodies, man,” he shrugs. “That’s what I think makes people stick around. I could be really fucking indie and cool and whatever, but I’m not bothered about that.

It’s so funny, indie bands will slag me off, but I don’t give a fuck – I wanna play stadiums. I want the milkman to whistle my songs, and I want to write about truth. I want to write about the stuff people don’t want to think or talk about – but they’ve got to, because it gets stuck in their fucking head!”

Hopefully if we have a successful vaccine rollout over the next year and things go to plan, we’ll be able to see Yungblud live before too long.

“We just announced the 3Arena in Dublin for next November,” says Dominic. “We played Vicar Street last time. The gig’s only been on-sale for a week and it’s already halfway sold out – it’s brilliant.”

• Weird is out now on Polydor. Yungblud plays 3Arena, Dublin on November 20, 2021.

HP. AN.21 029

My 2020

Villain of 2020?

That rogue Wuhan bat

Angela Scanlon

Presenter

Your Hero of 2020?

My sister.

Villain of 2020?

That rogue Wuhan bat Best Personal Moment?

Making it out in one piece Best Movie or TV show?

Succession. The family dynamics are insane & the polo necks make me want to be a priest Best book?

Glennon Doyle’s Untamed.

I return to it when I need a gentle kick in the arse.

030 HP. AN.21

missing the connection and excitement of live music. It was gorgeous.

Best record?

I’ve gone back in time and am romancing Joni Mitchell Best thing you saw online?

I was part of a gig put on for the London Irish Centre.

Maverick Sabre, Imelda May, Niall Horan all performed at a time when we are so

Your hope for next year?

That we somehow manage to look back on 2020 as the beginning of something new & positive. The beginning of a new way of living.

What tickled your funny bone?

My funny one & every other one. The Toy Show this year was pure joy.

• Angela Scanlon's Thanks a Million podcast is available now on Spotify and Apple Podcasts

SPONSORED CONTENT

PADDINGTON'S POSTCARDS from UNICEF

U

NICEF has enlisted the help of a beloved children’s character, as it strives to build a world in which every child can be happy, healthy and safe. That’s right: Paddington Bear™ has joined the UNICEF team.

Christmas is a perfect time to spread the UNICEF message – and to play your own part in making the world a better place. You can now offer your support to the global humanitarian aid agency while enabling your children to discover wonderful people and places around the world, in a way that will broaden their imaginations – and hopefully yours too!

It has never been more important to understand how people in different parts of the world live their daily lives – especially in places that are less well off than where we live, or that have been hit by natural disasters or ongoing conflict. The good news is that UNICEF has created a fun way for kids to have their eyes opened to new places and fresh experiences.

A Surprise in the Post Every Month Here’s how UNICEF’s unique gift idea works. You sign up for a monthly direct debit payment of just €12 to the world-leading charity. When you do, Paddington – yes, the famous bear!

– will send your child a personalised postcard, along with some other treats, every month as a way of saying a heartfelt ‘thank you’.

Paddington’s Postcards make an ideal gift for children aged 4-10. They are also a great way to teach young adventurers about how other families and kids live around the world. Each monthly-pack allows a child to explore a different country with Paddington – and to learn about the lives of people who live there. It is a great way of discovering new places every four weeks.

The journey begins with the arrival of a welcome pack, featuring a letter, world map poster, travel journal, stickers and a postcard from London.

Over the following

months, you can build up a collection of stories, pictures and fact-sheets that bring to life the diverse traditions and languages that Paddington has encountered since leaving Peru, and there are recommended educational activities that will spark your child’s imagination. These playful activities can all be logged in the travel journal. There’ll also be lots of fun stickers in the Paddington Postcards monthly pack, for children to put in their journal and mark on the map, as they learn about their peers around the world with the beloved bear.

UNICEF receives 100% of the monthly donations, and the money goes towards helping children around the world – especially those in trouble-spots or places hit by natural disasters or war – to survive with dignity and receive the care they so desperately need.

UNICEF: the Paddington Connection Explained Paddington Bear is an iconic character. His kindness, tolerance and perseverance, in the face of many an amusing mishap, make him the perfect champion for children – and an ideal symbol of what UNICEF stands for. The agency works in over 190 countries and territories – to save children’s lives, defend their rights, and help them fulfil their potential, from early childhood through adolescence. Your donation will help UNICEF to fulfil these goals, while offering your child a fulfilling learning experience with the beloved bear.

The kindness of strangers is needed now more than ever, with children’s rights at risk of being eroded, every day as a result of war, climate destruction, famine and disease. Paddington’s link to refugee children is well-known, with Michael Bond once explaining that the bear’s story was partly inspired by his memories of seeing Jewish children arriving at Reading Station in England, having escaped from Germany on the kindertransport.

Michael Bond’s much-loved tale of a bear who must leave his native land to find a new family and home in a strange country resonates now as strongly as it did when it was first published – and perhaps even more so, as a result of the precious links with UNICEF. • To sign up to Paddington’s Postcards with a monthly donation of just €12, visit unicef.ie/donate/ paddington

HP. AN.21 031

“On Plastic Hearts she swaggers the way the guitar gods from the primordial age used to.�

032 HP. AN.21

REINVENTION of the YEAR

Miley High Club If rock ’n’ roll is dead, then who better to bring it back from the great beyond than Miley Cyrus?

That is the mission the artist formerly known as Hannah Montana seemingly sets out on with her guitar-heavy new record. By Ed Power.

M

iley Cyrus has spent her entire life growing up in public. She has been a teen pop star, an “off the rails” young woman, a collaborator with Wayne Coyne of the Flaming Lips (though it sometimes felt that Coyne was serving chiefly as her muse).

All these conflicting feelings, memories and trajectories are given a rock ’n’ roll gloss and spat out in thrillingly day-glo form on her new record, Plastic Hearts.

As is often the case with great pop LPs, the album is full of contradictions. It is completely scattershot – one moment Cyrus is collaborating with Billy Idol (‘Night Crawling’), the next crooning over a remix of Stevie Nicks’ ‘Edge Of Seventeen’.

And yet this is also a project with a clear throughline. Cyrus knows who she is now and Plastic Hearts is a celebration of her evolution into a clear-eyed pop visionary. It is the most coherent mess you’ll hear all year.

Hannah Montana and teenage fame are, of course, the contexts she can never escape as a grown-up artist.

However, the immediate backdrop to Plastic Hearts is her marriage in 2018 to Liam Hemsworth.

“I wore a dress on my wedding day because I felt like it, I straightened my hair because I felt like it,” the pansexual Cyrus said at the time of the knot-tying. “But that doesn’t make me become some instantly ‘polite hetero lady.’”

Eight months later, the relationship was over.

Confirmation arrived with snaps of her in a romantic clench with reality star Kaitlynn Carter.

She doesn’t directly address her personal travails on the new LP (there was already a quasi-official break-up single, ‘Slide Away’ – which has nothing to do with Oasis).

Nonetheless, Plastic Hearts is audibly the work of a musician emerging from a storm and entering a period of reflection and personal growth.

Mixed in with that is her palpable desire to breath vitality into what is widely considered the most moribund genre of them all: rock ’n’ roll. This is spelled-out in the deluxe edition of Plastic Hearts via her covers of Blondie’s ‘Heart Of Glass’ – slowed down and steeped in guitars

– and The Cranberries.

Here the significance is surely that she is doing ‘Zombie’ rather than a more ethereal Cranberries highlight such as ‘Dreams’. Early Cranberries is the standard go-to for young bands citing Dolores O’Riordan as an influence (Beabadoobee, Weyes Blood etc). Cyrus, however, jumps straight to the Limerick icons’ grunge phase with an interpretation that is all about the riffs and the rage.

Is she pouring in whatever angst lingers after her split from Hemsworth? Who is to say? What’s beyond doubt is that this is a collection full of raw and ragged moments.

You can hear it, too, on ‘Bad Karma’, her growling get together with Joan Jett.

“They say it’s bad karma bein’ such a heart breaker,” goes the chorus. “I’ve always picked a giver, ‘cause I’ve always been the taker.”

It’s wrenching and unforgiving – and a reminder that, when it comes to processing bottomless pain, rock is still the only genre in town.

This brings us to the wonderful irony around Plastic Hearts. Rock, we are told, is long past its sell-by date.

Even the great new rock groups of the era seem embarrassed by the mythology created by their forbears.

The entire point of bands such as Rolling Blackouts Coastal Fever, Shame and Fontaines D.C. is that they don’t have any swagger and certainly do not wish to be on a pedestal. Humility is the new rock ’n’ roll.

This leaves a huge market gap for Miley Cyrus. On Plastic Hearts she swaggers the way the guitar gods from the primordial age used to. In 2020, when rock needs saving, who’d have imagined that the artist to do so would be a former Disney teen star? That’s the mixed-up world in which we live – and one in which Miley Cyrus has never been more at home.

• Plastic Hearts is out now.

HP. AN.21 033

Radio Days In the midst of endless acres of confusion, fear and isolation this year, people across Ireland tuned into local radio more than ever before. The friendly, familiar voice, beaming out across the airwaves, served as much-needed company where circumstances contrived to put people into isolation. For others, the coverage of local issues, and the shared experiences of everyday people, helped to draw them closer to their own community, despite being physically distant. No wonder there was a substantial increase in listenership figures across the country.Recognising the power of local radio in Ireland, and the important work that radio stations have been carrying out over the past year, we spoke to a selection of presenters from East Coast FM, Galway Bay FM, Highland Radio, KCLR, Live 95, Red FM, Midlands 103, South East Radio, Clare FM and Tipp FM – who told us how they rose to the multiple challenges of Covid-19 and cthe way in which the year forged an even deeper bond between the stations and their local communities.

Interviews: Kate Brayden & Lucy O’Toole

034 HP. AN.21

I R I S H R A D I O During L O C K D O W N

TIPP FM’s Fran Curry he awardwinning Tipp FM is among the most-listenedto local stations per capita in the country. And its popular morning show, Tipp Today with Fran Curry, continues to rank as the No.1 choice in the Premier County, with over 60,000 listeners tuning in each day.

And guess what? Over lockdown, the station saw a significant growth in its listenership – as local people turned to Tipp FM as a source of information, entertainment, company and togetherness.

“It drove listenership here right through the roof, according to the last JNLR figures,” Fran – a hugely experienced broadcaster – notes.

“We did extremely well. People were listening to the national information, but they also wanted to know what was going on locally – and they wanted to hear from local people who had the experience of having Covid.”

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Fran believes that the pandemic highlighted the pre-existing merits of local radio.

“We’re listened to by people from the rural areas, and we heard all about their feelings of isolation,” he says.

“That would be an ongoing discussion on local radio anyway. But this just exacerbated it completely. We spoke to ordinary people in their homes.

They were telling us on air how Covid was affecting them, and it was very emotional at times.

“People were really upset,” he adds. “In the initial part of lockdown, people were suddenly deprived of affection and communication with their loved ones. It was dreadful.”

These conversations with people in the community ultimately inspired Fran and the team at Tipp FM to create a documentary podcast, Surviving Covid.

“Some remarkable stuff came out of that,” he says. “We spoke to people about their experiences with Covid, There were also some extraordinary, unexplained things. One gentleman we spoke to had got Covid, and he had been sleeping with his wife, and had been in close proximity with all his kids – but nobody else in the house got it except him.

“Out of everyone we spoke to, Tom Gunn probably stands out most,” Fran

“In the initial part of lockdown, people were suddenly deprived of affection and communication with their loved ones.” reflects. “He’s a Tipperary man living in Mullingar. He’s now in his 80s – but he survived the Siege of Jadotville.

He used his military discipline to get himself out of the hospital bed. He made up exercises for himself, using the bars of the bed, so he could improve his lung function. It was a truly remarkable story. He also told us that this was the first time in his life that he had suffered depression, in the fallout of Covid. He had to get tablets for that.”

As Tipp Today continues to reflect the concerns of its listeners, Fran Curry notes that the next big topic on the agenda is, of course, vaccines.

And despite apprehension from some of his listeners, for the most part, the arrival of the vaccine is viewed as “the light at the end of the tunnel.”

• Listen to Tipp Today with Fran Curry, weekdays from 9am on Tipp FM. HP. AN.21 035

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“We had families calling us in relation to the death of a loved one, and the fact that they didn’t get to say goodbye to them is honestly gut-wrenching.”

Galway Bay FM’s Keith Finnegan he Covid pandemic asked unprecedented questions of all media organisations. That was even more true of those that directly serve and interact with their local communities.

The early days were a deeply uncertain time for those grappling with how to cover the story, whilst also trying to figure out the logistics of doing so.

Like all local radio stations, Galway Bay FM rolled with the punches – and produced powerful programming that reflected deeply on the experiences of their audience.

“I can recall the day the pandemic came to light for Galway Bay FM, on March 12,” says Keith Finnegan, who presents the weekday morning show Galway Talks.

“We worked right through it and kept the programme going for three hours a day. But I never thought we’d still be here nine months later. It’s more difficult now than it was during the first lockdown, in my opinion. People are cranky and there seems to be more issues with mental health, because of the dark evenings and dark mornings.

“Galway Bay FM has unique access to all of the national authorities: the HSE, the Government, the city council, the hospital consultants. At the beginning, it was all about getting the information out there. I was working six days a week for the first while just to keep people

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informed – and it worked, because Galway has had some of the lowest incidences of the spread of the virus.

“I didn’t think it would last this long, to be honest,” he says. “Nobody did.”

In interacting with listeners, Keith and the Galway Bay team were exposed to one of the harshest aspects of the lockdown: those who, because of public health restrictions, were unable to attend funerals.

“We had families calling us in relation to the death of a loved one,” Keith says, “and the fact that they didn’t get to say goodbye to them is honestly gut-wrenching.

We’ve also had people on-air who are stranded abroad, which is very tough. But the hardship stories we hear most are from those who didn’t get to see their relatives in their final hours.

“To put it crudely, when they died, they were just sent to the morgue and the family never got to see that person again. It was very cold and clinical. We’ve also had many carers on the line who felt isolated and lonely, or were forgotten about entirely.”

Was it all about Covid – or was it possible to let a bit of light in?

“I insisted we keep a delicate balance on Galway Bay FM, so it wasn’t wall-to-wall Covid. Otherwise, we’d have driven our audience around the bend altogether and caused more anxiety!”

The broadcaster heard directly about the toll the pandemic took on people’s mental health.

“I’ve had a lot of calls from people with depression and anxiety,” he notes. “A lady wrote me a very articulate letter this morning to ask if we could try to get her daughter’s council house back in Galway for her after she experienced horrific domestic violence. Her daughter couldn’t return because her former partner threatened her life.

“The pandemic has shown the importance of having a safe home, one without fear. Those are the types of stories that have surfaced during Covid that have astounded me. The fact is that they turn to us for help.”

Keith Finnegan feels that the effects of the Covid era will be lasting.

“I think Galway has changed forever,” he suggests.

“I don’t know if it will ever go back to being the way that it was. People around the world now understand how fragile life is, after seeing the devastating effect this has had on society. It may make us cautious in case something else comes down the line. I thought a pandemic like this one would never happen here - it’s a surreal experience. Galway will bounce back, but there will be many casualties. The show is here to support everyone.

“That generous spirit is unique to Ireland, but Galway has a special place in people’s hearts. It’s just such a small world once something like this happens.”

• Listen to Galway Talks with Keith Finnegan weekdays from 9am to 12pm.

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KCLR’s Eimear Ní Bhraonáin

or Eimear Ní Bhraonáin, KCLR’s Head of Content, and presenter of their morning talk show KCLR Live, the general election in February had already given the station a sense of the public mood.

“We have definitely had more of a handle on people’s frustration since the election,” she reflects. “There was anger with the establishment, and people have the ability to access our show, to give their opinions and ask us questions. I think the difference between working at local level versus national is that the public knows who we are, and can track us down. With Covid, the job became extremely demanding – but you had to be there for your listeners all the time.”

As with many other local radio stations, the arrival of the virus added to the sense of responsibility felt by the KCLR staff.

“We felt we had a duty to balance things during Covid especially, because when you come on the radio every morning, you have a powerful influence,” notes Eimear. “Just inviting a local GP on the show every day to reiterate simple messages about what we need to do is crucial. But people also get weary – so you have to entertain them too. The delicate scales of (a) informing people and (b) keeping them in a good space

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mentally is key, because everyone is finding it very draining.”

There were particular listener experiences that vividly highlighted the toll Covid was taking on people locally.

“There was a lot of fear,” says Ní Bhraonáin. “I remember at one stage answering the phone to a local woman who identified herself to me as a member of the Travelling community, and her biggest fear was that she’d lose another

“We fight against that undercurrent of social media who claim that the virus isn’t as serious as we’re being told; there are a lot of conspiracy theories.” baby to cot death. She wanted to know everything she could about Covid-19.”

More than ever, the broadcaster was conscious of the urgent need to battle against disinformation.

“We had to fight against that undercurrent of social media where it’s claimed that the virus isn’t as serious as we’re being told,” she says. “There are a lot of conspiracy theories. A narrow view of the situation can dominate at times.

When you hear the effects of Covid from people who work in St Luke’s, in Kilkenny,

when you hear the stress in people’s voices, you can’t deny it.

“When there were PPE concerns, healthcare workers would often find ways of communicating that with us, and we’d have to raise it with management at the hospital. How we convey our message is important, because people need to feel safe going into their local hospital.

“It’s a tricky balance as a reporter,” Eimear observes, “but experience has taught me resilience.”

Local radio became a coping mechanism for many community members, who needed a sense of emotional intimacy.

“It was very real for us,” says Eimear.

“You get a personal relationship with a lot of your listeners. The figures every night are just numbers to some, but we know some of the people that suffered the terrible effects of the virus. It was so close to home. St Luke’s Hospital was also the first to experience the deaths of healthcare workers, and they were two locals from right on our doorstep: Catherine Hickey and Jim Kenny.

“Catherine’s 19-year-old daughter, Michaela Whelan-Hickey, was incredibly articulate in describing what she went through and the human side of the story.

It is really important that those stories are told.”

• Listen to Eimear Ní Bhraonáin on KCLR Live, weekdays from 10am-noon.

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first-hand experience of the illness.

“The very first person we had on the show to talk about Coronavirus was a solicitor named Donal O’Sullivan,” Declan recalls. “He had been skiing in Italy, and got a Covid test when he came home with a nurse from the group. Neither of them had symptoms but he was positive, and he was brought to the Mater Hospital to be isolated.

“He got home eventually, but it was good to have his viewpoint anchoring it at the start, to illustrate that not everyone experiences horrible symptoms or passes away.”

Naturally, listeners in Wicklow spoke of many different experiences.

“We also had the wife of a man named Mark Burgh – Joanne – who was told that her husband wasn’t going to make it,” says Declan. “She was talking to us after Mark had actually managed to pull through – she was so full of relief, she was running on adrenaline. Joanne told us the tale in a very human way, of how the family had been suddenly looking to the future without Mark.”

“I look at Covid as our generation’s big plague, but just look at how the scientific world is dealing with this. is extraordinary.”

East Coast FM’s Declan Meehan eclan Meehan has presented East Coast FM’s The Morning Show for the past 26 years, and has a powerful connection with his local listenership in Wicklow. With a blend of current affairs, lifestyle and entertainment, his programme had to adapt to the new Covid reality, while also aiming to achieve a balance between realism and optimism.

“We were obviously watching Covid develop from China throughout January, and then we heard about the breakouts in Italy,” Declan remembers. “By that time, we knew it was destined to come over to Ireland. Personally, I’ve got an underlying lung situation, so doctors warned me to stay out of the way. I started working from home in February and I’ve been operating from there ever since.

“After March, we tailored the programme to become more of a community station, imparting information on what was actually happening to the audience. It became more about monitoring the situation.”

Early on, the show talked to someone who had

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There were many such powerful moments – illustrating the extraordinary sacrifices being made by people.

“Another story that stuck with me was Maria Messit from Kilcoole, a frontline nurse in Tallaght Hospital.

She was so afraid of potentially bringing the virus home that she had to leave her four-year-old son, Ezra, for eight weeks with her sister. Maria came on the show to describe her reunion with her son. and it was just incredible.

“There were guests phoning in to tell the audience anonymously about people who had passed away in nursing homes, so that was very disturbing. We tried to get a balanced outlook, without saying that this was an illness that everyone would survive. We didn’t want to batter the listeners with it all the time either, so we tried to bring a sense of normality later on.

“There’s a responsibility,” he adds, “when it comes to keeping listeners entertained while discussing critical health information. We never had anyone on the show that advocated for ignoring all of the rules.”

Despite having to retain a constant sense of caution due to his lung condition, Declan’s hopes for the future haven’t waned.

“We’ve heard about the Famine, the 1918 Spanish Flu, cholera plagues – for those generations, it was years before they were coming out of the ordeal. I look at Covid as our generation’s big plague. But just look at how the scientific world is dealing with this.

It is extraordinary. A solution will be found as fast as possible.

“We can all go back to giving people hugs and simple things like that when this temporary blip is over. So let’s just make the best of it and have our fingers crossed for next summer.”

• Listen to The Morning Show with Declan Meehan weekdays from 10am-noon on Wicklow’s East Coast FM (103FM).

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South East Radio’s Alan Corcoran lan Corcoran has presented South East Radio’s awardwinning Morning Mix for over 10 years. Of late, he has presented a specially extended, three-hour version of the programme with the latest Covid 19 information, giving a platform to health experts, frontline workers and listeners affected by the virus across Wexford.

Notably, Corcoran was this year honoured with a National Services Day Medal for services above and beyond the call of duty during the pandemic.

“The whole area of local radio changed dramatically during lockdown,” Alan reflects. “It went from concentrating on ordinary, run-of-the-mill things, if you like, to the sheer enormity of Covid. It caused panic – we hadn’t a clue what was happening. The Morning Mix Show straight away became a gateway to keeping people informed.

“One of the first things I did,” he adds, “was get a regular contributor, Dr William Lynch, to answer health-related questions.

We also got a whole host of human stories. The biggest thing I came across was loneliness, where people just felt totally isolated. When you’re living alone, local radio is all you have.”

Alan’s relationship with his fiercely loyal listenership deepened considerably in 2020. Receiving the National Services Day Medal was an emotional moment for the broadcaster.

“I have a friend who is a pharmacist, and she was delivering prescriptions to a certain part of Wexford,” he says. “When she came to the house, she could hear our radio show in the background. The woman embraced her and said, ‘All I have is that show, and you are the first person I’ve seen in two weeks’. If you wanted to know every detail of what was going on in Wexford, the people turned to us.”

There were certain stories that starkly illustrated the enormous toll Covid was

“This pandemic has made me more determined to try and do more to benefit the community, and to delve deeper into the issues.” taking the community.

“One of the saddest stories I heard,” Alan says, “was a woman in Wexford who lost a daughter to cancer last year, and then her other daughter took ill with Covid and tragically passed away. But this woman couldn’t travel to her other daughter’s funeral. It was very sad. The tears on the show were unbelievable.

“There were also tremendous stories of inspiration. The Wexford community really embraced the whole campaign, and so we have one of the lowest incidence rates of Covid in the country.”

With the end of 2020 now in sight, Corcoran has picked up on the fatigue people are feeling after such an exceptionally trying year. “Initially, we tapped into the lockdown and stuck rigidly to the game-plan, but people are exhausted at this stage,” he says. “Even the mention of the word Covid is tiring – it’s like Brexit! The sheer frustration has boiled over. Mental health is another pandemic because people have lost their

outlets, but Wexford did what we had to do.”

He strikes a personal note.

“I’m in my early sixties, so I’m absolutely petrified of getting it. I’ve spoken to people who have had the virus, and the stories of what they went through are staggering.”

Alan lost his own mother in February, giving him a deep understanding of how tough it is for anyone in mourning.

“This pandemic has made me determined to try and do more to benefit the community,” he says, “and to delve deeper into the issues. I lost my mother two weeks before this began. I actually haven’t had a chance to grieve for her yet, but at least we got to give her a proper burial. Many people didn’t get that chance.

“Every so often, the bereavement hits me, but I’m looking forward to Christmas so I can clear the head. I want to come back feeling recharged, because the onus is on us now to give people a bit of hope.”

• Listen to Alan Corcoran on South East Radio’s Morning Mix, weekdays from 10am-1pm.

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Live 95’s Joe Nash

ince its launch in 1997, Live 95 has been a crucial force in reflecting the concerns of the people of Limerick City and County. As the presenter of the station’s weekday morning programme, Limerick Today, Joe Nash has witnessed first-hand the impact of the global pandemic in the local area.

“On March 12, we had a guest on, just before midday,” Joe recalls. “I remember saying to him at the end of the interview, ‘I think you’re going to be the last guest in here for a very long time’. That was an hour or so after the Taoiseach had made his speech in Washington, closing down the schools and the creches. And from that day, to today, we have not had a single guest in the studio – which is an extraordinary situation to be in.”

Through his coverage of local issues, particularly during the first lockdown, Joe uncovered amongst his listeners a pervasive sense of ‘fear, worry and confusion’.

“It reminded me a little bit of what happened with 9/11,” he reflects. “In that initial moment, and for a few days afterwards, people didn’t know what was going on. We were genuinely a huge source of company and comfort through

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“We were the friendly voice in the room, when people couldn’t have their friends, and a lot of their family, with them.” that. We were the friendly voice in the room, when people couldn’t have their friends, or even a lot of their family, with them. Radio is always there – and that ability to connect Limerick listeners to each other, through the medium of Live 95, was so important in the crisis.

That’s always been the case, but it was particularly acute at that stage – and it has been consistently ever since.”

Joe’s most memorable moments of the pandemic have been his on-air conversations with local people who survived the virus – and wanted to share their experiences with listeners.

“I had a young woman on, Claire McNamara, a camogie player, at intercounty level,” he reflects. “She talked to us a number of months after having had Covid, and it was clear from the way she talked about it, how dramatic an impact it had on her. Even a number of months afterwards, she was still struggling to get back to a normal level of fitness. We also had an older woman on a few times over

the last few months, who also had Covid.

She survived the initial bout, but it’s clear the lingering effects of Covid-19 can be really traumatic.

“The level of Covid-19 in Limerick is coming down,” he adds, “but unfortunately it’s still relatively high.

Locally, the public health officials keep warning us, and warning listeners, to watch out for that.”

As well as helping to spread awareness and information about Covid-19, Limerick Today has also made a very deliberate effort to spread positive stories in the midst of the pandemic. Joe was particularly inspired by the the Community Call initiative.

“Limerick was the first place to really pilot that,” he states. “They were ahead of most of the rest of the country. I was struck by the willingness of people to get out into their communities and help people who are vulnerable – getting food and other supplies to where they were really needed it.

“In those first couple of months of Covid, that was crucial. There was a real sense of solidarity. Limerick City and County is big enough – but it’s still a relatively small place. So you had a lot of that inter-connectedness happening. It was brilliant to be able to reflect that on air.”

• Listen to Limerick Today with Joe Nash, weekdays from 9am on Limerick’s Live 95.

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Red FM’s Neil Prendeville eil Prendeville has been igniting passions and soliciting opinions in the Rebel County for the past 25 years.

Stirring debate and keeping Cork informed during the Covid-19 pandemic, the host of Red FM’s weekday show says he’s tried to steer clear of negativity.

“We have these calendars on the desks at Red FM and a lot of them are stuck on March 9, the date when many of our employees left the building,” says Neil says of the station’s dramatically altered atmosphere. “They haven’t been back. A radio station that would ordinarily have about 40 people milling around now has a max of five or six, so it’s eerie.

“You can sense people’s frustration and anger the longer this ordeal goes on,” he adds. “Their emotions are becoming much more stretched and frayed. Firstly, we thought the Coronavirus would never arrive. When it did, we thought it would be a short, sharp shock. None of us expected to still be at this stage by December.

“When we got into March,” Neil says, “the big thing that I remember is fear.

There were all sorts of announcements made and even predictions of 70,000 deaths in the first wave alone. People thought that those kinds of figures, like Ebola and SARS, were possible.”

Prendeville had always felt that, in a situation like this, local stations would really come into their own.

“I thought that there was always going to be a role for what local radio stations did on air,” he reflects, “but this year more than ever. I hope that we all stepped up to it. The concerns around unemployment fuelled an awful lot of our conversations on air in the first few months. People were being left with no jobs or prospects. I certainly got an awful lot more personal stories at Red FM. People were much more free with their emotions.”

People seemed to need the radio more.

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“Our show has been looking a lot at Cork characters and nostalgia themes instead, because listeners want to grasp onto that fuzzy, warm feeling of how life used to be.”

“My audience share went up by about 15,000 because of the public working from home,” Neil says. “By virtue of that, we got to hear a lot of stories. One of the tales that stuck with me was a young man who contracted Covid and ended up very sick in the Mercy Hospital in Cork.

Unbeknownst to him, his elderly mother was in the ward next to him. When he came out of the ICU, the doctors had to inform him that his mother had died. He’s now living with the guilt as to whether or not he passed it on to her.”

Stories of that kind indicate the emotions that are at stake. Prendeville recently made a conscious choice to steer the show away from the often-depressing intensity of the Coronavirus bubble.

“It would be easy to fill 15 hours of speech time with just the virus, but I’m quite Covid-fatigued at this rate,” he says. “The next big debate in the New Year will be between those who will take the vaccine and those who won’t. The narrative from constant medics on air is repetitive. Everyone knows what we have

to do and how to behave at this stage.

Our show has been looking a lot at Cork characters and nostalgia themes instead, because listeners want to grasp onto that fuzzy, warm feeling of how life used to be.”

In spite of the often dark tenor to 2020, Neil feels that adversity did also engender a real community spirit.

“There was a huge coming together. It’s what I love about this city,” he enthuses.

“When you can only go 2km from your home, and then you can suddenly explore more of your county, you realise that you just see it as second nature.

I’ve seen Christmas lights all over the world, but none of them are as beautiful as Cork’s. The capital is barren, whereas there’s an incredible buzz here. We’re the Rebel County for a reason. We know what matters now. Precious freedoms have been taken away from us that we’ll never take for granted again.”

The past year has also shown the extraordinary generosity of Irish people towards those in need.

“If I put out an appeal on the air, I’ve never been let down,” says Neil. “It could be for somebody who’s short of money or homeless, but every single time, we’ll get a rush of offers to help.

The people are always there. We’re an incredible country with regard to minding those around us. 2020 has shown people that there are dark days, but nobody should ever feel totally alone.”

• Listen to The Neil Prendeville Show, weekdays from 9am on Cork’s RedFM (104-106).

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“Initially, everybody was just scared, and there was a lack of information.

It highlighted the importance of radio.”

Midlands 103’s Will Faulkner

eaching 120,000 listeners every week, Midlands 103 has served as an important outlet for the people of Laois, Offaly and Westmeath over the course of the Covid-19 pandemic. Will Faulkner, the presenter of the award-winning Midlands Today morning talk show, has found that, in many ways, it was an “invigorating” time to be on air.

“There was real importance to what we were talking about,” he says matter-of-factly. “Initially, everybody was just scared, and there was a lack of information. It highlighted the importance of radio – radio listening overall was up. People turned to trusted sources to try and get their information.”

Through his show, Faulkner also witnessed the tragic reality of the impact of the virus in the local area.

“As the weeks went by, the first local confirmed cases came in,” he says. “I can recall the very first death in our area – it was a gentleman in Tullamore Hospital, and his son ended up calling the programme. He described how he hadn’t been able to be in with his dad for two weeks, because of all the restrictions that were in place at the time. Then they had a very lonely funeral, because at that stage, people really were staying at home, keeping to themselves. These days people can queue along the road, socially-distanced, but those early funerals really were isolated.”

For Will, one of his main challenges was trying “to balance the light and the shade” on Midlands Today.

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“You had all of these scary stories coming in, of people on ventilators for days or weeks,” he recalls.

“But in the first lockdown we also had some lovely community spirit. There was the ‘Do It For Dan’ campaign, for instance, for Dan Donoher, a child in Co. Laois. That gave people a lift. It was important to try and find those uplifting stories, as well as the stories about tragedy and grief.”

It was also inspiring to cover the stories of people who had recovered from the virus.

“There were some very powerful images,” he reflects.

“There was a lady who lives in Stradbally, who had been in hospital for 49 days,” he recalls. “And people lined the streets to welcome her back. There was something similar in Mullingar – again, everybody was out, at a respectful distance. There was a real sense of solidarity.”

Christmas is a hugely important time for Midlands 103. Despite restrictions, they’re also making an especially big effort to bring some much-needed joy to the season.

“You can’t really bring your kids to see Santa’s Grotto in shopping centres this year,” Will explains, “so we’ve now tried to bring Santa to the station. Children can phone in and talk to him, and that helps to replace a little bit of the magic that has been lost.”

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• Listen to Midlands Today with Will Faulkner, weekdays from 9am on Midlands 103.

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Highland Radio’s Greg Hughes or Highland Radio morning presenter Greg Hughes, Donegal’s experience during the pandemic was unique for one very simple reason.

The station is, of course, located in the Republic, but Northern Ireland is just next door. The border – and the level of co-operation or otherwise with the government in Northern Ireland – was one of the most difficult issues throughout the year of the pandemic.

“None of us had ever come across anything of this magnitude before,” Greg Hughes says with a sigh. “We didn’t realise how much our show – and our community – would have to adapt.

The longer the pandemic went on, as much as you might try to steer away from talking about Covid, it became clear that everything, no matter what you talked about, was going to be filtered through that topic.

“North Donegal has always been a unique place,” he adds, “in that it has Northern Ireland to its east and the ocean to its west. As a result, we were often far more influenced by what was going on in areas like Derry and Tyrone, rather than in the south. People go back and forward across the border all the time. And of course, officially, there’s rarely been a unified approach to it – you might see one set of guidelines in the six counties and another set in the Republic.

“That’s why our Covid journey has always been very different in Highland

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Radio. Our listeners have strong connections to the North. For a lot of people, Northern Ireland and Donegal is one and the same, so you normally wouldn’t necessarily differentiate. But it’s about trying to strike a balance. ” Hughes has felt an added responsibility to the Highland Radio listenership since Covid hit.

“You often only see what’s going on in specific regions when something bad is happening,” he says. “Donegal has made national headlines for a lot of the wrong reasons – not least for the high rates of deaths on our roads. But the people here felt forgotten about – in terms of our health services, lack of public transport routes and political representation.

Donegal has always felt somewhat left behind.”

That makes Highland Radio all the more important.

“Highland Radio is where the majority of the community get their news,” Greg says, “and that puts an enormous responsibility on our shoulders, especially because the county has consistently had a lot of Covid cases.”

The station became a place where people who experienced loss could express their grief.

“What resonated most was the reality checks,” Greg says, “whereby people who lost loved ones would come onto our show and relay their experience. That tradition of grief, where the community comes together to stand in the same room with a cup of tea – that was all taken away from them with the restrictions.

“What resonated most was the reality checks from time to time, whereby people who lost loved ones would come on our show and relay their experience.”

Some people last saw their loved ones in a nursing home, and the next thing they knew, they were standing by their graveside.”

There was one story in particular that stands out – and may well have played a part in keeping numbers down.

“We ran the story of a healthy 41-yearold woman and mother of two who became very ill and ended up in intensive care,” explains Greg. “The gardaí said there was a noticeable drop-off in road traffic after that story came to light. When we elevated tales of what people were having to endure, those stories resonated deeply with the community.

“This virus has changed all of us,” Grag adds. “We’ve re-evaluated our priorities.

There has been a lot of talk about mental health, – I just hope that we continue to maintain our focus on these issues.

Even when Covid is behind us, a lot of the problems that were magnified by it will remain. We need to hold onto that general care we feel towards the community.”

• Listen to Greg Hughes on Highland Radio’s Nine ‘Til Noon, weekdays on 103.3FM (North Donegal) or 95.2FM (West Donegal).

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“What we always try to do on radio is to capture the moment – whatever that moment is.”

Clare FM’s Gavin Grace

lare FM, the recent winner of the Silver Award for Local Station of the Year at the IMRO Radio Awards, continues to rank among the popular local stations in Ireland. Over lockdown, the station saw a notable increase in their listenership – with their flagship current affairs show, Morning Focus, presented by Gavin Grace, maintaining its position as the No.1 choice for adults in Clare.

“The Covid crisis has presented an unprecedented challenge for all aspects of the media – but from a local radio point of view, the spin-off from it is that there does seem to be a stronger connection with community, and people’s sense of place,” Gavin notes.

“My abiding memory from the early stage of the pandemic was our efforts to highlight the work that different groups were doing, in communities across Clare – to reach out and help their neighbours. There was a groundswell of support, and a real push to make sure that no one was left isolated. It was the worst of times, but it brought out the best of people.”

In the midst of these troubled times, Gavin has found that the pandemic highlighted the importance of the media in general, and local radio in particular.

“In terms of local radio, people have always had a desire to know what’s happening where they live,” he says. “Outside of Dublin, Clare was one of the first counties in the Republic of Ireland to have any

C

044 HP. AN.21

confirmed cases, so there was a big interest in it from very early on. And then, when we started to get county figures, people wanted to know how many cases were in their area on a given day. So while it is a national pandemic, in the early days, people still wanted to know as much as we could tell them about what was happening in their community.”

Of course, 2020 also brought plenty of challenges – particularly during the early stages of lockdown.

“Things in 2020 that I never thought would happen include broadcasting a current affairs programme from my son’s playroom,” Gavin laughs. “I had to do that during the first lockdown. One morning, I managed to step on Barney The Dinosaur – and ‘I Love You, You Love Me’ started playing. Thankfully my microphone was off at the time, so no one heard it on air!

“When I think back to that time, that’s what I remember – in really difficult circumstances, the industry as a whole really stood up. We were impacted, but we did our best to try to keep the show on the road.”

In the run-up to Christmas, Gavin reckons that now is “the time to recharge and reflect”.

“There’s a sense of optimism in the air now with the vaccine, and there seems to be light at the end of the tunnel,” he says. “Over Christmas, people will retreat into their own families and their own communities as much as they can – so in the build-up, we’ll look to reflect that. We’ll also look to reflect that a lot of people won’t be able to do that over Christmas. A lot of people won’t be able to come home. There’s also people who have lost loved ones, and haven’t had the chance to say goodbye properly.

“So it will be a very different Christmas. What we always try to do on radio is to capture the moment – whatever that moment is.”

• Listen to Morning Focus with Gavin Grace, weekdays from 9am on Clare FM.

The National Framework for Living with COVID-19

December & Christmas Arrangements 1st December: Ireland will move to Level 3, with some variations 4th December: Restaurants and pubs operating as restaurants will reopen 18th December—6th January: We may have visitors in our homes from up to two other households and we may travel beyond our county.

COVID-19 has disrupted our lives for more than 8 months. The pandemic has taken a serious toll—on us personally, on our economy, and on our society. Public compliance with restrictive measures has pushed down infection rates. However, we must continue to protect those at risk.

From Tuesday 1st December Level 3 (with some variations) applies from Tuesday 1st December into January.

There will be additional special measures for Christmas.

All shops will reopen.

Personal services, including hairdressers, will reopen.

Museums, Galleries & Libraries will reopen.

Attendance at religious services will be permitted with protective measures in place.

Travel within county boundaries will be permitted.

On 4 December Cafes, Restaurants and Pubs operating as restaurants will reopen with tables of max. 6 persons.

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Let’s stay safe this Christmas.

This is what we are asked to do: Plan ahead

Every contact counts – limit the numbers you meet

Special Arrangements for Christmas 18 December— 6 January We may have visitors in our homes from up to two other households.

We can travel outside our own county.

Remember, meeting outdoors is safer than indoors Keep gatherings small if meeting indoors and make sure the space is well ventilated Wear a face-covering as advised.

For full details of Level 3 and special arrangements for Christmas, go to gov.ie/SafeChristmas

Public health requires that social and family gatherings (indoor or outdoor) should not resume, except over the Christmas period.

gov.ie/SafeChristmas

2 0 2 0 H OT P R E S S C H R I S T M A S RO U N D TA B L E

A Lot Of Love In The Zoom Forget the Late Late Toy Show and the annual ‘Fairytale Of New York’ F-word controversy, the surest sign of Christmas being upon is the gathering of the good and the great of the Irish music industry for the Hot Press Summit. It had to be done virtually this year, but that didn’t stop us discussing everything from Fontaines D.C., Van Morrison and Black Lives Matter to Phil Lynott, Normal People and creativity in the time of a pandemic. Strap yourself in, it’s quite the read...

It

royally fucked the gigging year up, but Covid couldn’t stop the torrent of great new Irish music, much of which was recorded in bedrooms rather than studios and unleashed on a daily basis.

That old cliché of ‘from adversity comes great art’ was never truer with Hotpress.com premiering a record number of homegrown tracks and videos, and having an embarrassment of riches to chose from when it came to assembling our 150-plus Lockdown Sessions lineup.

This year’s Hot Press Summit, our believe-it-or-not nineteenth, celebrates the resilience of Irish musicians who’ve done their bit (and then some) to lift the collective mood and make us realise that there will be better days.

Sat around the virtual table to ponder the sometimes happy, sometimes sad but always surreal year that was 2020 are: With a new album, documentary film and book to promote, Bob Geldof was looking forward to a busy summer festival season with the Boomtown Rats, but had to settle for Lockdown in Kent.

He’ll be making up for it next year!

If it wasn’t for that pesky Covid-19, Ailbhe Reddy would have spent a goodly part of March running round the US with Paul Weller. It didn’t stop her, though, from releasing a stunner of a debut album,

046 HP. AN.21

BOB GELDOF

AILBHE REDDY

GEMMA BRADLEY

MALAKI

CELAVIEDMAI

C H R I S T M A S R O U N D TA B L E 2 0 2 0

Elf-In Chief: STUART CLARK

Personal History, and being 2.5% of the Irish Women In Harmony phenomenon.

When not unleashing R’n’B belters like ‘Obsessed’ and ‘Beserk’, Gemma Bradley could be found fighting the good fight on BBC Radio Ulster’s Across The Line musicfest. She did it with such enthusiasm that the Beeb have now set her up with her own BBC Radio One show.

Dublin rapper Malaki reckons he had a lazy lockdown, but his collaborative Cocoon project – five tracks in a ten week period – and a re-invention of Van Morrison’s ‘Somebody Like You’ that’s gone viral suggest otherwise.

Not being able to leave the house might have stopped some emerging artists in their tracks, but Celaviedmai flew the flag for Galway hip-hop with a series of wildly entertaining Zoom gigs. Her latest drill freestyle, ‘Known Better’, falls into the same category as does her collaboration with City of the Vibes bestie Melanin Tee, ‘Intimidation’.

Our man Stuart Clark who’s delighted/shocked that he’s finally mastered the technology, which has enabled us to bring these great musical minds together for a festive chinwag. In case you’re wondering, yes, he was contractually obliged to wear the elf hat and beard.

Stuart: We’ll start with our traditional early touch of the ball, which is your albums and tracks of the year…

Gemma: Two that stood out were Bitch Falcon’s Staring At Clocks and Joshua Burnside’s Into The Depths Of Hell.

If there’s any justice they’ll be massive stars.

Ailbhe: I loved Bitch Falcon too, and the Pillow Queens was probably my album of the year.

Mai: It was mainly tracks for me because I think everyone’s saving their albums for 2021 because of Lockdown. I love Mahalia’s ‘BRB’. Everyone in Ireland is just banging out loads of great tunes. Alicia Raye recently released her Alphabet mixtape project with a bunch of Irish artists; there’s a song on that called ‘Nobody’, which I can’t get enough of. I listen to the most random things – J Dilla, Aretha Franklin and Paramore all the time!

There are so many...

Stuart: Talking of bangers, that’s some tune you recorded with Melanin Tee! Mai: Thank you! She’s from Galway too. We all grew up together and it was just her time, really. There’s a lot of women from Galway coming up, which is great to see.

Stuart: Nobody’s mentioned the new Boomtown Rats

JUST SOME OF THE ROUND TABLES ALBUMS OF THE YEAR

Fontaines D.C.’ A Hero’s Death

Slow Thai Nothing Great About Britain

Joshua Burnside Into The Depths Of Hell

Bruce Springsteen Letter To You

album yet, Bob, but I imagine you will…

Bob: No, nobody bought the fucking thing because it came out just before lockdown. Perhaps oddly, I’ve barely listened to music at all this year, I just haven’t been in the mood. The only record that really struck me is Springsteen’s Letter To You, which is as good as my previous favourite of his from way back, The Wild, The Innocent & The E Street Hustle. I’m not a major Bruce fan; I thought it was a little bombastic and not really my thing. But his first two records, where he’s inside himself, were wonderful things to hear for the first time.

When the Rats made our first record – where I was trying to copy Van, really – I wrote a song called ‘Joey’s In The Street Again’ about a kid in Gardener Street. As we finished it, the record company person said, ‘That sounds like a track by a guy called Bruce Springsteen’.

And I went, “So? I’ve never heard of him.” He said, “It’s a good record” but with a name like Springsteen, I thought we’d never hear from him again. How wrong was I? When ‘Rat Trap’ happened, it was only played in America because DJs thought it sounded like Bruce. That didn’t really alter my opinion. I wanted to understand why people were responding to him with such enormous passion and I didn’t really get it. But with this record, you’ve got a 70-year-old man – which is maybe why I like it – rediscovering the depth as profound as one he was articulating when he was 30. And it took him ten days to make the whole thing with the band. There are some truly beautiful songs on that record, which stand up alongside anything. What were you listening to?

Stuart: I adored the Pillow Queens album. RSAG’s Chroma was by turns a punk-funk classic and the best record Talking Heads never made. Cornershop’s England Is A Garden and Phoebe Bridgers’ Punisher were played a lot in my house, as were Denise Chaila, God Knows and MuRli. It’s extraordinary what’s going on hip-hopwise in Limerick. An album I’m listening to a lot at the moment is Paris Jackson’s Wilted. I just assumed it would be a big production job like her dad, but it’s beautifully understated. Sorry, it’s you guys who are meant to be doing the talking!

Malaki: In Ireland, my favourite has to be Fontaines D.C.’s A Hero’s Death, which totally deserves its Grammy nomination. Over in the UK, because it was kind of his breakout year, I loved Slowthai’s Nothing Great About Britain.

Stuart: There weren’t too many positives about lockdown, but it did persuade Bob Dylan to release an album.

Bob: It’s awful!

Stuart: Really? I thought the first single, ‘Murder Most Foul’, was a stone-cold classic.

Bob: A list of obscure tracks from your execrable radio show, along with the well-rehearsed John F. Kennedy route to assassination is not a song. Dylan hasn’t made a great record since 1976’s Blood On The Tracks. There was once a vital need to listen to these people but not anymore.

Stuart: Ailbhe, I’m imagining that you didn’t launch into 2020 thinking that you’d be vying for the Christmas no.

1 with 39 other female Irish artists. It’s incredible how Irish Women In Harmony has captured the collective imagination.

Ailbhe: Yeah, I was blown away when RuthAnne got in touch with me because obviously she’s Grammynominated and a woman in the industry that a lot of us would look up to. The work that her and Erica Cody did bringing that many people together. RuthAnne had forty voices to mix into that track, which is an insane amount of work. We’ve done other stuff together since and she’s HP. AN.21 047

“I’VE FALLEN IN LOVE WITH RADIO AND AM THRILLED TO BITS TO GET THE BBC INTRODUCING GIG.” Gemma Bradley

Fontaines D.C.

“ROCK ‘N’ ROLL USED TO BE THE TRANSMITTER OF ALL IDEAS – CULTURAL, POLITICAL, ECONOMIC. THAT’S HOW YOU GOT YOUR INFORMATION AT THE TIME OF MONO-MEDIA.” Bob Geldof

048 HP. AN.21

“HE REALLY LIKED THE SONG ‘TIME DIFFERENCE’ AND SAID I SHOULD COME ALONG ON THE TOUR, WHICH WAS LIKE 19 DATES. MAYBE WE’LL GET TO DO IT IN 2021.”

Ailbhe Reddy on Paul Weller

Paul Weller

PHOTO (TOP): MIGUEL RUIZ

just a serious songwriter.

Stuart: If you look at the top songs she’s written for One Direction and Britney…

Bob: “One Direction and top songs” – surely there’s something wrong with that sentence?

Ailbhe: She was Grammy-nominated for the song she did with Britney Spears. To work with someone of that calibre is amazing.

Stuart: You proved to your Mum and Dad that this music lark isn’t a waste of time by appearing with the Irish Women on the Late Late Show.

Ailbhe: Yeah, I actually got to get dressed and leave the house, which is astonishing for the year that’s in it. I had family from Canada saying they’d seen me; it’s totally gone global. A Christmas number one would be gas craic. What impressed my parents even more than the Late Late was RTÉ sending a medic to my house to give me a Covid test ahead of me doing Other Voices tomorrow. That was a really big thing for them!

Stuart: It’s a little bit of compensation for not getting to go on US tour with Paul Weller in March.

Ailbhe: I don’t know if I’ll ever let that go! My manager has worked with him for years, and sent him my album before it was released. He really liked the song ‘Time Difference’ and said I should come along on the tour, which was like 19 dates. Maybe we’ll get to do it in 2021, who knows?

Stuart: Mai, like C-MAT, Denise Chaila and young Malaki here, you refused to let Covid stop you making music and perfected the art of the Zoom bedroom gig, as seen on the Hot Press Lockdown Sessions!

Mai: I’m not going to lie, I was positive the first couple of weeks and said, “I’m going to get so much writing done” and then it really hit and I did want to put everything on ‘hold’. I tried not to be too hard on myself and just do whatever I could. I had more planned than I put out this year, but thank you for saying that I’ve done something! I feel like I haven’t done anything. I’m just taking it a day at a time.

Malaki: I got a Covid scare and had to stay inside for two weeks and I hated it because my creativity and inspiration dipped, and I had nothing to write about. I felt useless about myself to the point where I actually got a job there. I wanted to feel useful to both society and myself, if that makes sense?

Stuart: It definitely does. You also Zoomed up a storm on a few occasions. It’s not the same as standing on stage with an audience in front of you, but do you get a buzz from those online gigs?

Malaki: It gives you that feeling of nerves because it’s a live stream and you can’t edit the mistakes out. I thought the Y&E

Series gigs Hot Press did were great in getting the upand-coming artists a bit of publicity and some money, which as Bob said in relation to Taylor is vital because it’s someone valuing your work. I think it’s run its course now, though, and we just need to get back to proper gigs.

Bob: I completely agree with what Malaki said about your creativity going and with it your inspiration. You begin to feel very depressed. That thing’s that’s in your head all the time is annoying, it’s irritating, it’s an itch. In my case, you pick the guitar up, scratch the itch and still nothing’s happening.

Stuart: My hangover of the year is the one I had waking up on March 4 after being in the Workman’s Club where the Rats film premiere and Fontaines D.C.’s Rock Against Homelesness gig after-parties were both being held. Did you get to meet the chaps?

Bob: I can’t really remember if I met them – it was that sort of night – but I get the sense that Fontaines D.C. in another life would be a massive global band. Rock ‘n’ roll used to be the transmitter of all ideas – cultural, political, economic. That’s how you got your information at the time of mono-media. You took sides. Beatles/Stones.

Clash/Pistols. Blur/Oasis. Duran Duran/Spandau Ballet.

That sort of went with the internet. The diffusion of the media meant the dilution of the message. So, while music is critically important to everyone on this chat now, it probably isn’t to the bulk of people in the world and that’s why sales are zero almost. As Taylor Swift brilliantly said, “If something is free, it has no value. Especially art.”

While everyone you’ve mentioned are probably great artists, their value is not appreciated except by people who love and live by music. It’s not the thing you’ll cut your wrists for, and I miss that. There are great artists and phenomenal music, but is it going to lower down that golden thread to some improbable boy in Dun Laoghaire who had nothing else to grab onto – i.e. me – and cling to for the rest of his life. I don’t think so. There are other escapes and means of articulating how it is you feel now.

Stuart: I’m glad you mentioned Taylor Swift, Bob, because that folklore album of hers is stunning. Gemma, is there music that’s lowered down that golden thread to

C H R I S T M A S R O U N D TA B L E 2 0 2 0

Phil Lynott

“HIP-HOP IS EVEN STARTING TO INFILTRATE THE MAIN MORNING SHOWS. IT’S HUGELY EXCITING TO SEE IRISH ARTISTS FINALLY GETTING THE RECOGNITION THEY DESERVE.”

“HE RESPECTED THE WORDS I CHOSE. I HOPE I GET TO THANK HIM SOMETIME.” Malaki on Van Morrison a girl in Derry?

Gemma: Yeah, I think so but I totally get what you’re saying, Bob. There are so many different outlets for people nowadays. But discovering music is my thing, and as important to me now as it would have been for you in the ‘70s. I teach on the weekends in Draperstown where I grew up, and the kids get excited about coming to their lessons and writing a song. They’re looking up and wanting to be like people in the industry here. I still think there’s hope.

Stuart: What came first with you, making music or playing it on the radio?

Gemma: I grew up listening to records and then playing and performing. Presenting I kind of fell into. It was never a career I’d considered, but I got an email from BBC Radio Ulster asking if I wanted to be involved in Across The Line. As I got more opportunities within that, I’ve fallen in love with radio and am thrilled to bits to get the BBC Introducing gig.

For the first while I’ll be doing it from the North but then I’ll be travelling over to do it London, so there will be a few life changes next year!

Stuart: Malaki, you’ve had a great response to your reworking of ‘Somebody Like You’, for which Van Morrison very kindly – that’s not an oxymoron – has given you a songwriting credit.

Malaki: I was shocked by that. He didn’t have to do it. Part of me thinks that he felt bad for young and emerging artists at the moment. I think he respected the words I chose. I hope I get to thank him sometime. We don’t realise the impact he had on our parents and the older generation. We were going to do ‘Moondance’ to begin with, and then I changed it to ‘Something Like You’ because there was something about Van’s original words that really struck a chord with me. It was also an easy one to break apart and rebuild. It’s something I’ll be shitting on about when I’m a 70-year-old man in the pub!

Stuart: Mai somehow managed to escape our clutches – next time! – but the rest of you all did covers for our Rave On, Van Morrison birthday celebrations. I have it on good authority that he listened to all of them as they went up on hotpress.com.

Hare Squead

Calaviedmai

Bob: I got a really nice note from Van who’s a singular Irish genius.

I don’t think there’s another artist in Ireland who would begin to dispute that. He literally invented a whole strand of rock ‘n’ roll that wasn’t there. Whether it’s Jackson Browne or Bruce Springsteen, they’ll tip their hat at Van. People find him difficult but I think he’s a funny and lovely guy. As Malaki says, you can take his songs apart, mess around and it still works.

Malaki: I thought it was going to be sacrilegious; something you don’t touch.

Bob: But Van does that with other artist’s songs. I picked ‘I’m Tired, Joey Boy’ because it’s so simple. How do you come up with, “I’m tired Joey boy/ While you’re out with the sheep/ My life is so troubled.” Like, what the fuck? It’s a folk song that will still be sung in a hundred years and nobody will realise it was written in the 2000s, you know? Van’s got an orchestra on it, but I stripped it down even more with the help of this errant genius from Northern Ireland called Henry Dagg. He lives in a biscuit factory, the railings of which he turned into an instrument and got the great deaf classical percussionist, Dame Evelyn Glynn, to come and play. That’s how cool he is.

Gemma: It was really difficult just picking one, and the one I did pick was gone so I ended up doing ‘Sometimes We Cry’. I’m really glad I did because I had a lot of fun putting it together. Again, you don’t want to touch these songs because they’re going to last fifty years into the future and are timeless. Like Bob, I kept mine pretty simple and stripped back. I don’t cover artists that often myself, so it was great.

Stuart: I was chatting to Jim Fitzpatrick, the guy who did all the Thin Lizzy artwork back in the day, and he said Phil Lynott would have been thrilled by the emergence of people like yourself, Mai, and Denise Chaila. Irish music can’t be defined any more; it’s so broad and multi-cultural.

Mai: You can see such a huge change over the last two years with people like Kojaque and Hare Squead doing things on an international level, and people like Gemma and Tara Stewart playing Irish hip-hop on the radio.

Stuart: This is not a sentence I ever thought I’d be writing, but a HP. AN.21 049

C H R I S T M A S R O U N D TA B L E 2 0 2 0

Celaviedmai at the BLM protest in Galway

drill artist from Drogheda, Offica, has just gone top 40 in the UK with a song that would not have come out of Louth a decade ago.

Mai: Hip-hop is even starting to infiltrate the main morning shows here. It’s hugely exciting to see Irish artists finally getting the recognition they deserve.

Bob: You cannot imagine the Ireland that Phil and I lived in. It was awful. It was like being in this national prison, this great claustrophobic silence. The government was putrid with corruption and the church had the hammerlock on everything you did and were utterly corrupt. It was a shithole. What’s happened in the last twelve years is revolutionary. Referenda after referenda where we just kicked out the past. Bizarrely, the UK has become the narrow-minded place. I had to run from Ireland, so did Philip, but now I’m much more comfortable at home than I am in the UK. It’s you guys who are conducting it, so thank you, thank you from the bottom of my heart.

Stuart: Wow, I think we just had a moment there. Mai, I know you don’t regard yourself as an activist but you seized the moment and brought people out on to the streets in support of Black Lives Matter after George Floyd was murdered.

Mai: When it comes to community, Galway is number one. It was great to have everybody come along and show compassion and stand beside each other. Even people who didn’t understand; it was the willingness to learn. I’m so happy I was able to be a part of that with a lovely group of people. I learned a lot because, as much as it was a positive thing, you realise a lot of social media is performative. Things can be a trend and after that it doesn’t matter anymore to some people. That’s not to say that people aren’t making an effort, but it’s something I’ve noticed.

Stuart: Were you all cheering the Biden victory?

Ailbhe: I don’t know how other people feel, but I’m so incredibly relieved. I’m a news junkie so I was glued to it. I think it signals something to the rest of the world about democracy. Hopefully it’ll have a knock-on effect in other countries as well. Biden’s an imperfect candidate but I don’t think Bernie would have taken Georgia and stuff like that.

Stuart: There was plenty of time this year for sitting on our posteriors and watching the telly. What were your lockdown favourites?

Gemma: I don’t watch too much TV, but when I do it’s something really escapist like Dr. Who. Something I finally watched for the first time this year was the Good Vibrations movie. Obviously it’s a reenactment, but I can imagine myself being there in that time. It all seemed really exciting.

Ailbhe: Again it’s a good few years old, but I loved the Wrecking Crew documentary on Netflix. Just the amount you learn from it about these major players who had a hand in all these legendary songs. The total star for me was Carol Kaye who came up with that little guitar riff at the start of ‘Wichita Lineman’ and was just paid a session fee. She’s giving bass lessons online now. I’m going to have one with her! I was a Normal People fan from the book and loved the TV adaptation. It really shot those two actors to stardom, didn’t it? And let’s not forget the Joe Duffy Liveline complaints. I think that was the highlight of my year, actually.

050 HP. AN.21

Stuart: Bob, it’s not like the ‘70s when Irish teenagers never had sex.

Bob: Yeah, I mean they’re getting more than I am, fuck! My favourite TV was Succession. My daughters are all boring the arse off me going “watch this, watch that” so I’ve also caught up with Ozark, which is staggeringly good. Actors that you’d have dismissed before, now that they’ve had time to develop the stories they just explode into it. Or else, fail.

Stuart: I’m not plamasing you Bob, but I watched the Rats documentary with my teenage stepson who up till then knew nothing of your rock ‘n’ roll exploits, and he said, “Wow, that looks like loads of fucking fun!”

Bob: It was because the film is about us when we were 19, 20. It’s interesting for us in the band to look back on the life that we weren’t quite aware we were living. You’re in a panic a lot of the time. I’m kicking off about the government and the church, and everything is instinct. And you’re being attacked left, right and centre. And I mean really attacked and shut and closed down. When we started having hits it was fantastic because two years before I was on the dole queue in Dun Laoghaire. The idea that you’d have a number one in the UK, never mind other countries, was so remote. And then there’s that famous phenomenon of fraud syndrome. You don’t quite believe that you’re as good as the other people around you at the time. You’re jealous of them. I listened to the Sex Pistols album, which came out a month before ours and thought, “We’re fucked. This is just so stupidly good and ours isn’t.” And then I heard Elvis Costello’s and I thought, “I can’t write songs like this.” But you see something and you reach for it, and maybe you can do it. We had the screaming crowds in the Liverpool Empire, which is the holy ground on which The Beatles trod.

We got to New York and there were the New York Dolls and Andy Warhol… it’s like you’re in a movie. Our first gigs in England were with The Ramones and Talking Heads. We played at school gymnasiums and did half-an-hour each. It quickly became apparent that nobody can follow The Ramones. Amidst all the chaos and the disruption, we thrived and became a really good band. The film helps you see that and understand the moment a lot more. Sorry, I’ve got to go now and pick the cat up from the vets. Which isn’t a euphemism!

Malaki: And I’ve got to get back to work!

Stuart: Okay, thanks guy! Right, that leaves the three of you to talk about your Christmas plans and whether or not there’ll be a singsong?

Gemma: Eating is what I plan on doing this Christmas. I’ll be back in Draperstown with the family who’ll all be heading to this wee bar called Reagan’s. I actually prefer staying in on Christmas Eve and putting up the Christmas tree, which my family is really awful at doing! My granddad is mad into his country, so if there’s a singsong I’ll do something to keep him happy.

Mai: I moved up to Dublin in the autumn, so I haven’t seen my Mum in three months. I’m very excited to be back in Galway. As for a singsong, yeah, definitely!

Ailbhe: I don’t do party pieces unless I’m really drunk, in which case ‘All I Want For Christmas’ is a great tune. Mariah Carey was gas the other night on Graham Norton. My plans are just to hang out with my family because it’s been a long aul’ year of not seeing each other.

Stuart: Happy Christmas everybody!

Everybody: Happy Christmas!

Bob and the Rats at the Citizens Of Boomtown premiere in Dublin

THE A&R DEPARTMENT S aibh Skelly

KK Lewis

S m o oth b o i E z ra

So Brad It’s Good If you’re looking for Irish stars in the making, step this way…

Words: Stuart Clark.

S

napped up recently by Collective Management, the same Dublin stable that’s brought you Laura Izibor and Gavin James, Brad Heidi impresses – and then some – on his self-titled debut EP, which features ‘Hearts Get Broken Sometimes’, ‘Dreamer’, ‘She’ and ‘Latte Master’.

From the North but based in Galway, the 22-year-old has busked his way round Ireland and over to London where there’s a massive buzz about him.

The comparisons with Dermot Kennedy and Ed Sheeran are inevitable and, to a degree, justified but Brad is very much his own man with his lyrics striking a very personal chord.

Also make sure to check out his Hot Press Lockdown Sessions Y&E Series set, which is lurking with considerable intent on our Insta. Find out more on page 12!

Another former Lockdown session-er Smoothboi Ezra is also garnering lots of A&R attention and no little Irish radio airplay with the Gen Z chronicling ‘My Own Person’.

“I don’t know what a song means when

052 HP. AN.21

I’m writing it,” Smoothboi tells us. “I don’t make a plan. I find myself basically doing a brain dump.”

Which is as eloquent a way as describing the process as any!

Continuing our series of rapidly rising Y&E Series acts is KK Lewis, another former busker who’s 20, from Dublin and was also part of this year’s Whelan’s One To Watch line-up.

Originally a poet, her ‘Loop Now’ single was partially inspired by a spell playing her soulful tunes on the streets of Berlin.

It’s hats off to the buskers (and the Lockdown Sessions) again as 16-year-old Saibh Skelly demonstrates a songwriting ability way beyond her years.

It’s early days obviously but having built up a loyal Grafton Street following and turned that into a formidable YouTube and Insta presence, she’s definitely one to keep tabs on.

Power and passion are delivered in equal measure by Ugly Beautiful on their Another Time EP. Very much of the grunge persuasion, the Leeside trio originally started out in 2007

as Satellite Escape, but changed names in 2010 to coincide with the release of their Paradise album.

You can tell from the tightness of their playing that they’ve got history together and will, as soon as Covid permits, be tearing up live stages wherever they roam.

In one of those great random stories, Cynema, a Newbridge electronica merchant and O’Sullivan, a Dublin indiepopper now living in Budapest, met at a small music festival in Transylvania in western Romania. The former loved the latter’s ‘Little Bird’ single and has given it a lush Four Tet/Bicep-ish makeover.

We absolutely adore it.

The Guardian and Later… With Jools Holland are among those picking up on For Those I Love’s ‘I Have A Love’, which has been given a ravey remix by XL Recordings duo Overmomdo.

FTIL is the nom de studio of 29-year-old Dubliner David Balfe who wrote the song as a tribute to his former bandmate, Paul Curran, who passed away in 2018.

His debut album, which includes Massive Attack, Mount Kimbie and Burial among

Rowan

its reference points, is due early in 2021 and tackles such pertinent social issues as sexism, classism and the prison industrial complex.

Having racked up a healthy 170,000plus Spotify plays of previous single, ‘Big Wave’, majestic pop trio Rowan have released their first EP, No One Is Safe Here.

Accompanied by a video shot in various Cork locales – the Shandon Tower is a dead giveaway! – the lead track, ‘I Had A Dream’, is a big power ballad deserving of copious radio play.

With the various members working in the past with the likes of Lyra, TOUCAN, The Stunning, Little Hours and The Frank And Walters, they’re a band in it for the long haul and ready to go gig crazy when the pandemic permits.

Also from the Real Capital but now residing in Glasgow is Jen Ella whose emotionally charged ‘Lipstick Queen’ nods at the likes of Eva Cassidy, Dolores O’Riordan and Stevie Nicks in her more melancholy moments.

Malcolm Lally timewarps back to the ‘80s on ‘California’, a veritable ray of sunshine on a rainy day from the Galway singer-songwriter who is a previous Christmas FM Song Contest winner with ‘Christmas Time (Baby You Are Mine)’.

Unashamedly in thrall to Pet Shop Boys and Erasure, this superior slice of synth pop might sound super-glossy but carries a gritty anti-climate change message.

The Rev. John Wayne McSweeney, AKA Street Corner Messiahs, is giving a pre-Christmas push to his gorgeous ‘Fly Robin Fly’ single, which celebrates the great Robin Williams.

The Cork singer-songwriter, who plucks a mean acoustic, is donating all of the iTunes profits to his hometown Money For Penny Dinners charity.

Having been among the standout acts at Irish Music Week, Patricia Lalor has released a new EP, This Is How We Connect, While You Stand So Tall, which is brooding vocals, dark synths and the sort of soul searching you wouldn’t necessarily expect from a 15-year-old.

Having started her own YouTube channel when she was eleven, the Wexford singer-songwriter now has 164,000 subscribers and the nascent talent to be massive.

ON OUR RADAR...

NEW MUSIC / PRODUCERS / BANDS

PATRICIA LALOR What are the main themes within your new EP This Is How We Connect, While You Stand So Tall?

Most of the songs off the EP are based on myself through the lens of social situations, which is usually the case with my music. I would say there is a recurring theme in there somewhere referencing social situations but I didn’t really write the EP with any particular themes in mind. I don’t even think I wrote it with the thought of it becoming an EP. I kind of wrote every song based on what I was feeling in that moment and then boom - four of those songs were put together.

Each of them have their own little thing but none of them really connect together.

What other artists would you like to collaborate with, if given the opportunity?

I’m not really looking to collaborate, but if I was, it would have to be in person.

Online collaborating is very difficult.

It’s always felt like such a personal thing to me and I prefer doing it on my own for now. Seeing as I’m just a really introverted person, it’s what I feel most comfortable doing. I’ll probably collaborate in the future when I feel like I know what I’m doing a little bit more

and when I find the right person to collaborate with!

Do you think that the comparisons made between yourself and other prolific teen artists like Billie Eilish are reductive?

Maybe a little bit. It’s hard to say, because being compared to Billie is like the best compliment ever, she’s amazing.

I guess it’s just the way that some people word it can be a bit reductive but it’s never really bothered me that much. My mom and I have a running joke about the comparison and that’s about it!

What do you hope to achieve musically in 2021?

I hope to sit on my music a bit more, so when I do release something it'll the best of what I’ve written. I’ll be completely happy with what I’m releasing into the world, which is the main goal. Also SHOWS! I hope gigs will happen next year, because I really do miss those a lot.

• This Is How We Connect, While You Stand So Tall is out now.

KATE BRAYDEN

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ON OUR RADAR...

THE A&R DEPARTMENT “It’s such a fulfilling feeling to give something or share it.”

BRAD HEIDI

How has busking around Ireland influenced your approach to music?

Busking gave me a sense of freedom, to be able to write about anything. I travelled everywhere in Ireland throughout all the seasons, so I met musicians from all over – young and old. I picked up little pieces from each musician I met.

Through that, I built up my songwriting portfolio.

What was the inspiration behind your single ‘Hearts Get

Broken Sometimes’?

It's inspired by a night I had in London, when I had a few too many. I was going through a difficult time regarding my personal relationships and my relationship with alcohol.

How are you feeling in the runup to the release of your debut EP? I'm very excited to have music released in general. It’s such a fulfilling feeling to give something or share it.

What are your plans for the year ahead?

I’m really looking forward to 2021. Hopefully it will be positive for everyone and I have new music lined up to be released including my debut EP. I hope I can spend some time with my family and friends and of course get back to playing shows when it’s safe to do so!

• The Brad Heidi EP is out now.

LUCY O’TOOLE

Tracks with Tanis Smither

CONOR DIGGIN

Uwmami – ‘Callisto (feat.

Henna)’ A stunning ambient track from the up-and-coming producer, ‘Callisto’ deviates slightly from her usual sound.

A wintry soundscape and bright percussive elements give way to a shimmering electronic melody.

Out December 18.

Uwmami

054 HP. AN.21

Damola – ‘Wrong Appeal’ A smooth R&B and jazzinfluenced track about the pursuit of an unhealthy relationship. Damola might be a relatively new name

in Dublin hip-hop, but he's already packing a serious punch.

Out December 11.

Grab a takeaway pint and head to the pub in your mind.

Out December 15.

/////// [seacht líne] – ‘deirfiúr’ The work of brothers Joshua and Conor Burnside, /////// takes heavy influence from trad, fusing it with fresh and modern elements. They released their gentle first track ‘Hawk On The Cliff’ last week, and ‘deirfiúr’ takes a sharp right turn, incorporating banjo and a distinctly uptempo swing.

Kojaque – ‘coming up’ Bassy, trappy beats, an autotuned vocal and cinematic strings arranged by Kojaque himself hallmark the latest offering from Dublin’s most exciting MC. The track is about standing up to a school bully, and marks the second release from his forthcoming, eagerly anticipated album.

Out now.

YORKE IN THE ROAD

056 HP. AN.21

RE-WORKING of the YEAR

Donegal singer-songwriter Rosie Carney opens up about panic attacks, looking after her mental health over lockdown, and reinterpreting Radiohead’s The Bends on her stunning new album.

Interview: Lucy O’Toole PORTRAIT: ROSIE CARNEY

S

ince overcoming early music industry woes with last year’s critically acclaimed Bare, Rosie Carney has quietly emerged as one of the most compelling forces in Irish music.

Consistently taking a fearlessly vulnerable position in her songwriting, the Hampshire-born, Donegal-raised singer-songwriter has been refreshingly open about her own mental health struggles – which flared up once again over lockdown. Fittingly, her latest project finds her covering the entirety of one of the most famously anguish-fueled, but devastatingly beautiful albums of the late 20th century: Radiohead’s The Bends.

Just like Lianne La Havas’ powerful reinvention of ‘Weird Fishes’ on her self-titled album this year, Rosie’s interpretation of the album manages to feel just as uniquely personal and intimate as Bare.

“Even though they’re not my songs, it’s just completely me,” she nods. “Some of the songs on this album feel more like my own songs than my own songs, which is really bizarre. They hold a lot of value to me, and really relate to me in a lot of ways. At times it was really emotional for me to record.

“There’s a rawness, and a real timeless honesty in Radiohead’s lyrics,” she continues. “It doesn’t matter who you are, or what stage of your life you’re at – their lyrics are just so special, and so relatable. Some people, like my mum, would hear Radiohead and be like, ‘Turn that shit off – that’s so depressing. What the fuck are you listening to? No wonder you’re depressed!’ But for me, there’s just a real honesty in their music.”

As she was reworking the tracks, Rosie also found a newfound freedom to take risks with her sound.

“Doing this album really taught me lessons about my own production, and what I can and can’t do,” she says. “The best thing about this album is that I got to really explore. There were new learning curves for me. For instance, I do ‘Sulk’ with vocoder. I’ve never done a track like that before, but I’ve always wanted to. This album gave me the creative freedom to really explore in that way.”

Although ‘Creep’ was part of her repertoire in her early days

of cover gigs, it wasn’t until she suffered a panic attack at a Radiohead gig back in 2015 that her connection with the band truly kicked off.

“We were right at the front of the gig for the support act,” Rosie recalls. “Jonny Greenwood’s band Junun opened, and that was amazing. And then the lights turned off, and Radiohead were about to come on the stage, and I had a full blown panic attack and passed out.

“I was well familiar with panic attacks, but this was the first time I actually blacked out. I think it was a mixture of things – I’d been standing for ages, because we got there super early so we could get to the front. And as soon as I started to panic, and tell myself I was going to pass out, I was completely gone with the fairies.”

“My friend had to carry me and our backpacks, and my shoes were falling off, and he had to lift me up over this six-foot barrier,” she continues. “I was completely blacked out, so I don’t remember any of this. He had to pass me to this bouncer. And I woke up in the first aid room as Radiohead were playing their first few songs.

I woke up crying so hard, like: ‘Oh my God, what have I done?’

And then we ended up right at the back for the entire gig. And we missed the last few songs, because we had to get the John McGinley bus back to Donegal! It was so depressing, but it was from that concert that I completely became such a big fan.”

As both a fan and a performer, music has played a crucial role on Rosie’s mental health journey.

“I didn’t really have any other way to channel what I was feeling, and get it out of my system,” she says. “From a very young age, I lingered in my feelings, and it made things worse.

When I picked up the guitar, and started playing the piano, and singing, it gave me this outlet. Since then, it’s always been this really cathartic experience for me.”

Like many people who found their lives upended by the pandemic, Rosie’s mental health suffered over lockdown.

Although usually based in London, in May, Rosie returned to her family home in Donegal – initially planning to stay for five weeks. Seven months on, she’s found a renewed love for her local area.

“The community where I am here is so small,” she explains.

“I have a horse over here, and I’ve been doing loads of horseriding through these old backroads. My appreciation for where

“It doesn’t matter who you are, or what stage of your life you’re at – their lyrics are just so special, and so relatable.”

HP. AN.21 057

RE-WORKING of the YEAR

“I really struggled with my sense of identity, and I sunk. I didn’t know what the fuck was going on. But coming back home to Ireland really helped with that.”

I live has come back a thousand fold. Just being out, and able to observe where I live, has been really special. I feel like I’ve reconnected with that, and my surroundings.”

While she was in London, watching the pandemic start to unfold, she admits that she struggled with adjusting to the socalled ‘new normal’.

“I couldn’t keep up with how quickly people seemed to be adapting,” she reflects. “I’m really quite an introverted person, and things like livestreams and video interviews make me so nervous. Even the thought of it makes me sweat. And it seemed like everyone was jumping on livestreams, and doing these gigs, and connecting with their fans. It just derailed me.”

Like many artists, she also felt the pressure to use her newfound spare time productively.

“I have a pole-dancing pole in my room in London, and at the beginning I was like, ‘Yeah, I’m going to learn dances’,” she says. “So I learned dances. Then I was trying to write, and going through a phase of writing a song everyday. Then I just stopped and I was like, ‘What the fuck am I doing? Fuck this.

I’m not going to abide by this pressure that has come on so quickly, to try and create’. I realised I didn’t need to be seen to be creative, just to feel validated. I really had to slow down, and stop everything I was doing – because for me, it’s always a slow and steady kind of thing, when I’m creating my albums. My first album was created over the space of six years, so I need time.

I felt like everyone was rushing. It fucked me up, and I couldn’t deal with that pressure.”

058 HP. AN.21

“I was about to go in and record an album – and in hindsight, it’s so good that I didn’t,” she continues. “Even though it’s a really cool collection of songs, it isn’t me at the moment. So I really struggled with my sense of identity, and I sunk. I didn’t know what the fuck was going on. But coming back home to Ireland really helped with that. My mental health has fluctuated so much this year – it’s been exhausting. But I feel, if I hadn’t had come home, I probably wouldn’t have been able to do this Bends cover project. So I’ve definitely come out the other end of it, which is a relief – because shit was real for a second!”

By removing the pressure, Rosie has been inspired to start focusing on her next album – and breaking down her sound to its rawest roots.

“Something I’ve learned this year in my music, and something this album has taught me, is that less is more,” she says. “Keep things simple – that’s what I want to achieve. I don’t really know what the end goal of that will mean, but don’t want to overcomplicate my music. I’ve done that before. I am a folk artist – and I want to keep that element.

“Like the new Taylor Swift album, folklore,” she adds. “There’s nothing wrong with returning to your roots. There’s been such a stigma around folk. As the years have gone, it became quite uncool or something. But at the end of the day, especially in the dynamic of the times that we’re in, folk music is what’s really going to help us and heal us.”

• The Bends is out on December 11.

My 2020 Johnny Marr

Singer/ Songwriter Your hero of 2020?

Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez.

Villain of 2020?

Where to start? Rupert Murdoch, Cummings etc.

Best personal moment?

Recording the James Bond theme guitar for No Time To Die with the orchestra at Abbey Road.

Best Movie or TV show?

The Social Dilemma.

Best record?

A Hero’s Death by Fontaines DC.

Best book?

A Life Of Picasso by John Richardson.

Best thing you saw online?

Best personal moment?

Recording the James Bond theme guitar for No Time To Die with the orchestra at Abbey Road.

The Blindboy Podcast.

Your hope for next year?

Shows. Fans. People feeling better.

What tickled your funny bone?

The young woman losing it on Tik Tok-Youtube when the Trump administration mistakenly called the press conference at the Four Seasons landscaping yard instead of the Four Seasons hotel. I’d recommend anyone to watch it at least twice.

CHECK OUT THE VIDEO HERE:

• Johnny Marr plays The Big Park, Burnham, UK on July 23, 2021

HP. AN.21 059

Y&E YOUNG & EMERGING SERIES

JAFARIS @jafarismusic

STRAY MELODY @straymelody

JyellowL @jyellowl

milk. @milkthemusic

ROE @roemusic

SION HILL @sionhillmusic

CELAVIEDMAI @celaviedmai

JAMES BURNELL @jamesburnell_music

SODA BLONDE @sodablonde

TEBI REX @tebirexofficial

JORDAN O’KEEFE @jordanokeefeofficial

TARA LEE @taraleee

DOPPLER @dopplerireland

ANNA CARMODY @annacarmodyofficial

POWPIG @powpig

MARIA KELLY @mariakellymusic

HAPPYALONE @happyalonehappy

SYLK @sylkcollective

ÁINE CAHILL @_ainemusic

THE WINTER PASSING @thewinterpassing

ROISIN EL CHERIF @roisinelcherif

STATE LIGHTS @statelights

DENA ANUK$A @denaanuksa

CEN MANU @cen_manu

ULY @uly.mjm

CMAT @cmatbaby

JEORGE II @jeorgethesecond

DEA MATRONA @deamatronaband

JACK O’ROURKE @jackorourkemusic

JESS YOUNG @jessyoungmusic

With venues around the world shuttered due to the Covid-19 pandemic, 2020 was a year that shook the music industry to the core. While every musician was heavily impacted, it’s been particularly difficult for the acts that were just launching their careers – and hoping to build up their live profile. Rather than let all that phenomenal talent sit idle, we launched the Hot Press Lockdown Sessions’ Y&E Series! With the support of the Department of Tourism, Culture, Arts, Gaeltacht, Sport and Media, we were able to shine a light on some of the best young and emerging talent that Ireland has to offer in 2020 – with a brilliant selection of acts joining Hot Press on Instagram for special live-streamed performances. Here, we present a pictorial salute to the 120 acts who flew the flag for Irish music across the year with their Y&E Series performances. Thank you all for the wonderful music.

JANET DEVLIN @janetdevlinofficial

SAARLOOS @saarloosmusic

RACHAEL LAVELLE @rachaellavelle

GREYWIND @greywindband

SMOOTHBOI EZRA @captain.ezweee

SEAMUS HARTY @seamus_harty

ROBERT GRACE @robertgracemusic

JAY RONIC @jay.ronic

SAIGE @thisissaige

APRIL @themonthapril

GEMMA DUNLEAVY @gemmadunleavy_

FIA MOON @fia_moon

SOMEBODY’S CHILD @somebodyschildartist

7th OBI @7thobi

LEMONCELLO @lemoncelloireland

LUCY @lucymcwilliams_

ELINA FILICE @elinafilice

SOPHIE DOYLE RYDER @sophiedoyleryder

S E R I E S

MALAKI @malaki_dublin

STEO WALL @steowallmusic

NNIC @nnic.official

RYAN O’SHAUGHNESSY @ryan_acoustic

SIVE @sive_music

JOSHUA BURNSIDE @joshuaburnside

JC STEWART @jcstewart

NATHAN MAC @nathanmacmusic

EVANS JUNIOR @evansjuniior

CHERYM @cherymofficial

P R E S S

JACK RUA @jackruamusic

E M E R G I N G

H O T

CIARAN LAVERY @ciaranlavery

Y O U N G &

Y&E ROSIE BYRNE @rosiebyrnemusic

THE OCELOTS @theocelotsmusic

LLOYD JOHN @lloydjohn_

@sjswords & @garethqr

SJS AND GQR

BRENDAN MURRAY @brendanmurray96

PAJ @pajmahalia

MEGAN BURKE @meganburkemusic

SÍOMHA @siomhamusic

SON @soundsofson

LITTLE HOURS @littlehoursmusic

DELUSH @delushlife

TOLÜ MAKAY @tolu_makay

HARRY FENNELL @harry.fennell

RYAN MACK @ryanmackmusic

CLARE SANDS @claresandsmusic

TOYGIRL @toygirlband

NIAMH REGAN @niamhreganmusic

JACOB KOOPMAN @jakumaru

STOLEN CITY @stolen_city

WILD YOUTH @bandwildyouth

LILLA VARGEN @lillavargen

PADRAIG JACK @padraigjackmusic

LAOISE @laoisemusic

EVE BELLE @_evebelle_

AILSHA @ailshamusic

SPECIAL GUEST

MARTIN McDONNELL

OWEN RUA

PADRAIG CAHILL

JUNIOR BROTHER

DYLAN HARCOURT

@martin_mcdonnell_music

@owenruamusic

@padraigcahill_music

@junior.brother

@dylanharcourtmusic

AMY MONTGOMERY

AOIFE SCOTT @aoifescottmusic

JOHNNY BOURKE @johnnybourke

ZASKA @zaska.music

BRAD HEIDI @bradheidii

SAIBH SKELLY @saibhskellymusic

EMMA LANGFORD @emmalangfordmusic

KK LEWIS @_kklewis

JOEL HARKIN @joelharkin

TOMIKE @tomike_j

LARABELLE @larabelle._

PATRICIA LALOR @patricialalor_

AMY NAESSENS @amynaessensmusic

SHIV @hi_im_shiv

EOIN GLACKIN @eoinglackinmusic

LENII @bylenii

GRAHAM MITCHELL @grahammitchellmusic

IZO @izo_musicc

CAOILIAN SHERLOCK @caoiliansherlock

RACHEL MAE HANNON @rachelmaehannon

ELAINE MALONE @elai_malo

@siights

MICHELLE GRIMES @michellegrimesofficial

MATT MCGINN @mattmcginnmusic

GEORGE HUTTON @georgehuttonmusic

OSCAR BLUE @oscarblue

RACHEL GRACE @rachelgracemusicwx

REBECCA McREDMOND

EIZA MURPHY @eizamurphy

H O T

@amymontgomeryofficial

P R E S S Y O U N G & E M E R G I N G S E R I E S

SIIGHTS

SPECIAL GUEST GAVIN JAMES @gavinjameslive

@rebeccamcredmond_music

P A D D Y

!

R E P O W

064 HP. AN.21

C A U T I O N A RY TA L E o f t h e Y E A R

Julien Temple’s Crock Of Gold: A Few Rounds With Shane MacGowan film explains how the singer weaponised his Irishness with The Pogues. Bowie, Ray Davies, the Stones and Gerry Adams are also up for discussion as the legendary rock documentarian meets Stuart Clark.

PORTRAIT: ANDREW CATLIN

T

“If you want Paddy, I’ll give you fucking Paddy!” hat was the mission statement in 1982 when, having previously fronted punkabillies The Nipple Erectors, Shane MacGowan came up with the equally offensive Pogue Mahone as the name for the new band he formed with Jem Finer, Spider Stacy and James Fearnley.

Taken aged six from the rural idyll of Tipperary and plonked in an unwelcoming part of London where ‘No Dogs, No Blacks, No Dogs’ signs were still commonplace, the then 25-year-old Shane had decided to weaponise his Irishness.

While not exactly the tin whistle arm of the IRA, there was a strong nationalistic zeal about Mr. and Mrs. MacGowan’s eldest, which manifested itself in his writing of 1988’s hugely controversial ‘Streets Of Sorrow/ Birmingham Six’.

Partial to a pint of plain since before his First Communion – one of his aunties fed him pints as a reward for getting up and singing in pubs – Shane made sure that this fucking Paddy came with a keen intellect and choruses big enough to fill Madison Square Garden.

For English rock ‘n’ roll documentarian Julien Temple, it wasn’t a case of if but when he’d point his camera at this errant son of Erin who he’d first encountered in 1976 when he was known to the punkeratti as Shane O’Hooligan.

“I was actually the first person to do an interview with Shane, which is in the film,” Temple says proudly. “When you became a punk rocker in ’76 the first thing you had to do was put peroxide on your hair and go blonde – and some people, like Shane, did it with more peroxide than others! It kind of waned a bit but early on a lot of those guys had that sort of Marlon Brando/Julius Ceasar look.

“Sid Vicious had been King of the Crowd – those legendary Sex Pistols gigs weren’t really rock ‘n’ roll shows, but theatrical madness where the audience was as important as the band – but when Sid actually joined the Pistols there was a vacancy that Shane filled. If you were filming those early Clash and Pistols gigs, your camera would pan across the crowd and end on Shane and stay there ‘cause you just felt this sense of him absorbing all the energy and the meaning of it and the life-changing challenges that it spat out.”

Shane told me in no uncertain terms to “Fuck off!” when I mentioned Shane O’Hooligan’s wearing of a Union Jack shirt, which didn’t appear ironic at the time but probably was.

“I once said to him, ‘I think you’ve still got a little punk

in you’ and he went, ‘Fucking punk, I’m not a punk, don’t call me a punk, you Brit bastard’, but he obviously does,” Julien reflects. “That time was indelibly stamped on him.

Many people who went through it became better versions of themselves. Everyone in the early scene had different ideas of what punk meant, which was great because it was about individual trips and journeys; it wasn’t about conformism and leather jackets and studs and all the bollocks it became afterwards. The original thing was ‘be yourself.’”

Having previously zoomed in on the Sex Pistols, The Clash, Ray Davies, Dr. Feelgood, Keith Richards and David Bowie, Julien is used to working with big, sometimes dysfunctional personalities. Even so, Shane presented unique challenges.

“It’s the most difficult film I’ve done because Shane is by definition difficult. I can see that a film, which shows your whole life before you is going to be unsettling and weird and raw, and it’s never going to be right because it’s two hours some idiot’s put together. I totally understand his resistance towards being interviewed for it.”

In one toe-curlingly awkward scene, Bobby Gillespie’s innocuous enquiry viz-à-vis when Shane first came to

“It’s the most difficult film I’ve done because Shane is by definition difficult.”

London is met with a hissed “Stop interrogating me!”

“Yeah, he goes for Bobby’s jugular,” Julien laughs. “He was very gracious to let it all stay in, Bobby. He holds his own but it does show you the aggressive side of Shane, which is a big part of it.

“He’s a prickly character but I’ve always found that difficult people are the best people because they’re defending their creativity. There are elements of spoiled rock star in him – you can’t go through the adulation without having some sort of damage on that front – but at times he tried very hard to keep it under control. The fact he’s difficult, and we had to find other ways of telling the story, made a better film than if he’d said, ‘Yes, I’ll tell you everything’ in one go.”

The only time during Crock Of Gold when Shane can be accused of good behaviour is when Gerry Adams takes over the questioning. The cackling MacGowan bravado is replaced by puppy dog adoration as Gerry recalls how he passed on Shane’s ‘Tiochfaidh ár lá!” to Tony Blair during the Good Friday Agreement negotiations. Whose idea was it to bring him in?

“I don’t know who exactly, but it was one of his people.

HP. AN.21 065

 (clockwise from top) Shane with Johnny Depp; Julien Temple; Shane; Keith Richards; David Bowie; Gerry Adams; Sex Pistols

“I found Gerry Adams very charming and gentle and good with Shane.” he doesn’t fascinate me in the same way that Ray Davies or Shane somehow do. Johnny’s too nice a man and not difficult enough!”

Having not caught up with him properly since their shared punk days, was Julien shocked by Shane’s state of health?

“Yeah, it reminded me of Sid Vicious actually,” he sighs.

“I was slightly like, ‘In the position he’s in does he want to make a film?’ I’m sure there’s anger about being in a wheelchair, but his mind and his mental acuity is still as sharp as ever. He’s very aware of his limits and, actually, when you’re with him, he’s drinking but you realise it’s just a sip. He’s not glogging it, it’s a little top-up. It’s the other stuff that’s more dangerous. I think he’s reining it in.

“It’s definitely among other things a cautionary tale, but not in a banging-you-over-the-head-with-it way. Let that come out of the film rather than making a statement. He’s survived for like how many years, though? People were saying, ‘He’s gonna be dead’ in 1976. The guy’s nothing but an amazing specimen.”

The sense of London Irishness has receded since the Pogues formed, largely due to Ulster finally saying “Yes!” and the Good Friday accord being struck.

“Yeah, going into Kilburn or Camden Town during the ‘70s you were immediately aware of that culture, but it’s far less visible now. I guess it’s been absorbed or people have gone back to Ireland with the economic situations changing. The contradictions in Shane are what make him great. He’s such an Irish soul but he speaks with a London

JULIEN TEMPLE BY STEPHEN ORGAN

066 HP. AN.21

Gerry obviously had a pre-existing relationship with Shane and it’s a conversation with an old mate he looks up to rather than a stilted interview.”

It strikes me that Gerry Adams was the kind of rock star revolutionary that The Clash so desperately wanted to be.

“Well, I suppose so,” Julien says sounding not entirely convinced of the analogy. “I found Gerry Adams very charming and gentle and good with Shane the time I met him – and full of interesting insights. It’s good for English kids to get an Irish perspective on the history between the two countries, and Shane has obviously been a great proclaimer of that.”

To help bankroll his seven night a week gig, booze and amphetamine lifestyle – it’s the cheap speed that did for his choppers – Shane used to dispense hand-jobs for a tenner a time in the seedy parts of Central London described with unflinching detail in The Pogues’ ‘Old Main Drag’.

“Well, that was a big part of pop music at that time,” Temple reflects. “Boy George was there and the punk thing was connected with that kind of underworld sexuality including the MP whipping sessions and all of that. It was a bizarre time where that darkness weirdly coincided with the youth culture and the pop charts. The whole punk thing was centred on Soho and it was very much in your face.”

Another of the Crock Of Gold interviewers is Johnny Depp who’s also listed as one of the producers. Given his recent legal travails, how hands-on was he able to be?

“Well, he stopped the boat from capsizing on a few occasions (financially),” Julien reveals. “In situations like that you need someone whose voice really carries weight in the industry and Johnny’s certainly does.”

Would he be interested in making an, if you will, Deppumentary?

“Errrrrm. I don’t find it… uuuuuuhm. No, not necessarily.

I like him as a friend more than anything. I admire him but

C A U T I O N A RY TA L E o f t h e Y E A R

“Johnny Depp stopped the boat from capsizing on a few occasions.”

;SHANE 1986 BY ANDREW CATLIN; KEITH BY JANE ROSE/NETFLIX

accent. He’s a public schoolboy and a street punk. These are the things that make people have their own unique take on things.”

There’s a very poignant moment in the film when Shane says, “I wish I could write songs like I used to.” Does Julien think he mourns for the records he never got to make?

“I think by that he means the ease with which he came up with songs. He could write them and throw them away – and write another one at a certain point. I feel that’s the same with Ray Davies and Keith and Mick Jagger. When they were young it seemed to flow out of them, didn’t it? But it’s hard for them now to confront their own body of work without second guessing it. Like everyone of that status you’re faced with, ‘Can I do better than I’ve done before; am I going to be judged by songs that are very hard to top?’”

At the height of their success a friend of mine was commissioned to write a Pogues biography, but returned the advance when they realised they’d either have to leave parts of the story out or delve into some really dark stuff. Did Temple hit that same wall of darkness and have to pull back?

“I was aware of what could’ve gone on at times in the late ‘90s and early 2000s,” he says picking his words carefully.

“There wasn’t much evidence of it on film, really. People claimed to film it but it was all lost. I’m sure there was real darkness there. I think you get a sense of hinting at it. I’m not into glamourising that sort of stuff, so I didn’t particularly need to go there. I’m not sure you have time in a film like this to properly explore that because I want to celebrate the guy without whitewashing him. His fans would rightly stick your head on the gates of Dublin Castle if you did that.”

Was it a conscious decision not to involve any of the other Pogues in the making of the film?

“No, we extended invitations to them but they declined. I don’t know why that is, but obviously the band have a history and you’d have to ask them why they didn’t honour it. Again, I’m glad in a way because it takes away from the rockumentary thing I hate so much. I prefer to see music as a window into

people’s souls rather than the story of a band and when they recorded this and that, and which mixing desks they used.”

Crock Of Gold’s most reliable witness is Shane’s younger sister Siobhan, herself a fine singer, who looks haunted by the fact her brother could die tomorrow. What did Temple make of her?

“She has the MacGowan gift of the gab,” he smiles. “She speaks so insightfully and with such clarity. Shane is wrapped in self-mythology; that’s part of the job description. So to have someone who can, with respect and love, give another perspective on it was a key part of the film. She obviously grew up with him and saw the evolution of his extraordinary personality. And she is worried about him. There’s a tragedy about Shane and a triumph; these things co-exist.”

Johnny Depp is a massive ‘no’, but is there anyone from, say, the hip-hop world Temple would like to give the documentary treatment?

“Skepta and Stormzy are really emblematic of now, but like Steve McQueen with Mangrove, it should be a black kid that does that with them, not some old fart like me,” he notes.

Sticking with the journalistic tradition of asking the hardest question last, who’s the most charismatic person he’s pointed a camera at?

“That is so hard because charisma comes in and manifests itself in so many forms,” Temple answers. “Sometimes understated charisma is more powerful than overt charisma.

You’ve got dark charisma; you’ve got upbeat charisma. But whatever form it comes in it’s still pretty intoxicating. Mick Jagger is hugely charismatic, but in a completely different way to Ray Davies who’s far more internalised but brilliant and funny as well. Keith Richards drips charisma. David Bowie was born in a charisma waterfall.”

We don’t have bad jobs, do we?

“No, we lived in a good time, so were lucky.”

• Shane MacGowan: A Crock Of Gold is in selected Irish cinemas and on VOD now.

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2020

PHOTOS OF THE YEAR

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P H O T O S of the Y E A R

(clockwise from opposite) Stay Safe by Miguel Ruiz; David Keenan in the Olympia Theatre in January by Danni Fro; DEA MATRONA at Whelan's Ones To Watch by Ingrid Angulo.

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P H O T O S of the Y E A R

(top row) Hot Press & Southern Comfort Carnival Spirit in February by Miguel Ruiz; Lennon Stella in the Olympia in February by Ava Holtzman; Lewis Capaldi in 3 Arena in March by Danni Fro; The 1975 in 3Arena in March by Danni Fro (bottom row) Shaefri playing the Lockdown Sessions by Miguel Ruiz; Black Lives Matter protest in Dublin in June by Miguel Ruiz; Fontaines D.C. for Rock Against Homelessness in the Olympia in March by Brenna Ransden.

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P H O T O S of the Y E A R

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P H O T O S of the Y E A R

(top row) Dublin keeps on smiling during lockdown by Karen Kelleher; Dublin in Level 3

by Miguel Ruiz; Pillow Queens by Miguel Ruiz; Uly FaceTime by Miguel Ruiz (bottom row) Professor Luke O'Neill by Miguel Ruiz in November; masked up on the Limerick train by Miguel Ruiz; Level 5 sign of the times by Miguel Ruiz; and JyellowL at Swords Castle in November by Miguel Ruiz.

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P H O T O S of the Y E A R

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“By the time I started writing these essays – two or three years ago – I was in my forties and I had a lot to say.”

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E S S AY I S T o f t h e Y E A R

It Was A Fine Idea At The Time…

Newspaperman Patrick Freyne delivered one of the Irish non-fiction books of the year with OK, Let’s Do Your Stupid Idea. It’s a “mix of the funny and the personal,” he tells Pat Carty.

PHOTO: CHRIS MADDALONI

P

atrick Freyne – reared, in part,

by Hot Press and now columnist and feature writer with the Irish Times.

Sniff, they grow up so fast! – took a step away from the paper of record in 2020 with his first book, a collection of personal essays entitled OK, Let’s Do Your Stupid Idea. The notion to explore this far from foolish scheme had been knocking around for a while.

“It had been in the back of my mind for ages,” Patrick tells me, as we ‘hang out’ on Zoom. “I love things like Clive James and a book that had a big impact on me was 45 by Bill Drummond, so personal essays, funny writing, and kind of self-mythology. In more recent years, I really liked that wave of really good female Irish essayists like Emily Pine and Sinead Gleeson. I wrote a mix of funny and personal ‘deep’ stuff.”

It is different to the more objective fare that Freyne’s admirers will be familiar with from his day job.

“I think it is because I’d never written about myself as a journalist, I don’t tend to write opinion journalism, I don’t tend to write about my life. Like you, I’m either interviewing people, or writing about culture. By the time I started writing these essays – two or three years ago – I was in my forties and I had a lot to say.”

Freyne’s father, who used to train the Army Rangers and would possibly make even Chuck Norris think twice, looms large over the earlier part of the book and seems like a thoroughly decent chap. One might have thought he’d be looking at his arty offspring and shaking a bewildered head, but this was not the case.

“Kind of counter intuitively, for a tough army man, he was surprisingly supportive, at least to other people it’s surprising,” Freyne remembers. “At home he was quite a maternal figure, he cooked and cleaned and changed nappies, but when he’d be training the army, he was like the Sergeant Major from Full Metal Jacket. He gave us a complex version of masculinity, I got a sense that masculinity is a form of drag, like he was going out and performing his masculinity.

He had quite an evolved attitude, although my Mam would say she beat it into him, she would have been coming from quite a feminist background.”

He Came Third Or Fourth…

Speaking of ‘versions of masculinity’, Freyne warmed the heart of a small town boy like myself who had no interest with

his assertion in the book that “sport is just stupid.” Those who didn’t live for the game, back in the day, were conferred with outsider status by default.

“Yeah, totally,” he agrees. “I pretended for ages. I’m big, so I was sort of useful – put him in a fullback position and he might fall on someone. You were either a sports or a music person. When Oasis came along, we’d be touring England [Freyne was the handsome one in ‘90s indie gang, The National Prayer Breakfast] and we were surprised to find people in bands that actually liked sports. When we started, the music scene was made up of the leftovers, who didn’t like sports.”

Or were shite at it?

“Oh yes,” he adds. “And I added an extra problem because I don’t even know if I was capable of being good because I was so disinterested.”

I’m Not Sure If I Am Laughing Or Crying…

Freyne’s writing has the ability to touch as well as tickle. The essay on his time as a carer is particularly moving and his ruminations on mental health and not having children are almost jarring in their honesty.

“The ‘Brain Fever’ essay about mental health is one of the first ones I wrote. I started writing that ages ago and put it aside. I was still too raw, and writing about your mental health when you’re in a bad patch isn’t a great idea. I think it works because I came back to it with a bit of safety and objectivity.”

“Those were essays that required more thought and more work and more drafts,” he explains. “You’re conscious that some of the readers will have experiences of these things, and may be raw themselves. You can still present it with jokes but you should be taking seriously what someone else might be going through.”

Did Freyne’s better half, journalist and author Anna Carey, object to the discussion about having children?

“Anna didn’t have any changes she wanted to make,” says Freyne. “I think that’s ‘cause we’re in the same place with a lot of it, and we talk about it.”

We should add here that there are essays about being pissed in Germany with his mates, and a guffaw-out-loud one about jumping out of a plane, to balance things up.

“They were fun to write in a very straightforward way. The process of writing essays about care work or not having kids was partly working out my take on it, how I feel about it.

I’m not sure if there’s an underlying theme to the parachute story, my purpose with that was to make people laugh. My guiding principle was that the essays had to be entertaining or helpful, or both.”

• OK, Let’s Do Your Stupid Idea is published by Penguin Books Ireland.

HP. AN.21 075

FESTIVE DRINKS SPECIAL

We Whiskey You A Merry Xmas & A Happy New Beer!

No cockle will be left un-warmed as we guide you through the pick of the festive Irish tipples. Sláinte!

Words Stuart Clark

G

iven the travails of the past twelve months, we’re extra entitled to enjoy a cup or three of cheer this holiday season.

As a wise beer man once said to me, “The key is to drink less but better”, which is where this Hot Press Festive Drinks Special comes in handy.

As we’ve been saying for many a year, the quality of the beer, cider, whiskey and other spirits being produced with much love on this island is off the scale.

With so many of their traditional outlets having to pull the shutters down, some never to return, brewers and distillers came up with innovative new ways of getting their products out there.

One of the funnest nights in we had during Lockdown Part 1 – thankfully, it’s

076 HP. AN.21

not an oxymoron – was the online Twitter tasting party thrown by Lambay Whiskey who got the renowned Steve Rush from @ TheWhiskyWire to guide us through their award-winning Small Batch Blend and Single Malt bottlings.

We’ve also been loving our nightly nip of Grace O’Malley, the rock ‘n’ roll-inclined whiskey brand that very kindly sponsored the first series of the Hot Press Lockdown Sessions.

A gold medal winner at the Spirits Business Irish Whiskey Masters – “The whiskey I’ve been waiting for,” enthused competition chair Karen Taylor – it not only tastes great but looks impossibly cool in its leather-bound decanter special edition for Christmas. We’re also very partial to Grace’s Irish Gin, another Spirits Business gold medalist, which is perfect for festive cocktail-making and smooth enough to sip

on its own.

The Dubliner Irish Whiskey has collaborated with local artist Sketchy Inc on their limited-edition Christmas gift-box, which weaves The Liberties, The Custom House, the Poolbeg Chimneys, Phil Lynott and James Joyce into a festive tableau.

“This was a dream project for me,” Sketchy Inc says. “The Dubliner Irish Whiskey and I both share a love for the city, and wanted to capture the spirit of it so that we can share it with you.”

A delicious 40% blend of malt and grain whiskey, aged for three years in bourbon casks, The Dubliner Irish Whiskey is available across the capital in Tesco and Dunnes Stores.

Meanwhile, Walsh Whiskey in Carlow didn’t let Covid get in the way of them raising a whopping €16,000 for the Jack & Jill Children’s Foundation’s provision of

FESTIVE DRINKS SPECIAL 1,000 homecare hours for seriously ill kids under five and their families.

They’ve also warmed our hearts with the latest release of Writers’ Tears, AKA the Dram of Dreamers, which is all sorts of wonderful and should be standard issue for us journalists. Look out for it and their other seasonal releases.

Proudly independent and Irish are Kinnegar, one of the craft beer heavy hitters who are the only brewery we know of that have their own branded table lamps and cushions amongst the goodies available from kinnegarbrewing.ie/shop.

They’re the sort of 4AD of breweries in that everything bearing their distinctive running rabbit logo is worth checking out.

We’ve an extra special place in our hearts for their 4.8% Yannaroddy Porter, a gold medal winner at the highly prestigious Brussels Beer Challenge and a real winter sat-in-front-of-the-fire sipper.

Also striking Brussels gold this month were Kinnegar’s Black Bucket Black Rye IPA, Donegal Lager and Thumper Double IPA. One of the newest breweries on the block is D8 Beers who’ve commandeered the Thomas House bar for the making of their Winter Ale, an 8% Christmas seasonal with hints of honeycomb, caramel, dried fruits, biscuit and orange zest.

All of the proceeds from it are going to My Lovely Horse Rescue, the animal

A NEW

welfare charity run by Cathy Davey and her partner Neil Hannon who, courtesy of his Father Ted Song For Europe classic, is responsible for the name. December 18 finds them joined by an array of special guests for a festive knees-up in Camden Studios, which will be broadcast on Facebook Live from 8pm.

To swell their coffers order your Winter Ale direct from d8beers.com and tell them Hot Press sent you.

Also on our Christmas craft beer radar are Wicklow Wolf’s Peanut Butter Cup Imperial Stout; White Hag’s Noel Egg Nog Pale Ale; Dungarvan’s legendary Coffee & Oatmeal Stout; Eight Degrees’ Sherry BA Belgian Tripel; and a really sensational Winter Seasonal Red IPA from Hope Brewing, which has been our go-to session ale for the past few weeks.

If you need another stocking-filler for the beer nut in your life, Early Bird tickets have been released for the second Fidelity Beer Festival, which fingers crossed will be held on July 16 and 17 in the Dublin Mansion House. Brought to you by the nice people from Whiplash brewing, day entry is €62.50, which covers all, yes all, of the fine beers you’ll get to sample. Hit them up at fidelity.beer., Wherever you are; whoever you’re with; and whatever you’re drinking to this Christmas, have a great one!

A NEW

A NEW

Malt Irish Whiskey with a Cognac Cask Finish

Malt Irish Whiskey with a Cognac Cask Finish

Malt Irish Whiskey with a Cognac Cask Finish

lambay Malt NM+Puff No ill 180x133mm.indd 1

HP. AN.21 077 28/10/2020 17:20

FESTIVE DRINKS SPECIAL

SIP SIP HOORAY! Step this way for great festive drink ideas including a couple of extremely cheeky cocktails!

LAMBAY IRISH WHISKEY KINNEGAR BREWING

CROSSROADS AMERICAN-STYLE IPA (6.2%) Kinnegar’s roots may be embedded in the hilly fields and farms of northeast Donegal on Ireland’s Wild Atlantic Way, but their Crossroads IPA draws inspiration from the West Coast of America! Rich in citrus and tropical fruit flavours, this classic IPA is designed for those who value a clean hop profile – perfectly supported by a good malt backbone.

Kinnegar pair brewing tradition with a contemporary sense of adventure, to produce clean, crisp, full-flavoured beers. Crossroads is available both as a 500ml bottle and a 440ml can.

lambaywhiskey.com

There’s a story behind the taste of Lambay Irish Whiskey. Lambay Island is just three miles off the coast of Dublin, Ireland. This small and historically strategic island is a story in itself, with many intriguing tales of dynasty and allegiances to explore. Most importantly, it is the home of a fine Irish whiskey that is inspired by the natural beauty of this fascinating place.

Launched in 2018, Lambay Whiskey is an independent whiskey company that blends and bottles its own unique whiskey.

Lambay Irish Whiskey takes the blending and expertise deployed in making great Cognac, and combines that with centuries-old Irish distilling knowledge. The result is Lambay Whiskey: a unique craft Irish whiskey from a very special place, with a marvellous, distinctive taste.

WINTER WARMER

As winter approaches we return indoors and seek comfort in delicious seasonal drinks, and the folks at Lambay Whiskey have shared this easy-to-make at home hot drink infusion.

Whether you make up a large batch for family gatherings or simply a warming punch at the end of a long cold day, Lambay Small Batch Blend makes the perfect hot punch to warm the cockles of your heart throughout the festive season.

INGREDIENTS

• 50 ml Lambay Whiskey Small Batch Blend • 10 ml Port • 120ml Hot Apple Mix (Cloudy Apple Juice, Cinnamon, Nutmeg, Cardamom, Pinch Salt)

METHOD

For the hot apple mix for one: Add 150ml cloudy apple juice into a pan, add low heat until simmering, next add a pinch of salt, 1 cardamom pod, and large pinch of nutmeg. Let simmer for 5 minutes then turn off the heat and add 1/2 cinnamon to a cooling liquid. Let sit for 5 minutes, then strain.

For the drink: In your glass add 50ml Lambay Small Batch Blend, 10ml Port, and Hot Apple Mix. Garnish with a cinnamon stick.

KINNEGAR BREWING YANNARODDY PORTER (4.8%)

Symbol of authenticity BUY LOCAL IRISH BEER Beer that carries this mark has been brewed in a genuinely Independent Irish Microbrewery.

Learn more: www.icbi.ie/symbol 078 HP. AN.21

Rich in traditional dark roasted malt flavours, and laced with an exotic streak of coconut, Kinnegar’s Yannaroddy Porter was the worthy winner of the 2019 Brussels Beer Challenge gold medal. With a surprisingly light profile that delivers rich and complex flavours, you can find Yannaroddy in both a 500ml bottle and a 440ml can.

Originally based in Rathmullan in Co. Donegal, Kinnegar Brewing commissioned K2 in 2017 – a state-of-the-art facility in Letterkenny. While the clinking of bottles coming off their line no longer mingles with the bleating of sheep from the surrounding fields, the farmhouse ethos at the core of their work remains unchanged.

FESTIVE DRINKS SPECIAL

GRACE O’MALLEY BLENDED IRISH WHISKEY graceomalleywhiskey.com.

DASHING THROUGH THE SNOW! GRACE O’MALLEY HEATHER INFUSED IRISH GIN graceomalleywhiskey.com.

Grace O’Malley Irish Spirits began their journey with Blended Irish Whiskey, but their gin has a reputation for excellence of its own. Rounded and balanced, Grace O’Malley Heather Infused Irish Gin is made with modern distillation techniques to deliver true taste intensity and a wonderfully fresh, floral finish.

The Grace O’Malley Heather Infused Irish Gin features a total of 14 botanicals, with defining aromatics from the West of Ireland, including wild thyme, red clover, blackthorn, fraughan and rock samphire. Heather grows in abundance along the Atlantic Coast and gives the gin its flavour.

The Dubliner Irish Whiskey gifts us this fabulous winter warmer of a cocktail

THE LAST ONE BEFORE TOWN • 50ml Dubliner Bourbon • 50ml Pink grapefruit juice • 15ml Sugar syrup • 2 dashes of Angostura bitters • Top up with soda water Garnish: rosemary

METHOD

Add all ingredients in glass over ice. Stir tenderly, ooh. Give the rosemary a slap and add as garnish.

Glassware: Highball/ tall glass

If you’re looking to boost local businesses this winter, look no further than Grace O’Malley Irish Spirits. Dedicated to the infamous 16th century Irish pirate queen of the same name, the brand ensures that flavour and the story itself remains at the heart of its products.

We can’t think of a better treat than liquid gold in the form of Grace O’Malley’s delicious, premium whiskey. A special blend of triple and double distilled malt and grain whiskeys, each batch of Grace O’Malley’s Blended Irish Whiskey is aged perfectly in different barrel types.

With fruit overtones in its palate and a finish that delivers toasted notes with Middle Eastern pastry and sweet spice, Grace O’Malley’s Blended Irish Whiskey is perfect for festive celebrations.

The Dubliner Irish Whiskey limited edition gift pack, in collaboration with SKETCHY INC. A love letter to the greatest city on earth.

The Dubliner Irish Whiskey, part of the Dublin Liberties Distillery, in the heart of D8.

New Limited Edition Gift Box now available across Dublin stores in Tesco Ireland and Dunnes Stores.

HP. AN.21 079

The Ryan Line Is Open

Having just landed Novel of the Year at the Irish Book Awards for the stunning Strange Flowers, Donal Ryan talks about its origins, his love of Margaret Atwood’s work, and why he isn’t planning on writing the great Covid novel.

Interview: Paul Nolan PORTRAIT: ANTHONY WOODS

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D

onal Ryan is most definitely ending the year on a high, having scooped the prestigious Novel of the Year gong at the recent An Post Irish Book Awards for his latest offering, Strange Flowers. It maintains a longrunning hot streak for the 44-yearold Tipp author, who has twice been longlisted for the Booker, and who also won the Guardian First Book Award for his 2012 debut The Spinning Heart.

Strange Flowers tells the powerful and affecting story of Moll Gladney, a young woman who disappears from her home in ’70s rural Tipp, only to reappear five years later. As the story delves into the reasons behind Moll’s disappearance, Ryan also examines

Irish life and society and that time.

Scooping one of the main prizes at the Irish Book Awards – which was voted for by readers – was the icing on the cake for a novel that had already enjoyed a very positive critical reception. More generally, how has Ryan found 2020?

“It’s been fine, I can’t complain really,” he replies. “It’s been so fucking horrific for so many people. Luckily, I’ve been insulated from most of the worst of it. Really, the only difference was that I wasn’t on the road very much with the book. Other than that, it was business as usual really. Writing is a fairly insular, isolated kind of profession anyway. It didn’t make too much difference to the writing, other than it went a bit slower for some reason – a common complaint for most people this year.”

With an unexplained disappearance setting up the narrative of Strange

NOVEL of the YEAR

“I don’t think anyone wants to pick up a book of mine next year, or the year after, and read about masks and fucking quarantine.”

Flowers, Ryan was exploring the kind of haunting scenario we read about all too regularly in the news.

“It is a haunting idea,” he nods. “It’s embedded in all our imaginations as Irish people particularly, because of that spate of disappearances. I think of that a lot – how bloody horrific it must be for the families. But the manner of Moll’s disappearance in the book is kind of taken from a story I remember being told about my own parish. A neighbour of my grandparents, a really nice young guy in his twenties, came down and did some work for my grandmother one day.

“I remember being told the guy refused to take payment – I don’t know what he was doing for her exactly, it was something around their small little holding. My grandmother chased him back up the boreen to pay him, but he wouldn’t take the money off her, and the next day he went to England and was never heard of again.

“I often think about that, this guy who just disappeared off the face of the earth. A really nice, loving guy who was great with his family and everything – but what the hell happened to him?

I couldn’t bear to write a book where someone disappears and their fate isn’t explained at the end. So I had to bring Moll back pretty quick.”

Does Ryan see her as a character who suffers because of the social attitudes of the era?

“I guess so,” he responds. “Obviously, in the mid-’70s, she wasn’t going to come out and say, this is what I am, because she hasn’t got that strength. You would have had to be very strong to make the declarations that Moll would have had to make, in order to live her own life in that place in the ’70s. So to leave and go somewhere cosmopolitan – somewhere she could be anonymous – made sense for her. That’s really it I guess.

“When you start to dig deeply into why a character’s a certain way – I mean, why is anyone who they are, really? Why are any of us the way we are? We’re not necessarily products of our environment: we’re born with a certain way of living, a certain way of seeing the world, and that’s informed by our environment and what happens to us. But you kind of are who you are, really.”

For those of us who remember back to the ’80s and further beyond in Ireland, there is a sense it was a more monochrome time before the technicolour ’90s arrived.

“Well, I was born in ‘76, so I grew up in the ’80s as well,” says Donal. “In my recollection, the difference between the ’80s and ’90s is stark.

The world just seemed to open up in the ’90s – it seemed to get bigger and smaller at once, it was strange. The way we communicated changed drastically around the middle of the decade: in ’97/’98, every single person in the country, or the world it seemed, had a mobile phone. This communication revolution took place.

“But I mean, in the ’80s, I never try to describe a whole country, or to homogenise a group of people – you’re at nothing trying that. These are particular people. Maybe I’m just lucky enough to be from a very quiet, gentle place where most people seemed kind. I don’t remember experiencing the worst excesses of the theocracy that people suffered from. But again, I was insulated from it, I wasn’t in a position someone

like Moll might have been.”

As Nabokov once opined, critics have a terrible habit of asking “What is the author trying to say?”

I wonder how the current trend towards hyperdevoted fandom and author interactions on social media plays with those writers who simply want to let the work speak for itself.

“Yeah, to be honest, when I hear writers talking about their books, it fucking ruins the book for me!” laughs Donal. “I’m happy to do interviews, but I don’t really want to say to a reader, this is what I was thinking, this is what I want you to see, this is my message. The story just kind is the way it is. You read these reviews and they go into these complex concepts about literature, and they ascribe all these noble motivations I didn’t necessarily have. And sometimes it sounds great, and sometimes it’s a bit terrifying – you’re thinking, Jesus!”

In terms of formative influences, Ryan cites the likes of Roddy Doyle, Doris Lessing and Margaret Atwood, the latter of whom has enjoyed a real cultural moment in recent times thanks to the stellar TV adaptation of The Handmaid’s Tale.

“My mum always bought Margaret Atwood books,” reflects Ryan. “She’s kind of a hero to writers, because she can do anything. She can do historical fiction, she can do sci-fi. She’s a poet and everything she writes just seems so right. It seems to have always existed, it’s amazing.”

After a brief chat about the best books Donal has read this year (“Stephen Sexton’s poetry collection If All The World And Love Were Young is a thing of immense beauty and power”), talk turns to 2021.

Thankfully, news of a vaccine rollout means we end 2020 on a badly needed note of optimism.

As for the idea of tackling the Covid era in fiction, Ryan says he’ll be giving it a wide berth for the foreseeable future.

“I have a novel written at the moment,” he notes.

“There’s a draft ready to go into my editor in the next few weeks. The book is set in the present day; it’s clear it’s a guy narrating his life story in the current time. And I’m thinking, okay, I really should go back now and write in Covid, and have his neighbours calling in and wearing masks – and I can’t do it.

“I’m just gonna set it in 2019. I don’t think anyone would thank me for it, to be honest. I don’t think anyone wants to pick up a book of mine next year, or the year after, and read about masks and fucking quarantine and that kind of stuff.”

• Strange Flowers is out now, published by Lilliput Press.

HP. AN.21 081

TALK ON THE WILD SIDE

Niall Horan

It was a year unlike any other - but one thing that didn’t change was the amount of good quote in Hot Press, from the profound and insightful to the funny, offbeat and just plain outrageous. Compiled by Paul Nolan

MUSIC If you love someone, you’re living in risk because your heart can be confiscated at any moment. But it’s the element of danger that excites us.

David Keenan I wanted to show an awareness of certain things people don’t like to talk about openly, like mental health.

Malaki

“Playing to 80,000 fucking people at Croke Park was one of the best nights of my life.”

NIALL HORAN

The best thing you can do is work as hard as you can every day, because you don’t know what could happen. That’s the best attitude to have.

Lilla Vargen

I knew that a lot of money had been spent on me, and I had to learn that in the end you’re a product.

Luan Parle

Elton John - sorry Sir Elton John saying nice things about us was totally fucking surreal.

Inhaler’s Robert Keating

There’s a kind of alchemy that happens when you bring really good musicians together in a room.

The Gloaming’s Martin Hayes

There comes this point where it’s taking a moment just to try and imagine things from someone else’s perspective.

Kitt Philippa

I feel very lucky to be a musician who plies his trade in Ireland when I’m looking around now, and seeing the variety of music coming out of this country. For so long it wasn’t like that it was so one-dimensional.

Cry Monster Cry’s Richie Martin

I’ve actually thought of engaging more with traditional Irish folk in my songwriting.

Hozier For me, it’s a case that I’m a grateful we’re playing music and that I get to be in this band.

Sleater Kinney’s Corin Tucker

082 HP. AN.21

Celaviedmai

Gerry Cinnamon

Country music is about storytelling, which I reckon is one of the reasons that music is so popular in Ireland.

Paul Heaton I’ve never been - whilst I’ve been in The 1975 - a guy at fucking Soho House doing cocaine until five in the morning

Rina Sawayama

QUOTES of the YEAR

Beabadoobee

R EEFER M A DNE S S Pat Kenny: Final question to you both - honest answer: have you ever taken illegal drugs in any shape form?

Leo Varadkar: You know, I answered that question in a H ot Press interview about 12 or 13 years ago, and I answered it truthfully.

Pat Kenny: Which is?

Leo Varadkar: Yes, but it was obviously a long time ago.

The exchange during the Virgin Media leaders’ debate that caused a major scandal during the general election

Pheobe Bridgers

“I’m just blown away by Christy Dignam.”

GERRY CINNAMON

and coming home drunk. Like, I used to do smack by myself. That was my vibe.

Matty Healy I’m just blown away by Christy Dignam.

Gerry Cinnamon It goes through this angry stage, which turns into more of a confident, selfloving phase.

Rina Sawayama

Gregory Porter

Gemma Dunleavy

I can’t go on TV with my hair not looking how it would naturally, because that’s not the example I want to set for little girls who are like me!

Celeste

“I was breathing the frustration of my community being meddled with.”

DUBLIN R&B STAR GEMMA DUNLEAVY

Slash on Rory Gallagher I like things that are cute and scary at the same time.

Phoebe Bridgers My dad read me Spike Milligan as a kid, and he’d act out each poem.

Imelda May In Irish hip-hop, we have a lot of people who want to emulate other cultures which are similar to theirs.

JYellowL We’ll have released two albums I’m really proud of before my 25th birthday.

Fontaines D.C.’s Grian Chatten Lockdown is the first time I have really gotten to chill and focus on myself and what I want to do with my music.

Celaviedmai I still have moments when I wake up at four in the morning, absolutely pulverised by fear.

Rufus Wainwright We were growing up looking at groups like Odd Future because they weren’t trying just to be musicians.

God Knows I like things to have a point. I can’t just turn on a switch that will make me write songs.

Lianne La Havas

We can make music, but we can’t really exist without fans, so to not have the touring experience was frustrating.

The Strokes’ Nikolai Fraiture

I was breathing the frustration of my community being meddled with.

Dublin R&B star Gemma Dunleavy

It’s not about being some kind of perfect, happy person. The world is not like that.

The world is full of pain.

Richard Russell

Black people have had to find their culture, resurrect it, and from that, there is a lot of pain and suffering.

Gregory Porter

Rory was a great rock and roll guy, he was a great blues guy - but he was also a great fucking traditional folk guy.

For Ireland, they delivered a sense of pride and possibility.

The Blizzards’ Louize Carroll on U2 HP. AN.21 083

“We wanted to look at the artist behind the rock star, and the man behind the artist, and to tell the story of his life.”

Director Emer Reynolds on her Philip Lynott documentary Songs For While I’m Away.

I came into my career without expectations, or thinking that this would ever happen to me.

Beabadoobee I didn’t grow up in an Ireland where I saw black people on the Late Late or TV in general unless it was a charity commercial or a cry for a help.

Denise Chaila If you bring in Denise Chaila all of a sudden MuRli is like Pharrell!

MuRli Van Morrison’s music has had a huge impact on me - he is my favourite artist of all time.

Sinéad O’Connor

THOUGHTS ON COVID I’ve always been someone who

hates routine. My home until now has been a storage place for my stuff.

But now I long for routine.

Laura Whitmore There is nothing surreal about the images of an empty Dublin, an empty Venice, hospital doctors, nurses and patients enclosed in various forms of disposable plastics. They are all too real. Too ordinary. Too contemporary.

Neil Jordan Bowie’s The Next Day has a song on it called ‘You Feel So Lonely You Could Die’: there’s beautiful humour in that now.

The Murder Capital’s James McGovern If you listen closely you can hear distant singsongs from the surrounding balconies and the general sense of unity is tangible.

Soda Blonde’s Faye O’Rourke

FILM & TV So many different types of men exist in this world, and it’s a privilege for me to step into their shoes and honour that and give them a chance to be seen.

Waves star Kelvin Harrison Jr Willem Dafoe would say the most trying scene was - spoiler alert - where he’s lying in the mud delivering a speech, while dirt is being thrown in his mouth.

The Lighthouse director Robert Eggers He is truly a real-life hero for our time.

Michael B. Jordan on portraying lawyer Bryan Stevenson in J ust Mercy A guy in Korea came up to me, crying, saying it made him think

about how hard his parents had to work to make sure he had a nice life.

Director Lorcan Finnegan on his movie Vivarium I went to where Ned’s dad was from in Ireland - he was from Cashel and I rode horses.

George MacKay on researching his role in The True History Of The Kelly Gang It’s a very immersive experience and nothing captures that more than seeing it on the biggest possible screen.

Robert Pattinson on Tenet We wanted to look at the artist behind the rock star, and the man behind the artist, and to tell the story of his life.

Director Emer Reynolds on her Philip Lynott documentary, Songs For While I’m Away

Willem Dafoe would say the most trying scene was - spoiler alert - where he’s lying in the mud delivering a speech, while dirt is being thrown in his mouth.

THE LIGHTHOUSE DIRECTOR ROBERT EGGERS 084 HP. AN.21

QUOTES of the YEAR

BOOKS If you allow that to censor you, you’re fucked.

You’re just another superfluous writer, a coward.

Rob Doyle The ‘Raglan Road’ scene is an example of writing about music’s effect on people.

David Mitchell With popular music, so much of it is tied up with conceptions of youth.

John Connolly I’d lived with kind of apocalyptic thoughts for a year and a half before this all started.

Robert Harris The whole hip-hop thing has been fantastic for Limerick. It’s given the city a confidence that really wasn’t there.

Kevin Barry There are problems with many associations, but unfortunately, the FAI is a special case in terms of how badly it was run financially.

Champagne Football author Mark Tighe

“It’s not good enough to just be liberal anymore because there are so many bad things happening out there.

We have this platform, so why not use it?”

THE CORONAS’ DANNY O’REILLY

POLITICS

SEX & LOVE I don’t think it’s going to satisfy people’s cravings, I think it’s going to sharpen them!

Lenny Abrahamson on Normal People I spent years sort of wrapped up in this culture of heterosexuality, and had suppressed a lot of my own personality, and my own sexuality.

When I was doing the film, I had to give so much weight and thought and care to Amber’s story and her sexuality. I realised that I hadn’t done that myself.

Dating Amber star Lola Petticrew

“The Ramones were nothing but style, totally curated. The Clash, totally curated.”

BOB GELDOF

Everyone likes socialist ideas, but everyone also likes to think that they’re hard-nosed capitalists on their way to the top.

Saoirse McHugh Mary Lou’s shown a real toughness and tenacity in terms of bringing Sinn Fein to where it is now.

Labour MP Conor McGinn It’s not compatible with public health to run a country the way Fine Gael have been running Ireland.

Naoise Dolan I’ve always tried to promote diversity in terms of sexuality and race and ethnicity and body size.

Stylist, producer and activist Oyinza We need to stop voting for people who look after the ones at the top and turn everyone else against each other.

TPM Trump was anti-science to his core. It was horrendous.

Professor Luke O’Neill

Sex written from a female perspective can appear transgressive - not just in Ireland.

Author Niamh Campbell

AND FINALLY...

The Ramones were nothing but style, totally curated. The Clash, totally curated.

Bob Geldof In fact, the album title was actually stolen from an Irish poet called Brendan Kennelly.

The Psychedelic Furs’ Richard Butler on the band’s album Made Of Rain I’m an avid reader - I read all the crime novelists.

Everyone looks at me and goes, “You’re really reading that?’ And I go, ‘Yeah, I think they’re good fun. I sometimes get ideas out of them you never know!’

Former state pathologist Dr Marie Cassidy HP. AN.21 085

GIFT GUIDE PT 2

APRIL AND THE BEAR

More gifts to amaze and delight!

By Kate Brayden 086 HP. AN.21

April and the Bear is one of Ireland’s most exciting interior and lifestyle shops, stocking a carefully curated selection of eclectic homewares, art prints, furniture and gifts.

With each piece carefully selected by founder Siobhan Lam, the Rathmines-based store is the perfect independent store to choose your Christmas gifts from this year. Lam’s aesthetically-focused items bring a hint of fun and beauty to every room, luxe Irish-made candles, large mirrors, bright lockers, exclusive art prints, beautiful coffee books and velvet couches are all currently for sale. We predict that the festive decorations will be gone ASAP, so head over to their website to browse the virtual collection.

April and the Bear is now offering free shipping on orders over €100 within Ireland. aprilandthebear.com

Part 2 of our Christmas gift buying guide!

BOOKS UPSTAIRS There’s never been a better time to support local independent bookshops like Books Upstairs – and with the launch of their new website, it’s never been easier!

Books Upstairs is Dublin’s oldest independent bookshop – trading in the heart of the city centre since 1978. In 2015, they expanded into a bigger space, when the shop moved to its current home in a beautifully preserved Georgian building at 17 D’Olier Street.

As well as a fantastic range of new and secondhand books, Books Upstairs also offer unique Book Bundles – the perfect gift for both adults and children. To create your Book Bundle, you simply choose from a series of themes – including fiction favourites; politics & philosophy; poetry; memoir & biography; and more. You’re then invited to write a little bit about what you or the person you’re buying the gift for likes to read – which allows Books Upstairs to curate the perfect bundle, with a selection of three books. If you’re sending the Book Bundle to a friend via the Books Upstairs website, they can also include a note from you, and post out the personalised bundle in its very own Books Upstairs box. booksupstairs.ie

HIFI HUT KLIPSCH R-51M The importance of great sound is not to be underestimated – whether you’re playing music from your turntable, your phone or your computer.

HiFi Hut stock a wide range of speakers, including the acclaimed Klipsch R-51M: bookshelf speakers that will fill your home with loud, crystal-clear sound and robust bass.

Klipsch’s exclusive Tractrix horn technology delivers the power, detail and emotion of the live music experience with the cleanest, most natural sound possible – offering an experience you won’t get with any ordinary bookshelf speakers.

For more information see hifihut.ie

DUBLIN BIKE MAN Selling second-hand bikes in Dublin city centre, Dublin Bike Man has an impressive range of bikes in excellent condition, rust-free and ready to go, for a great price.

The website is updated daily, with a selection of mountain bikes, folding bikes and classic/vintage bicycles for L’Eroica available in an array of sizes. Operating a convenient test run service seven days a week - from 10am to 7pm by appointment - Dublin Bike Man also offer detailed knowledge on bike parts and upkeep. As well as being the more environmentallyfriendly option, you’re guaranteed to get value for your money by going down the second-hand bike route and the risk of bike theft is significantly lower.

With the largest selection of high-quality used bicycles in town, the Irish company are the ideal choice for a Christmas gift this year.

For more information, visit dublinbikeman.com or check out their Instagram page @dublinbikeman

GIFT

GUIDE

DEADLY CHRISTMAS JUMPERS When it comes to Christmas jumper shopping, why not make sure to buy local this year?

From hilarious ‘Happy Birthday Jesus’ knits and Breaking Bad references to winter wonderland scenes and elf themes; Deadly Christmas Jumpers has a cosy option for absolutely everyone this year. In business since 2009, the Irish company won’t be letting Covid dampen their spirits this December and currently have some great value products on their online store.

Deadly Christmas Jumpers have also added personalised stockings and pet clothing to their store this year, for a custom touch that the whole family can enjoy. With free delivery and 50% off all products, they’re sure to sell out fast.

Nab your Deadly Christmas Jumper now while you can, and get in the festive mood! deadlychristmasjumpers.ie

Arts

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Attractions

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Comedy

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Events

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HOT PRESS SHOP A Hot Press subscription is giving the gift of music – for a whole year! It’s the ultimate, access-all-areas pass to everything that matters in music in Ireland – and a whole lot more besides. Even better, if you take out a print subscription NOW, we’ll include a digital subscription (worth €40) for free – so you can enjoy the complete Hot Press Archives, dating back to 1977. Support independent Irish journalism, and enjoy award-winning writing and photography over and over again.

Also available online from shop.hotpress.com is a seriously rocking collection of t-shirts, books, back issues, high art posters and Hot Press covers signed by the artists. For more info, see Page 55)..

Family

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Festivals

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Music

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Sport

Gift cards have 5 year expiry period

Buy your gift card today

ticketmaster.ie/giftcards

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Theatre

GIFT

GUIDE

BODY GEMS AT WILDCAT INK Wildcat Ink are officially stocking Body Gems - bespoke 14k gold body jewellery handmade in the United States - in their Temple Bar store and online. The colourful range includes yellow, rose, and white gold threadless jewellery in a variety of eye-catching styles for all types of piercings.

In addition to their comprehensive range of surgical steel adornments, Body Gems is now stocked in Wildcat Ink just in time to treat yourself or a friend for Christmas. The popular Irish business has been tattooing and piercing in Dublin since 1999 and have built a reputation for solid work and for excellent customer care.

Pop into their Eustace Street store in Temple Bar to see the full Bodygems selection, or visit wildcat.ie

TICKETMASTER GIFT CARD Valid for five years, a Ticketmaster Gift Card is just the ticket for any lover of live entertainment.

Live events will be back, so a Ticketmaster Gift Card under the tree this year is going to be a guaranteed hit. Available in any amount up to €250, you can also add a message for a personal touch.

To send an eGift directly to their inbox or have a Ticketmaster Gift Card delivered by post, simply visit ticketmaster.ie/giftcards

MAKTUS For fun, quirky gifts with an Irish twist, make sure Maktus is at the top of your Christmas shopping list this year.

Located in George’s Street Arcade - as well as online - the independent store has become a beacon of homegrown creativity, stocking unique products from both their own studio and a range of local artists and designers.

From lockdown-themed gifts, Jackie

Healy Tae mugs, Michael D. Higgins enamel pins and Teresa Mannion coasters to t-shirts, Irish landmark tote bags, hilarious cards and stunning prints; Maktus have no shortage of tongue-in-cheek souvenirs and colourful pop culture games.

Drop into the shop at Unit 21/22 George’s Street Arcade, Drury Street, Dublin 2, or browse the range at maktus.com – with free shipping on orders over €60 within Ireland.

PADDINGTON’S POSTCARDS FROM UNICEF In these turbulent times, the kindness of strangers is needed more than ever. Why not buy a very special gift this Christmas – and help a child in need? The good news is that, in doing so, you will have the ongoing assistance of the beloved character, Paddington Bear™!

Here’s how it works: you sign up for a monthly direct debit payment of just €12 to UNICEF. In return, Paddington will send your child a personalised postcard, along with some other treats, every month, as a bear-sized thank you.

Whether for your own family or a friend’s, UNICEF’s Paddington’s Postcards make an ideal gift for children aged 4-10.

The journey begins with the arrival of a welcome pack, featuring a letter, world map poster, travel journal, stickers and a postcard from London. Each monthly pack then allows a child to explore a different country with Paddington – teaching young adventurers about the lives of families and kids who live there. It is a great way of learning about new places every four weeks. 100% of the proceeds go to UNICEF, helping the agency to carry out its vital, lifesaving work globally, 365 days a year.

• To sign up to Paddington’s Postcards with a monthly donation of just €12, visit unicef.ie/ donate/paddington 088 HP. AN.21

HIFI HUT PRO-JECT JUKE BOX E As vinyl continues to make a remarkable comeback, there’s never been a better time to reconnect with your favourite records on a highquality turntable.

At HiFi Hut, you’ll find a wide selection of options – including the Pro-Ject Juke Box E. This premium turntable has it all: with an integrated phono stage, a Bluetooth receiver, a pre-amplifier and a power amplifier all in one stylish, compact chassis. Requiring only a set of speakers to make a complete hi-fi system, the performance and level of convenience on offer is unprecedented for the price!

For more information see hifihut.ie

GIFT

THE SUPERIOR SESSIONS ALBUM AT THORNTON PIANOS If you’re looking for a way to support mental health causes and the local music industry alike this Christmas, Thornton Pianos have come up with the perfect answer: an album of brilliant Irish talent that aims to raise funds for Minding Creative Minds – the 24/7 wellbeing and mental health support line for everyone involved in music.

As you can imagine, Thornton Pianos have witnessed huge changes in the music industry during their 53 years in business – what’s encouraging, however, is that the piano has remained as reliable and central a component as ever, in modern music.

With their eyes on the next 50-plus years,Thornton Pianos have

GUIDE

introduced the superb Ritmüller range to their portfolio. For the uninitiated, Ritmüller have been making waves in the piano industry across the globe since 2014: they really are very special.

You can hear for yourself just how good the Ritmüller sound is on The Superior Sessions 2020, which is set for release on December 18th via Bandcamp. Since September, Thornton Pianos has been providing a performance space for some of the country’s best emerging musicians, under the banner of The Superior Sessions. Recorded live with the exceptional sound of Ritmüller pianos, the resulting album features the talents of artists like Nathan Mac, Jacon Koopman, Megan Burke, Gemma Cox and Colm Gavin. It is a collection that’s not to be missed.

The Superior Sessions 2020 album is set to be released on December 18th for €6.99 on Bandcamp and will be available on all major streaming services. 100% of the proceeds will be donated to Minding Creative Minds.

DublinBikeMan

Largest selection of high quality used bicycles

DUBLINER IRISH WHISKEY GIFT BOX If you’re looking to celebrate the spirit of Dublin this Christmas and treat your loved ones to some liquid gold, look no further than the latest Dubliner Irish Whiskey collaboration.

The Dubliner Irish Whiskey is a 40% blend of malt and grain whiskey, aged for three years in bourbon casks. Representing the best parts of the capital, the brand found the perfect creative to join forces with this festive season.

Dublin artist SKETCHY INC designed a love letter to our home city in the form of a limited-edition Dubliner Irish Whiskey gift box; featuring landmarks in the Liberties, The Custom House and the famous Poolbeg Chimneys as well as odes to cultural icons Phil Lynott and James Joyce. Inspired by our rich and colourful culture, the gift box encapsulates the endurance of Dublin.

For more information on Dubliner Irish Whiskey, visit thedld.com.

Vintage Bikes | Mens & Ladies Racer Bicycles | Dutch Bicycles Accessories, New Parts & Vintage Parts for old or new bicycles also available

Visit our selection on:

Web: dublinbikeman.com Instagram: @dublinbikeman DEPOSITS TAKEN | DELIVERY NATIONWIDE HP. AN.21 089

This Reporting Life In the thick of all the Trump action these past two years, RTÉ’s man in Washington D.C., Brian O’Donovan, has struck up a burgeoning relationship with Joe Biden. He talks political machinations and rock ‘n’ roll with Stuart Clark.

PORTRAIT: MARTY KATZ

090 HP. AN.21

B

efore we get down to political business, RTÉ’s man in Washington D.C., Brian O’Donovan, wants to make his Prime Time-presenting and Springsteen-loving colleague David McCullough jealous.

“My fantastic American cameraman, Murray, is also Bruce obsessed,” he smiles. “There was this lovely moment driving down in his massive SUV to Deathtown, Pennsylvania for a story when he cranked the Boss up and we were like, ‘Wooooahhh, this is what he’ singing about on ‘Youngstown’!’” It was like Bruce was narrating the journey. It really was the perfect soundtrack.”

He may look every inch the soberly suited foreign correspondent on the Six One and the Nine O’Clock News, but the proud Corkonian reminds me that he has a rock ‘n’ roll past that momentarily intertwined with my own. I’ll let Brian explain…

“We met many, many years ago in London for the launch of Linkin Park’s Meteora,” he recalls. “It would have been 2003 because that’s when I got my first gig after college on Red FM in Cork who were the ones who sent me over. Before the gig, you, me and Dave Fanning went somewhere for a playback of the album. Do you remember that?”

Yes. A burly orangutan disguised as an American record company employee almost cavity searched us in case we had a hidden tape machine up our bottoms. You should have heard the angry grunts when I quipped: “The sound would be a bit muddy, wouldn’t it!”

RT É ’ S B R I A N O ’ D O N O VA N

(clockwise from left) Bruce Springsteen, Joe Biden and Kamala Harris

“Yeah, they were really paranoid about it being pirated,” Brian laughs. “They brought us into this boardroom and played us the record, which was actually really good. Later at the venue you and Fanning got Chester Bennington, god bless him, and I being the local radio guy was given the drummer for ten not very talkative minutes. I ran out of questions after seven minutes, but had to make small talk so as not to incur the wrath of the rather fierce PR person.”

Ah, the good old days when you could actually get on something called ‘a plane’ and go to other countries.

Rock ‘n’ roll war stories compared, let us turn our attention to matters of a Trumpian nature.

“Trump telling us Biden was a car crash might’ve backfired on him.”

PHOTOS: GAGE SKIDMORE VIA FLICKR

Stuart: When you took over the Washington gig from Caitríona Perry in 2018, did she warn you that you were walking into a madhouse?

Brian: Yes, she did! Caitríona and the other former Washington correspondents, Richard Downes, Carole Coleman and Robert Shortt, were all very good in giving me advice. What’s interesting is that everybody had a different experience. Under Bush or Obama, you didn’t have the day-to-day big controversial presidential story outside the White House. There would be weeks, fortnights, perhaps even a month when you wouldn’t go to 1110 Pennsylvania Avenue because nothing much was happening there. That’s obviously been totally different under the Trump administration. I’m thinking next year, which is my last in Washington, covering the Biden presidency will be significantly calmer because you won’t have senior staff leaving their jobs regularly or these sudden major policy announcements. Well, probably!

You’ve met ‘Sleepy Joe’ a couple of times; what do you make of him?

The first time I met him was in September 2018 when he was launching a history book in the Irish embassy.

At the time it wasn’t expected that he would declare his candidacy for the presidency. He didn’t do that until March 2019. I’ll be honest with you, his public speaking as he stood on the podium wasn’t great. He rambled, lost his train of thought, and it was a boring speech that went on too long. I was like, “Ah, here’s this guy we’ve

heard so much about.” And then he came off stage and spent an hour chatting to everybody, posing for selfies and shaking hands with everybody including the journalists. I said, “Hi, Irish television” and he was, “Oh, happy to talk to Ireland” and I got a little one-on-one interview with him. He was warm, friendly, approachable and charismatic in a gentle sort of way.

When Covid kicked in I remember thinking, “This is really going to hinder his campaign because he won’t be able to come off stage and hug everybody and take selfies and shake hands. All he’s left with is the big public speeches, which he’s not good at.” Added to that you had Donald Trump telling us all year that he was this bumbling mess who could barely string two words together, but in the end Joe Biden did pretty well in terms of speech and debate performances. Maybe that’s because expectations had been lowered by Trump telling us Biden was a car crash when it came to his public addresses. That might’ve backfired on him.

Before the Biden campaign started to gain momentum, whom had your Democratic presidential nominee money been on?

What struck me when the field started to emerge in late 2018/early 2019 was the wonderful diversity. Covering his mid-term Senate campaign to try and unseat Ted Cruz I was very impressed with Beto O’Rourke. Pete Buttigieg was very impressive too, although we were going, “Oh no, not four years of having to try and pronounce that surname!” You could not but be blown away by Elizabeth Warren and Bernie Sanders who are such good campaigners, and of course coming from the very liberal left progressive side of the party.

I would not have put Joe Biden top of the list, but he had the name recognition and appealed to both liberals and the centrists. He ticked all the boxes. I think people will look back HP. AN.21 091

(clockwise from above) Brian in the Washington newsroom; Trump & Pence; a D.C. Defund The Police mural; BLM protest & commemorating George Floyd

on that race and say, “It’s a shame” because there was such diversity in that field – young, old, gay, straight, black, white – but we ended up with a white man in his ‘70s going up against another white man in his ‘70s.

Which was obviously what was needed on this occasion.

As it turned out, yeah, absolutely. I mean, Good lord, their policies and the things they say are poles apart, but Biden isn’t as overtly radical a departure from Trump as Bernie and the others would have been.

Do you see him as a one-termer handing over to Kamala Harris or is she just there as a sop to the leftwing of the party and will be circumvented in 2024?

Very difficult to say because, you know, four years is an eternity in politics. Biden just turned 78, making him the oldest president ever, so will he able to commit to another campaign in four years time? He’ll probably only know when the time comes round. Whoever the Democrats go with is going to have their work cut out because, if Trump runs again, I don’t see him being too far shy of the 73 million votes he got this time round.

Such is the extremely divisive nature of American politics that, whatever he does, I can’t see Biden winning many of those Trump voters over. With regards to Kamala Harris, she’s excellent. Her background as a prosecutor and an interrogator meant that she stood out during the Supreme Court hearings. She’s very tough and good on the debate stage – as Biden himself found out during the Democratic nominee campaign. I think she’s going to be 092 HP. AN.21

“He loves Irish poetry and quoting Seamus Heaney.” very impressive as Vice-President. I haven’t interviewed her yet. We’re waiting for the family tree to come out – we know there’s Indian and Jamaican heritage but maybe there’s an Irish great, great grannie!

Does the Irish card still come in handy when trying to gain access in D.C.?

I gave you an example of Biden stopping to talk to me because I was from an Irish news organisation. I think he’s genuine in loving his Irish roots and heritage. He loves Irish poetry and quoting Seamus Heaney and tweeted about the internal market during the height of the Brexit controversy. He spoke about Brexit again last week when I shouted out, “Can you take a question from Ireland?” and he came over and said, “I’m happy to take a question from Ireland any time.”

Being from Ireland worked with Trump too, didn’t it?

Yes. You might remember the speculation about whether or not Ireland would be added to the itinerary when he visited France and England; the White House wouldn’t say. My wife, Joanna, gave me this genius tip – when he’s walking across the White House lawn to board Marine 1 and stops to do what we called ‘chopper talk’, why don’t you just shout out “Doonbeg!” because he’ll hear the name of his Irish golf course and want to talk about it. So I shouted “Doonbeg!” at him over 50 other journalists and, sure enough, he turned and looked and I said, “Are you going to Doonbeg?” and he replied, “Yes, we’re going to Doonbeg and we’re going to hold our meetings there.” It was a big scoop and controversial too because you’re not supposed to use your own private property for heads of state meetings. The Irish Government weren’t comfortable with him wanting to use Doonbeg, so Shannon was picked as a compromise. Being Irish definitely helped me get good access to Mick Mulvaney when he was acting White House Chief Of Staff. People think that the Taoiseach going to see the President with their bowl of shamrock is a junket, but it actually gives us amazing sitdown access every year to the most powerful politician of the land, and afterwards the Speaker of the House, Nancy Pelosi, and all the senators.

RT É ’ S B R I A N O ’ D O N O VA N

You spoke recently of having a ‘Reeling In The Years moment’.

Yes, I was on the White House lawn when Trump boarded the chopper that took him to Walter Reed Hospital, which seemed like a very significant moment – and would have been even more significant, if he hadn’t recovered from Covid. Most of the time you’re in the moment doing the job, but every now and again you’re struck by the enormity of what you’re witnessing.

Does covering the Black Lives Matter protests that erupted in Minneapolis after George Floyd’s murder fall in to that category?

Definitely. The negative side – the looting, vandalism and burning out of buildings – was a tiny percentage of the overall moment, but it was a percentage that Donald Trump latched onto strongly. He tried to use it to his electoral advantage by portraying himself as pro-law and Biden being in favour of all this chaos. In reality, it was mainly white people walking alongside African Americans in a show of solidarity.

Is there part of you that will secretly miss Trump?

Well, I’m sure he’ll still be there sniping none too quietly from the sidelines, but in terms of constant newsworthiness, yes, you were never short of a major story with him and his family in the White House. I’ll miss the Trumpisms like: “Rex Tillerson; dumb as a rock”, when he fired him from his position as Defence Secretary. He’s vicious on Twitter whereas Joe Biden’s account is very sanitised. You had members of his communications team, like Kellyanne Conway with her ‘Alternative Facts’, becoming the story themselves. I doubt that’ll happen under Biden.

Did Trump’s branding of the media as “enemies of the people”, which is straight out of the Goebbels playbook, make going out and doing your job dangerous?

He’d mention the Fake News media at one of his rallies and people would go “Booooo!!!!” and maybe give you the finger, but afterwards they were happy enough to talk to you. There’s no evidence in the world that’s going to stop them thinking the election was stolen from Trump. Twenty-five per cent of the American electorate is evangelical and, while Biden being Catholic helped with the religious vote, they’re not going to abandon him either.

Did you ever get up close to any of the pro-Trump militias?

No, but I was at the Stop The Steal March three weeks ago where the Proud Boys were out in force in their black and

yellow t-shirts. The moment they passed me the chant was “All Lives Matter”, which as you know is denigrating the Black Lives Matter movement. We hadn’t really heard of them until when Trump was asked about them and he said, “Stand back and stand by.” The thought that some of these groups who turn up at events might be armed can be quite scary. I remember, preCovid, covering a gun rally in Richmond, Virginia where people were protecting their 2nd Amendment rights by brandishing their firearms. There wasn’t any trouble but it does unsettle you thinking, “What if?”

Do you have any favourites from the ream of Trump books that have been published?

I suspect the best is yet to come but, yes, I’m just finishing up Rage by Bob Woodward, which I’m really, really into. It was fascinating talking to him for this podcast I do, State Of Mind. I think Trump was really angry about not being interviewed for the first major book about him, Fear, and wanting to put his stamp on Woodward’s he gave him no fewer than 18 interviews. It got to the point where Donald Trump was calling him! Even though it spelt the end of a Republican president, Richard Nixon, he seemed flattered that the man who was part of breaking the Watergate scandal was writing about him. Another one I found really interesting because it focuses a lot on Trump’s dad, Fred, and the whole family dynamic is Mary Trump’s Too Much And Never Enough. Read both of those and you’ll have a good idea of what makes him tick.

Was somebody setting him up with that photo-op of Trump sat at a tiny desk?

I have no idea, it was so small and he’s a big guy. I’m 6’2 and he’s possibly a bit taller. He’s a big guy with a big presence – he really commands the room – and that desk just made him look ridiculous.

RTÉ aside, where should we go to find coverage of American politics, which doesn’t resort to alternative facts?

There’s a political paper and website based in D.C. called The Hill, which has an Irish guy Niall Stanage working for it, which is very good. The BBC America news service is good too if you can find it. You can still rely on the New York Times and the Washington Post most of the time, but best of all in terms of playing it straight are the nightly news shows from ABC, NBC and CBS. Those old traditional networks still do it the best.

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Gubu On A Global Scale: It Was A Year We Will Never Forget

T

he year began in flames. Vast fires in Australia. Destruction on a scale we can’t even begin to imagine here in Ireland. Hell on earth. Imagine it: fires so hot they create their own climate, changing the very rules of conflagration. The smoke and ash obscured the sun and fell like black snow. It was seen from space. It felt like the beginning of the end of times.

I know. We hardly needed another reminder that the world is overheating and that the climate crisis is an existential threat to life on earth. But still, there it was, as stark as could be. A billion birds and animals were incinerated. The destruction was immeasurable.

People spoke of an apocalypse and that’s exactly what it was. It only lacked four horsemen and then, right on cue, there they were too. The assassination of the Iranian General Qasem Soleimani could have sparked an inferno as monstrous and destructive as the Ozzie firestorms.

Thankfully, the Iranians resisted the provocation.

Back home we voted in what became known as The Change Election. Nobody won, not even close; but Sinn Féin took the honours, and deservedly so. They played a different game and it changed everything.

But the central story of 2020 was already beginning to unfold elsewhere. Gradually, the appalling truth dawned.

We were not going to escape. Across the world, this would be the the year of Covid – and there wasn’t a damned thing we could do to change that. A virus is a tiny thing – but this one packed some wallop. From the same family as SARS and MERS, and also OC43, the coronavirus that caused the global pandemic of 1891, once it cut loose there was no way back. The only question was: how bad was it going to be?

Virtually everything changed, and utterly at that. All areas of human endeavour and behaviour were retooled to limit the spread and toll. We bunkered down and placed our trust in science; or at least some of us did.

There was the basic science of how to wear a mask, wash our hands, meet and work. But beyond that, we had to become familiar quickly with the inter-related sciences of immunology, virology, biochemistry and, of course, developing treatments and especially making vaccines.

It’s not been pretty.

The initial unity of purpose is a rare and precious thing.

But it wasn’t built to last. It became overused, and in many ways abused. It lost its sheen. We’re all grumpy now, not helped by being talked down to by ubercautious, inward-looking medics.

What did it all mean? What did it – or might it yet – change? Everyone has a view. Many have an axe – or two – to grind. The virus is a blank page on which people scrawl their dreams and despairs, their fears and furies.

Contradictions have been rife. We have lived in hope while battling with despair. We have seen manifestations of both the best and the worst in people. Thankfully, as US CMO Anthony Fauci says, the cavalry is coming in the form of a vaccine. In Ireland, holding your breath is not recommended. Our health bosses don’t rush things here, do they? Unless it’s bouncing us into lockdown at Level 5, that is.

Trust me, tears will be wept and teeth ground down before our vaxxing’s done.

Don’t start us on “done”. After all, that was what was supposed to happen with Brexit.

This time last year we might have thought we’d be finished with Brexit by now. But four years after their vote, the British are still messing around. Devious, laughably incompetent, stupidly self-important, and utterly hypocritical, under Boris Johnson’s shambling, lying leadership the Brits probably shouldn’t be trusted to sit the right way round on a toilet seat, to quote Rowan Atkinson.

It may yet end with the shit hitting the wrong surface.

But the landing area for sympathy is tiny. If it weren’t for the complications of that border with Northern Ireland, you’d have applauded an EU decision to say ‘Good look, chum – see you later’.

And then there’s the United States of America. Or after four years of Donald Trump maybe that should be the Disunited States?

During his term, race relations have disintegrated. The far right has become a significant presence in the US and elsewhere – indeed white supremacists are regarded

by US security forces as the number one terrorist threat.

That’s before we mention the militias patrolling with

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INTRODUCTION THE WHOLE HOG

MARY-LOU BY SINN FEIN/FLICKR

YEAR IN A NUTSHELL: Mary-Lou McDonald; Dr.Fauci and Trump; Boris Johnson placard at a Brexit protest

“WE ALL KNOW THAT TRUMP FOSTERED A GREATLY INCREASED LEVEL OF STUPIDITY AND IRRATIONALITY; OF BELIEF IN CONSPIRACY THEORIES AND IN FAKE NEWS.” enough armaments to overpower a mid-sized country.

For all his populist promises to the Rust Belt Trump leaves office with the rich richer and the poor very much poorer; the opiate problem no closer to being resolved; tech firms no closer to being controlled; the wildernesses hocked and hawked to fossil fuel companies and mining interests; and, perhaps most unforgivably, the worst pandemic illness and death rates in the world, in what is the richest nation of all.

The extent of the damage wrought by Donald Trump is like the forest fires in Australia. There is no way of measuring it accurately. But it is potentially catastrophic.

We all know that Trump fostered a greatly increased level of stupidity and irrationality; of belief in conspiracy theories and in fake news. The swine is so crooked he has to screw himself out of bed in the morning. He knows that the best thing a cheat can do is accuse everyone else of cheating. The scariest thing is that in the USA, over 74 million people voted for the creepiest creep ever to crawl of of Creepytown.

And yet, despite his deeply malign and poisonous influence, the struggle for equality goes on. The battle against hunger. The fight against racism. The campaign to resist the toxic impact of social media.

It’s no accident that global climate change is affecting the poor of the world much more than the rich. Nor is it any surprise to find that SARS-Cov-2 has proven vastly more deadly among blacks and minorities in the United States, the richest country on earth by a very great distance.

But unexpected, positive things happen too. Look at the success of Normal People and what it has potentially done for Irish film and TV production.

No tears will be shed as 2020 ends. It’s been the worst of years. Some things will get better soon.

Vaccines will stall and then kill off the pandemic. And we’ll get back in the air. But there’ll be little plain sailing next year. Too soon for that. Apart from the bleeding obvious, like restarting our stalled economy and getting things moving again, there will be Brexit; and there will be the increasing urgency of dealing with climate

change.

How fast can we go? Not very, if we rely on our NPHET. As a breed, they are uber-cautious and fussy, at this stage far too wedded to power plays, high drama and intrigue. The danger is that a dragged out vaccination process will be played like a soap opera; the bright lights won’t be surrendered without a fight.

In politics, February’s election left us with a new landscape, though the shape of it is not fully evolved yet. The big winners were Sinn Féin, who have brought a more abrasive note to politics. Their use – and sometimes abuse – of social media has changed the nature of the game.

For a start, the Shinnerbot twitterati delight in taunting and attacking those who are more moderate and consensus-driven. But they have put their feet – individually and collectively – in it too, to the extent that people are now wondering about the nastiness that has been deleted by SF Central Command.

Curiously too, the Government, persuaded as much by Covid as conviction, has adopted rather Shinnerish Big State policies. Perhaps the lure of “change” will fade.

We’ll have some fun watching, that’s for sure.

Meanwhile, it will take work and plenty of good will to maintain the unity of purpose that has characterised our Decade of Centenaries to date. It’s likely to fray as we start to deal with the War of Independence and the subsequent Civil War. But, in this regard, we really do need the centre to hold. It is important. But it is history.

We should look back carefully and clinically and see what we can learn and understand, especially in relation to what we weren’t taught in school.

Even as we recall the savagery of those conflicts, we’ll be waving goodbye afresh to the UK. But this time it is they who are leaving us, and Europe, and irrevocably diminishing our ties to the Anglosphere, politically and culturally. How’s your French? Your German? Your Spanish?

Daunting times ahead, perhaps. Exciting, certainly.

A new dawn awaits…

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With contributions from: Eamonn McCann, Paul Nolan, Tanis Smither, Pavel Barter, Kate Brayden, Ingrid Angulo & Dermot Stokes HP. AN.21 095

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C OV I D -19

THE PLAGUE IS UPON US

T

he chastening thing is that it was always only a matter of time. We’d long been warned that a virus would break out somewhere.

We’ve escaped an awful fate a few times already, with SARS and MERS and with Ebola and Zika.

Only a matter of time they said.

Bureaucracies may have ignored them, but they were right, worse luck. By the time it was first talked-of in Wuhan, China last January it had already sprung from the traps and was going full tilt. That’s the way the modern, high-speed and ultra-connected world works. All it took was a few blinks and missteps, and there we were: facing into the abyss.

What a terrible, bruising and too often deadly trip it’s been.

By February it had been christened SARS-Cov-2 and the Covid-19 pandemic was declared. Jesus wept, that’s only ten months ago but in so many ways it feels like a lifetime.

The death toll is heading for 2 million worldwide now. By Christmas 2020, confirmed cases will probably number 75million. And some statisticians, for example the US Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), estimate that the real case-load could be ten times as many again.

It was all a bit of a lark for a while, back when we watched quirky Vietnamese TikTok videos on hand-washing, started shouting to each other in public spaces and doing elbow and knee bumps. Well, except for Boris “I’m not going to stop shaking hands” Johnson.

Great gas altogether, as we pretended we were kids again and accepted instructions like school children.

But the impression of fun didn’t last for long. Pictures from Italy and then New York of mass graves and body bags shocked us; medical staff in full hazmat suits, stunned spokespeople, stern medics, stricken relatives too. This wasn’t ten time zones away and under Chinese rule. It was on our doorstep. And then it was everywhere, up close and personal – and very serious indeed.

A vast evacuation took place, ferrying millions of travellers

096 HP. AN.21

back home, criss-crossing each other, many traipsing through eerie and deserted airports when they arrived. Then the planes left the sky; almost everything stopped.

A whole new way of life developed, revolving around by now ultra-serious hand-washing, mask wearing, minimising contact, working and studying from home, exercising and socialising outdoors only – and having your victuals delivered and your hair uncut. In the days of beards and balayage, salons closed and foreheads wrinkled. And not just because it was all very perplexing.

There was a lot of hot air about how we’d all been brought

“A VAST EVACUATION TOOK PLACE, FERRYING MILLIONS OF TRAVELLERS BACK HOME.” together, how our social sense and neighbourliness had been rediscovered and how, perhaps, we were all being taught a lesson by the virus. Yeah, just a little bit. But anyone who tries to convince us that in some way this was all a good thing – putting us in touch with our spirituality or our sense of community or getting us to slow down – will get short shrift around here. Only those who are privileged, in one way or another, could afford guff like that.

For many Irish people – including virtually everyone in the music, entertainment and hospitality industries – it was a nightmare come to appalling life. No wonder tempers started to fray as time went by.

Inevitably there were random acts of stupidity, and crowds and rowdy parties were occasionally outed via social media posts, thereby putting the nay into neighbourliness. Some fools even called for troops on the streets.

Lockdowns were underpinned by laws that would be unacceptable at any other time. They must have been

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chuckling in China. The US or, to be more exact, the Trump administration, went pure rogue. Trump blamed China, undermined and threatened the World Health Organisation and generally went into denial. The UK were led by what is probably the most incompetent British government in history. They disguised the figures and lied to the public – but they still had the highest per capita mortality rate in Europe and by a wide margin if the true figures were taken into account.

Other authoritarians took the opportunity to increase their hold on power. Never waste a crisis, eh? But leaders weren’t immune and many themselves fell victim. Some, like Boris Johnson, were seriously ill. His younger and thinner partner fared better. Trump suffered less thanks to major advances in treatment that had been found by the time he was infected.

Meanwhile New Zealand isolated and locked down: easy for them, you might add, in that they are so far from almost everywhere that there are never any great hordes descending on Auckland. Their success may have been relatively easily won, but the Kiwi premmy, Jacinta Ardern became the poster girl for zero Covid nonetheless and she romped home in the General Election. What our lot would give for her ratings – and her electoral success!

The same goes for our health politburo. They really wanted to be best in class. Some unkind wags suggested that it was so that they could lord it at conferences for the next decade. Think of the approbation, the chortling congratulations, the book deals. Hence their hard lines!

Easy for them too. We lost sports events, theatre, live music and festivals, travel and much trade. In April shop sales collapsed by over 35%, the worst month for a decade. We took to online shopping with gusto, but little joy.

New modes of working emerged. Plus new ways to divert ourselves. Coffee queues grew and grew. Like, where else would you meet anyone?

It’d be wrong to deny that the lockdown had its pleasantly perverse upsides. At least some of us enjoyed a lot of sex for a start! The air was cleaner and grass grew on Grafton Street.

Wildlife explored newly empty spaces around the world, like the pumas that nonchalantly strolled through Santiago in Chile. But there was no equivalence to the devastation and loss. And as winter bites the air is dirtier, the mood darker.

So many issues arose. Like, how do we harvest our crops? With Eastern European workers, that’s how, and a good job we have them. But the medical junta didn’t see it that way.

Right wing Governments, meanwhile, ignored the grim truth and so the pandemic became another field of rancour between left and right; that is, those now styled as progressives and their diametric opponents. Troublingly, science fell victim to both side’s prejudices and belief systems.

Mainstream media’s timidity towards the medical aristocracy left gaping holes for doubters and dissenters. Social media helped fill it with a load of old bollocks: conspiracy theories, hoaxes and contagious superstition.

There were attacks on 5G masts. Anti-vax theories spread. Some in America marched behind “coronahoax” banners – but wearing masks! Trump trades in this shit – it’s snake oil stuff and who better than a snake oil salesman who follows his hunches?

Then there were the breakouts: the Covid-19 parties in Cork and elsewhere; and in Britain the June madness that erupted on Bournemouth beach and Notting Hill.

The pandemic’s second surge affected young people more.

Fingers were pointed. In some instances in the UK, Paris and Berlin, police interventions led to violent clashes with revellers.

In October freshers in various UK cities were locked up rather

PHOTOS BY KAREN KELLEHER

“SOCIAL MEDIA HELPED FILL IT WITH A LOAD OF OLD BOLLOCKS: CONSPIRACY THEORIES, HOAXES AND CONTAGIOUS SUPERSTITION.”

ANTI-VAXXERS, DUBLIN, DEC 2020

than locked down. And to think: all they wanted was to get locked!

The inescapable truth is that Covid19 has taken a terrible toll, one that will continue to increase until well into 2021. By Christmas, global deaths will be around 2 million. They’re rising steadily by 1% every day.

Science has responded well. In what is double-quick time by medical standards, a selection of vaccines are at the gate.

The virus will be tamed gradually. But one suspects that we won’t return entirely to the way we were.

Many cities around the world welcomed the respite from tourism, for example. Rents fell as a result. And business flying suddenly seems much less important than heretofore. So can we keep the best and dump the rest? Would that it were that easy…

The changes in people’s routines – whether working, shopping or entertaining one another – may prove a boon for village life as certain moon-eyed prophets forecast, but the impact on city centres has been dreadful, representing what London’s mayor Sadiq Khan described as “an existential threat to city centres.”

So can we now revive our urban cores while also nurturing the villages?

We’re also going to have to find a way to balance public safety with human rights, and the imperative for real democratic control snd accountability. Right across the planet, freedoms hard-won over the centuries, were simply signed away in the blink of an eye to keep the pandemic under some level of control. Authoritarians and populists took note: cause panic and people will submit.

Health juntas won’t forget that either.

Those freedoms are central to democratic processes and freedoms. We have to preserve them. So how are they to be protected, and without yielding the field to libertarian loonies?

Meanwhile, much of the idiotic posturing about the world having had enough of experts that was spouted by the henchmen and women surrounding Trump and the clowns who gave us Brexit alike has been exposed for what it was: stupidity writ large.

We do need experts – like scientists, for example. So long the bright hidden child in the class, science is now the star.

Fine. We’re all epidemiologists now, all expert in statistics, mathematical modelling and forecasting, as mentally toned as we all became about banking ten years ago. Allegedly. But the truth is that science is getting us out of the pandemic. And there’s more to come on that front. There has been an extraordinary and quite unprecedented pooling of expertise and discovery – and out of that ferment of searching, experiment and analysis, we can be certain that new forms of diagnosis, treatment and prevention will emerge for a host of other illnesses.

There is a challenge here too, because access to such advances shouldn’t be confined to those countries or individuals who can afford them.

A brave new world might follow. But don’t hold your breath!

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CLIMATE CHANGE: THE END REALLY IS NIGH

W

ill the circle be unbroken, by and by lawd, by and by? No, it seems, it won’t.

The year began with catastrophic bushfires in Australia, conflagrations the size of Ireland.

Think about that. The size of Ireland. And now, with the hottest November night ever recorded, they’re on maximum alert again down under.

The Year of the Plague is also one of the three hottest years on record. Ever.

In August, a temperature of 54.4 degrees Celsius was recorded in California’s Death Valley. That is the highest temperature ever measured with modern instruments.

Yes, pandemic lockdowns reduced pollution and cleared skies and that was, sort of, great.

But, and it’s a big but, here’s the rub: smoke and dust pollution actually keeps the earth cooler. It blocks the sun.

Also, there has been a La Niña in the Pacific. That’s a massive new natural climate pattern that messes with normal temperatures, rainfall and storms in many parts of the world.

Here is the news. When it’s dry and hot, bushfires follow. Dozens of people died in Australia early in the year. More than 2,000 homes were destroyed. And 10 million hectares were burned black. Brigid Delaney wrote in the Guardian of “Fire raining on beaches, red skies and a billion animals killed: (it’s) the new Australian summer.”

Hallelujah.

Estimates put the cost of the fires at A$4.4bn. And that’s just for starters. After all, there’s a simmering row between Australia and New Zealand about who might pay for cross border pollution.

Australia is not the only place where the herald angels have been singing a blues song. Many countries had very severe heatwaves: India in May and much of SE Asia in September. Once again there were huge wildfires in California, infernos so vast, and furious, that they create their own weather, microclimates and 180kmh “firenadoes”: a new kind of earthly hell. As former Gov. Jerry Brown said, it was beginning to feel like the “new abnormal.”

There were outrageous floods too, even in Australia. Ireland and the UK suffered the wettest February on record, with some places recording once-in-a-century rainfalls and floods. China was hit by epic rains in May and 100,000 were evacuated as waters reached the Giant Buddha statue.

Then, in August, the Three Gorges dam, along the Yangtze River in China, recorded the largest inflow of water in its history.

Officials had to assure the public it wouldn’t be breached. Thankfully, for the many millions downstream, it wasn’t. But there is always a next time…

In August Storm Ellen rocked up in Ireland, leaving 195,000 homes and businesses without power and one hell of a mess in its aftermath.

And, sure, would it really be an apocalypse, without plagues of locusts? There they were, on cue, vast swarms of them – in East Africa in February and subsequently appearing in

methane, hitherto locked down beneath vast levels of Arctic ice, are starting to escape. It’s even worse than carbon dioxide…

Are we fucked? Well, according to the UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres we are “close to climate catastrophe.” There is little point in self-delusion. “Apocalyptic fires and floods, cyclones and hurricanes are increasingly the new normal,” he added.

“Humanity is waging war on nature. This is suicidal. Nature always strikes back – and it is already doing so with growing force and fury.”

Signs of hope are few, but there is one: the election of Joe Biden as President of the United States of America. It’s not that he’s a raging green. But at least he is not a climate change denier. He brings awareness and some sense of responsibility after the derangement of the last four years.

Maybe the pandemic has awakened a new sense of collective purpose. Hook that up to the renewed faith in good science and realisation of the merits of good micro-level and macro-level technology, and we might have a chance of dodging Armageddon.

It now looks like we’ll have to go beyond puritanism and abstention and embrace bigger and wilder thoughts.

Specifically, extensive carbon capture will be required, and this year the journal Nature published details of a project to do it that’s very simple, very cheap – and very big.

It’s called enhanced rock weathering (ERW).

You spread rock dust on farmland and it sucks CO2 from the air. Many farmers already do it, for example in South East Asia.

Basalt, which is one of the most common rocks on Earth, is the best rock for capturing CO2. Huge stockpiles already exist and – even better news – China, the US and India, that is, the world’s three biggest polluters, have the greatest potential for ERW. No, it doesn’t obviate the need for all the other things we know we should all be doing.

But right now, we need to find ways to buy very precious time and this is potentially one way to do just that.

That should be the mantra for the coming decade.

“APOCALYPTIC FIRES AND FLOODS, CYCLONES AND HURRICANES ARE INCREASINGLY THE NEW NORMAL.”

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southern Africa and right across to India and Pakistan.

On a more benign note, lockdowns freed animals to extend their range on land and sea. Spectacular scenes were photographed around the world as they sashayed around towns and cities. And various kinds of whales and dolphins appeared off our south coast in great numbers this year, feeding on abundant shoals of sprats.

Climate change deniers be damned.

Pointing to the scientific facts, we have said it again and again in Hot Press: there’s no escaping the imminence of the apocalypse.

This year we heard that the Greenland ice sheet lost a record 1million tonnes of ice per minute in 2019. The Earth has lost 28 trillion tonnes of ice in less than 30 years and climate-driven ice sheet loss in 2020 is likely to be the worst for centuries. The result is higher sea levels – and therefore greater damage from storm surges and torrential rains.

Not only that, but huge deposits of

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BREXIT

Our Relationship With Britain Will Never Be The Same Again

S

houldn’t Brexit now be history? The answer is yes, it should but it isn’t.

Indeed, watching the Westminster circus one can safely say that Brexit will be a story for a long time to

come.

The gambit, decided on by the ultras in Boris Johnson’s ludicrously shambolic Government, of unpicking a central part of the EU withdrawal agreement, the Northern Ireland protocol, broke trust between the negotiating parties.

The idea that they would basically legislate to break international law is farcical. But it is of a piece with every wretched manoeuvre the Tory party has been guilty of, since the cringingly inept David Cameron let the cat out of the bag, playing into the hands of reactionary fantasists like Nigel Farage and his dishonourable right-wing schemers.

Even at the best of times, few would freely trust Boris Johnson’s team – but all negotiations demand a basic level of good faith. The Tories chucked that out the window. Amal Clooney resigned as the UK’s special envoy on market freedom in protest, describing the action as “lamentable”.

That they’re acting the bollocks to the very end – and we are not there yet as we write – has prompted large UK food and drink companies to secure extra storage space here as the risk of a no-deal Brexit threatens

supply chains into Ireland.

And the increasing clamour for a reliable alternative to the land bridge through the UK has led to ferry companies opening or enhancing their direct services to key European ports, and putting Brexit-busting ferries into action.

There are fears that a route through the UK would gravely compromise the delivery of the Covid-19 vaccine, so the direct ferry routes and air corridors will be used.

Make no mistake: whatever the final outcome of negotiations, Brexit is going to hurt, and badly. Many businesses will struggle. And it will reach into every nook and cranny of UK and Irish society alike.

For example, think of the complexities of musicians touring Europe and the UK and the logistical nightmare they will now likely face transporting equipment…

Apres Brexit, in Ireland, we’ll have to turn

more emphatically to Europe in every sphere.

Supply lines are a very visible manifestation of the change – but we’ll also have to face something much deeper than that, in the weakening of our link to the Anglosphere.

We really need to talk about this sooner rather than later.

True, the benefits accruing from our command of English won’t diminish. If anything, they’ll grow. We’ll now be the key bridge between the USA and the EU. But the Anglosphere is more than that.

It encompasses mind-set as well as media, culture, thought and habit. See what newspapers and magazines are sold here; hear the music we listen to; look at the books we buy, the films and series we watch, the sports we follow, the clothes we wear, the food we eat, the trends we pick up, the things we discuss.

Our history within the Anglosphere is complex. It has been mutually beneficial in many respects; but it has been bitter, brutal, exploitative and mutually hostile in others.

Much of the time, like all relationships, it just potters away, often mundane and thoughtless. Just there and working, more or less.

Some of this will endure. Our links with Scotland may even intensify as the march towards Scottish independence gathers momentum. Indeed it may well be that, in the not too dim and distant future, Scotland will rejoin the EU in its own independent right.

But you can’t ignore history. And you certainly can’t ignore the kind of seismic change that’s now afoot. To a greater extent than ever, we have to find our own way forward.

There Really Is A Word For Everything. Nearly.

A

living language is always changing. But, where speed of change is concerned, some years take the biscuit. And as we discovered in 2020, there’s nothing like a global crisis to trigger invention!

Collins Dictionary named “lockdown” as its Word of the Year 2020, saying it added the term because it “encapsulates the shared experience of billions of people who have had to restrict their daily lives in order to contain the virus.”

So, what words and terms are you taking from 2020? Here’s a few to conjugate!

Coronavirus, Covid-secure, gamechanger, heroes, infodemic, new normal, unprecedented (the pandemic wasn’t, but never mind), second wave, the R number, pivot, Zoom.

You still want to play?

Face covering (with or without a hyphen), working from home, hybrid schooling (see face covering), remote learning, home office,

blended learning, “furlough”, “key worker”, “self-isolate” and “social distancing”. Oh, and “complete fuck-up”. But that’s not new, is it?

This too, we learned.

“Ramp up” has nothing to do with elevating a car to examine the exhaust nor with a walkway down which models parade. No, it’s something you do – and in particular Boris Johnson does (stop sniggering at the back) – with tests, with efforts, with production, with being a complete dick...

About the new wave of marketing speak – the use of “family” as a verb; the idea (if that is the right word) of “humaning”; or the promise of a “brand journey” – we will simply say “nowt”.

Others “Words and Phrases of the Year” include: “Dystopian”/“Orwellian”; “We’re at war with a virus”; “Stay safe!”; “Stay safe and be well”; “Be well and stay safe!”; “[literally anything] in the time of Covid-19”; “In these uncertain times...” ; “Hoax”; “Conspiracy

theory”; “QAnon”; “We’re all in this together”; “Now more than ever…”; “OK Boomer?”

“Fuck off”.

Away from Covid-19, technology and social media generated a few too that might be considered new. Amid the dross, we do offer sneaking approbation to whoever invented “mukbang” from South Korea, which describes those who broadcast videos of themselves eating large quantities of food.

Finally, there’s Karen: A “Karen” is – apparently – used to refer to an entitled mum, who’s likely to want to talk to the manager. Drives a huge but eco SUV. To which we can only say a very old word indeed: “Boooooo”. That’s certainly not the Karen we know!

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USA

Have We Seen The Last Of The Putrid Donald Trump?

Maybe...

A

t the outset of 2020, Donald Trump appeared well placed to secure a second term as US President. The message being hammered home was that the economy was booming – though neither Trump nor his sycophants in Fox News and Breitbart were keen to discuss the fact he had inherited a strong economy from Barack Obama.

The Democrats seemed to be in a mess with an apparently endless field of contenders, none of them an obvious vote winner – and so there seemed to be precious little chance of a curveball disrupting the Trump masterplan. In the end, however, we had the biggest curveball imaginable: the arrival of Covid-19 in March.

Finally, Trump’s outrageous incompetence would be exposed in the most transparent – and lethal – manner possible.

For three years, his strategy of distracting from important matters of State with a blitzkrieg of Twitter bullshit and lies had proven effective in bamboozling the mainstream American media, who had proven virtually clueless in how to deal with him.

Covid, though, left no room for superficiality: it was time for a subtler and more inspiring form of leadership, qualities which Trump – whatever the delusions of his supporters – utterly lacks. He had promised to make America great again, but by year’s end, the richest country in the world had racked up in excess of 15 million cases of Covid – more than any other nation in the world. Tragically, more than 290,000 Americans dies as a result of Covid-19.

It really was his fault. As Michael Lewis outlined in his 2018 book The Fifth Risk, since his election, Trump and this alt-right henchmen and women had commenced a process of hollowing out the federal government, eroding its ability to cope with a major public health disaster.

To add to the chaos, Trump’s suspicion of science led to the sidelining of experts, perhaps the most prominent of whom was Dr Anthony Fauci, the long-time director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases.

Trump played the virus down. Said it’d soon be gone

“ONLY TRUMP COULD HAVE POLITICISED FACE-MASKS TO THE EXTENT WE WITNESSED THROUGHOUT THE YEAR.”

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“like magic’’. Attacked the World Health Organisation.

Suggested quack remedies. Promised vaccines months before they were likely. Turned it into a racist issue by referring to it as the Chinese virus. Suggested masks were only for pussies.

Ultimately, the poisonous chump was hospitalised himself in October after catching the virus.

APPEALING DIRECTLY As dire as his performance during the Covid emergency was, Trump plunged to new depths in the aftermath of George Floyd’s murder by police officers in Minneapolis in May. As support swelled around the globe for the Black Lives Matters movement, it was time for the President of the USA to acknowledge historic injustices and to pledge to end systemic racism. Instead, in the most disgraceful moment of his presidency Donald Trump doubled down on the hateful rhetoric.

Throughout the summer of 2020, he spewed racist tropes. He threatened to send in the military to crack down on peaceful protestors. He cosied up to far right armed militias, encouraging them to be ready – thus emboldening some of the most repugnant elements in American society.

One of the most disturbing documentaries of recent years was American Dharma, Errol Morris’s 2018 account of the life of Trump’s one-time adviser Steve Bannon. The film painted a bleak, desperate portrait of a man – and a movement – prepared to see American society go up in flames in the pursuit of a heinous political vision.

In mid-2020, the film’s despairing thesis became perilously close to reality: as Covid continued to run rampant, the levels of political turmoil and social division, in the US and elsewhere, made it the darkest time for the world in living memory. There were moments when it felt like we had been plunged into a genuine, nightmare dystopia.

In the autumn, there were chinks of light. Joe Biden had been selected as the Democratic presidential nominee.

He made the astute choice of Kamala Harris as running mate. With Trump looking ever more inept and dangerous, the polls gave Biden a comfortable lead. We’d been here before, of course, but American voters seemed to be genuinely responding to Biden’s message of unity and stability.

During the presidential debates, he gave Trump’s ravings short shrift and regularly looked into the camera, appealing

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directly to the American public. It worked.

There was a sweet moment, when Steve Bannon was arrested in late August on wire fraud and money laundering charges, with the trial date set for May 2021. Thus, he joined the ever-growing list of Trumplandia apparatchiks and assorted dirtbags to have fallen foul of the law, with Paul Manafort, Roger Stone and Michael Flynn among those to have accumulated various convictions.

In November, Bannon called for the beheading of various public officials, including Fauci, in an outburst that immediately earned him a blanket ban on the major social media platforms. Trump did not demur.

MOMENTS OF RESPITE History rarely progresses in straight lines, and it so proved in the final days of 2020.

Joe Biden was elected President with an unprecedented 80.2 million votes. And there was considerable optimism about a Covid vaccine being rolled out in 2021.

On the flip side, almost 74 million Americans voted for a corrupt and dangerous racist. That would have been enough to win any other election, and as many commentators – most prominent among them the US political satirist Bill Maher – had been predicting, Trump was refusing to gently into that good night.

He claimed that he had won the election.

Accused the Democrats of tampering with the polls. Cited electoral fraud. HE did everything he could to undermine American democracy, and to stoke up far right extremists. There was a real danger he might attempt an authoritarian power grab.

The likelihood now seems to be that, following a prolonged period of kicking and screaming, Trump will exit the stage early in the new year, still howling about a rigged election. Thus, the scene would be set for another run in 2024.

A possibly even more frightening scenario is Trump giving the nod to a similarly sicko political operator with the kind of intellectual nous he himself sorely lacked. His presidency has opened a Pandora’s box Stateside, with tens of millions of voters now open to the idea of an authoritarian figure in the White House. Who knows what the future holds? To quote one of the great lines from Veep: the only thing that’s unthinkable is that anything is unthinkable.

Focus now shifts – along with millions of dollars in advertising – to the runoff of two Senate elections in Georgia in January. If the Democrats can win them, then they will control the Senate and Congress and Biden will be able to put policies into action. If not, expect a bruising four years. For now, however, America and the world have earned the right to a few brief moments of respite and optimism after a gut-churning year.

THE WORLD IS STILL AT WAR – BUT THE WEAPONS ARE DIFFERENT

T

he election of Joe Biden has reset global geopolitics. As he and his emerging team see it, in global geopolitical terms, the United States is back – and about to reassume its position at the head of the table.

Many might not be happy about this – but the frenzy and chaos that have characterised the past four years should give them pause for thought.

It’s not just that Donald Trump cosied up to barbarians and cheered-on despots and criminals. It’s that the lack of any coherent or consistent position or policy from the United States created a very dangerous vacuum, one exploited by the proverbial parcel of rogues.

Early in the year Trump crowed about the assassination of Major General Qasem Suleimani, a leading Iranian leader and a key military figure in the Syrian conflict. Trump called him the world’s number one terrorist and a monster.

He was neither, of course. It’s true that he was inimical to the US and Israel and a formidable strategist and that you’d have been ill-advised to cross him personally. But he was as legitimate a state actor as any of Trump’s appointees.

The assassination of Suleimani was one of many committed by state actors through 2020. But what’s new? Thankfully they don’t all succeed. The Russians failed to kill the anti-corruption politician Alexei Navalny on a flight from Tomsk to Moscow using their favoured nerve agent novichok.

Everyone condemned the Russians for that, and rightly. The same everybody made a lot less noise about the recent murder of Mohsen Fakhrizadeh, head of Iran’s nuclear programme, allegedly by Israeli agents.

What’s the difference? There is none, except whose side you think you are on.

Assassinations, whether literal or virtual, should have no place. They, and terrorist knife attacks and bombings and drone attacks, are all of a piece and equally disgraceful. That assassinations are considered routine tells us much about the world in 2020.

Trump’s policy of isolationism pandered to a bunch of authoritarian strongmen, like Putin, Xi, Erdogan, Bolsonaro, Orban, people he liked the look and sound of – people with no moral compass whatsoever, in other words. It made for grisly watching.

It also meant that he didn’t seriously confront expansionism or repression. Like, what about China and the Uighurs and Hong Kong; or indeed the vast Chinese fishing fleet which has been hoovering around the

Pacific and Indian Oceans and South East Asia for some time now?

They’re doing more than fishing.

It’s complicated. Though Covid-19 began in China they have played the pandemic well and when you compare their success in suppressing it with the unmitigated chaos of the United States under Trump, you can see why people argue that they aren’t far off being the pre-eminent world power. The Belt and Road initiative – a form of economic empire building – is developing rapidly and is aimed at taking China to that next level.

At that top table they’ll find Vlad Putin, who during the year arranged to rule until 2036.

That might explain Trump’s admiration. And yet, and yet...

A year ago Putin looked like a master tactician. This year, blindsided by crises in Belarus, Kyrgyzstan and the Caucasus where Armenia and Azerbaijan are engaged in a rather nasty war, things look different.

Meanwhile, the United States has indicted Sandworm, Russia’s most destructive cyberwar unit, one of the actors in Putin’s assymetric warfare against western targets.

Six of its agents were named and charged,

“Assassinations, whether literal or virtual, should have no place.” by the US Department of Justice, with carrying out many of the most significant cyberattacks.

That change is part of a pattern that democratic governments have to face head on. The size and slipperiness of major internet and social media companies – enterprises that manage annual turnovers that dwarf the income of small to medium sized countries and manage their own security forces – and are in control of platforms that give them extraordinary access into and control over people’s path towards knowledge, opinions and now even emotions, is also an existential threat to democracy itself.

We’re not talking here of armies as such, since no arms are necessary in cybersecurity.

But ‘do no evil ‘ bedamned. The threat is very real indeed.

Finally, we must mention the brutal, grotesque murder of teacher Samuel Paty in France, horrifically beheaded by an IS terrorist. It reminded us, as if we didn’t already know, that they haven’t gone away, you know. His death is ours. Je suis Samuel Paty…

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I R E L A N D 2020

ALL CHANGE HERE!

“The sudden onset of the pandemic effectively suspended parliament, and BAM – there we were, ruled by a new hardline junta of unelected officials and experts.”

For example, how is Sinn Féin the richest party of them all?

One excellent article by Colm Keena in the Irish Times found that the party was “a tightly controlled organisation where unelected officials seek to tell elected representatives what to do.” Sinn Féin is controlled by its Ard Comhairle, some of whom are IRA veterans. It is an old boys’ network.

There is much more to drill into. As recent weeks have confirmed, there is within Sinn Féin, a very murky background in which brutal murder and the killing of innocent civilians raised more than the odd cheer. But there’s no argument about the effectiveness of the election campaign they ran – nor about the result then, and the trend of polls since. They certainly made ground among younger voters. The question now is: can they sustain it?

Or might the atrocities of the past start to catch up with them.

For the party leadership, there is another question: how 102 HP. AN.21

come so many of the party’s TDs say outrageously stupid things on Twitter?

NOT THE CHANGE ANY OF US HAD IN MIND… Oh, for the innocence of February! Voting and arguing and having the craic, weren’t we happy in our own miserable way? Nobody noticed the shadow looming, even as the votes were cast.

Towards the end of the month, some Irish were stranded in a sandstorm on the Canaries, caused by what is called a Calima – a hot wind created by high pressure over the Sahara. The sand hung in the air like fog. All flights were cancelled. Few cars or taxis ventured out. Everyone wore masks. One woman rang home and said it was like the Apocalypse. Little did she know…

They were so relieved to get home! Some of them had a bit of a cough but thought it was just the lungs expelling the dust. They were wrong there.

Covid-19 struck like a tsunami. There was a bit of nervous gas at first, what with elbow bumps and knee bumps and wash-yer-hands. And government formation dragged on and on. But there was no evading the bullet. Everything shut – and we began to hear a whole new vocabulary of control, words like lockdown and the new normal. That one, in Hot Press, we refused to countenance under any circumstances.

The sudden onset of the pandemic effectively suspended parliament, and BAM – there we were, ruled by a new hardline junta of unelected officials and experts.

Or perhaps that should be Curia, or synod – because every day we were force-fed daily sermons with readings from the stats of gloom: this many new infections, that many dead. How grim is this reaper, how morbid these Horsemen of the Apocalypse? Ooohh, very grim indeed!

Minister for Health Simon Harris rebuilt his tattered reputation by clasping his hands and espousing pieties.

Some characterised him as the oily curate to Tony Holohan’s stern cardinal. Actually, however, it was much more like post-revolutionary Iran, with Harris playing deferential imam to Holohan’s Ayatollah at the daily prayer meetings, basking in the guru’s bright and shining light.

The fear of death, and the litany of woe, sparked an appreciation of frontline workers that was genuine.

Candles were placed in windows. Crowds formed chains in the streets and cheered. The workers might have preferred better contracts and equipment – but, sure, we do what we can.

The veneration of NPHET during those first months was far less understandable. They were just doing the job they’re very well paid to do.

And how the mainstream media gloried in Covid misery porn! We’re all going to die! Unless we’re not! It continues yet, with articles warning that a vaccine mightn’t work,

MARY-LOU: SINN FÉIN FLICKR

P

eople wondered why Leo Varadkar opted for a February election. Late Spring or Summer would always be better, they said.

They had a point! Instead of celebrating a stonking economy and zero unemployment, the lay of the land had tilted: the election became a platform for resentment and rage – about health, housing and homelessness.

It was, you might observe, Ireland’s first real social media election and, on that score, Sinn Féin were streets ahead.

In the end the numbers didn’t stack up for them to lead a Government but they now lead the Opposition – and that’s probably more to their liking right now, even though they mightn’t say it out loud.

It wasn’t just Fine Gael and Fianna Fáil that were blindsided. The media were too. Certain Shinners hung their chins out and asked to be hit, like Paddy Holohan, who was suspended by the party for homophobic comments. And there were ugly scenes as some candidates were elected, shouts of up-the-ra. Controversial past remarks by the new TD Reada Cronin emerged. But overall, they got a relatively easy ride.

The extent of their electoral success changed many things, not least the media’s view of Sinn Féin. Fresh questions were asked. Some of these might better have served the electorate before the election, but that’s life.

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GRETA BY ANDERS HELLBERG

others on sudden deafness, the Long Covid or… well, anything to block the glimmers of light, eh?

Is it any wonder that there was a shortage of toilet paper? People were shitting themselves!

Fortunately, there were exceptions to the prevailing gloom. Professor Luke O’Neill, take a bow. And not every broadcaster swallowed the standard text. Pat Kenny, take a bow too.

And we gained a new expertise. Once we were experts on banking but now we’re scientists. All we can say is: bring on the vaccines. We want an end to all of this Covid shit!

ONE DINNER AND A FUNERAL In the end, a Government formed. A sort of greenish rainbow of – in coalition together for the first time ever – Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael along with the Green Party.

And then they started shooting themselves in the foot.

Over and over again. You couldn’t make it up, really.

Barry Cowen – gone. His Fianna Fáil replacement on the front bench Dara Calleary – gone. Leo Varadkar sailing perilously close to the wind. The former Fine Gael Attorney General Seamus Wolfe refusing to go, almost costing Helen McEntee her job as Minister for Justice.

For now it appears that there is peace in the valley. But who knows what lies around the corner?

There was fun ’n’ games along the way. In the UK, they used an algorithm to assist in the marking of the GCSE. As you’d expect in a Tory swamp, it worked against the less privileged.

Cue uproar in Ireland, even before Leaving Cert results were published, because everyone expected the same.

Wrong! In the event, our algorithm worked against the privileged, even to the extent of a farcical downgrading of results in German for students of St Killian’s Deutsche school in Dublin, where they all speak excellent German.

Ya couldn’t make it up either.

The funeral in Belfast in July of Bobby Storey, seen by most as a republican hard man and enforcer, in a self-styled army that committed murders by the dozen, raised some political heat. There were long lines of men and women in black trousers, white shirts and black ties, marching through the streets of Belfast. Respectful crowds lined the roadway in numbers. And all the leading figures in Sinn Féin were there, including Mary Lou McDonald, who travelled up from Dublin even though it was clear that she was going to a Covid hotspot. There were pipers too.

In short, it was the full enchilada.

But what really caught the eye was the lack of social distancing and the absence of masks. Cartoonist Martyn Turner had some fun with a sketch in The Irish Times of an IRA group on the march, with the question “Why are they wearing masks?” – and then one of the funeral with the question “Why aren’t they wearing masks?”

For reasons that are still not clear, the outrage levels were, shall we say, moderate. Maybe Fianna Fáil and Fine Gael are just too polite for their own good.

The golf dinner fiasco in Clifden – oho now! – that was different. In truth, for sheer stupidity, it would have been hard to top, but it was hardly the making of a nuclear incident. But nuclear it became. That hallowed ground of the terminally self-righteous, Twitter, went mad. Dara Calleary (Fianna Fáil) and Jerry Buttimer (Fine Gael) fell on their swords. The dogs barked. The Government looked very lame. Then the hounds went after Phil Hogan too.

What a prize, to take down an EU Commissioner!

Looking back, it’s hard to see why one lot went down and the other lot didn’t. Their excuses were much the same. But basically, the Shinners shrugged it off, the Government didn’t. Those who resigned were accused of arrogance, those who didn’t weren’t.

Sometimes you’d wonder…

C L I M AT E C R I S I S

The Struggle Goes On

2

020 forced humanity to adapt rapidly. Perhaps, it was suggested, the pandemic had created an opportunity to revisit and change the dominant ‘Western' socioeconomic model; to move away from neo-liberalism and the “small-State” austerity model, toward greater equality, increased State spending especially for crucial services such as health, social services, education and housing – and, of course, serious climate action. Hope springs eternal.

Youth climate activists like Greta Thunberg made the point that the older generations have saddled anyone under the age of 35 with the dire task of rectifying environmental mistakes not made by them. With that as the backdrop, the EU introduced the Green New Deal. It is but a step in the right direction. Now, can the big polluters – the US, India, China, Russia etc. – be shamed into action too? At least Joe Biden’s defeat of climate change denier-in-chief Donald Trump offers some encouragement.

In an address at Áras an Uachtaráin last year, President Michael D. Higgins reaffirmed the need for a globalised response to the climate crisis. “Our task is now so urgent,” he said, “in light of the existential threat facing humankind in terms of the climate change and biodiversity crises, that it now requires a co-ordinated global response…

“Our residual sense of a shared humanity must be invoked,” he added, “to reconnect our lives through a balanced relationship between ecology, ethics, economy, culture and lived experience.”

Shared humanity and a sense of justice would become the overarching themes of 2020. The eruption of Covid-19 represented a threat to all humankind. But its impact has been unequally felt, with the influence of social class, race, ethnicity, income, nutrition, education, living conditions and geographical location conspiring to ensure that the disadvantaged have been hardest hit.

Against that backdrop, forecasts of a second Age of Revolution may not be entirely wide of the mark. In the era of social media, however, with its capacity for propagating misinformation, disinformation and downright lies, the nature of any potential political upheaval is impossible to predict. For a time, the so called Arab Spring was seen as a good thing. That, of course, was before ISIS surfed in on its big wave…

The only thing that’s really certain is that the struggle will go on.

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G E N E R A L E L E C T ION

POLITICAL PARTIES AND SOCIAL MEDIA: A RACE TO THE BOTTOM

T

he general election result in February was a major shock. By the usual metrics, Ireland was doing pretty well. Yes, there were long-running sores, in the areas of homelessness, housing and health in particular. But the economy was close to overheating and unemployment was minimal.

In theory, the outgoing Government should have done well. But it tanked.

Sinn Féin’s performance was pretty impressive. Indeed, had they fielded more candidates they might have gained several more seats.

The inquests came thick and fast. Early analysis suggested deep-seated resentment

against Government, especially among the young, over a range of issues, in particular the unavailability of affordable housing.

Many looked at the great enigma of Irish politics, The Undecideds. What had turned them so decisively?

A simple truth emerged from a study by academics Kirsty Park and Jane Suiter: Sinn Féin had used social media more effectively.

They had ten times more engagement on Facebook during the campaign than any other political party. This conclusion is supported by data from CrowdTangle.

In this context, the party’s anti-elite and “change” message resonated with younger people who are, of course, more engaged with social media than older voters. And an army of Twitter users on both sides of the border, known to many as the Shinnerbots, wade in to like or love tweets by Sinn Féin leaders and to attack those from other parties.

Thus are people confirmed in their righteousness, irrespective of whether they are right or wrong.

According to Park and Suiter, ‘Haha’, or ‘Angry’ constituted 94 per cent of emoji reactions for posts by Fine Gael; and 90 per cent for Fianna Fáil. They only accounted for

7 per cent of these reactions to posts by Sinn Féin. The study found that 91 per cent of the emoji reactions to Sinn Féin posts were ‘Love’.

This explains many things about recent Irish politics – for example, why a Twitter storm might erupt over Golfgate but not the Bobby Storey funeral. The process is rigged. The posse can be turned on or off, just like that.

If that sounds like Donald Trump it’s because in some important ways it is.

One can safely assume that other parties are belatedly trying to up their game. But can one say the same for the mainstream media which rely so heavily on Twitter reaction and trends to divine what’s agitating the mob and what’s not? Looks like Sinn Féin can play them like an accordion!

Of course, lording the Twitteracy has a price, as Brian Stanley has discovered. And something else has emerged, with the attempt to silence internal debate and the heavy hand of Democratic Centralism within the party.

Either way, getting Twitter mobs to do your dirty work for you is a race to the bottom.

You can find Park and Suiter’s study as a chapter in the latest version of How Ireland Voted 2020.

My 2020

ROB KEARNEY Rugby Player

Your Hero of 2020?

Joe Biden Villain of 2020?

Donald Trump Best Personal Moment?

Getting engaged to my Fiancé Jess Redden Best Movie or TV show?

Succession on Sky Atlantic Best record?

A star is born – Bradley Cooper and Lady Gaga Best book?

No Hiding – by me - I have to say that don’t I Best thing you saw online? (streamed gigs/trending topic/something that caught

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SUCCESSION

your attention) Music for Hope – Andrea Bocelli Your hope for next year?

A covid free world and a sense of normality returning What tickled your funny bone?

Two Jonnies do America • No Hiding: My Autobiography by Rob Kearney, is out now.

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TECH

It’s All About Entertainment (Except When It’s Not)

2

020 was the year when the world lost its grip on reality.

Lunatics thought 5G caused Covid. They burned 5G masts and posted unhinged ramblings (from their 4G phones); QAnon conspiracy theorists babbled about Satanic paedophiles harvesting children’s blood in tunnels beneath America; Donald Trump became the cheerleader for all this misinformation.

Social networks traditionally profited from such untruth and propaganda, whilst shoe-horning users into vacuum tunnels of their own guff, thereby dividing the world further. It took a pandemic and an out-ofcontrol President to finally whip Facebook and Twitter into some kind of line, with both platforms cracking down, sort of, on hate speech and misinformation. Lies spread faster than truth, so social media moderation is a game of Whac-A-Mole (except on Trump’s Twitter account where the amount of porkies would make Stalin wince).

Under 25s flocked to TikTok, a platform made in China, to post dance videos and watch stupid trends like breakfast cereal water-boarding and home socket electrocution. Yeah, that’s where you can stick your Ice Bucket Challenge, grandad.

Short-form videos provided some respite from elections, pandemics, and institutionalised racism, but so did home entertainment, with streaming services – Netflix, Amazon Prime, Apple TV, and our own networks such as RTE (wasn’t the Toy

“DESPITE ITS ABILITY TO UPEND THE WORLD, TECH REMAINS A TOOL FOR ESCAPISM.” Show great?) and TG4 – providing good reasons to stay at home and thereby avoid the plague.

Sky, which created one of the greatest TV shows in history in Chernobyl, has added over 40 movies in High Dynamic Range to its Sky Q service for Christmas. Sky Q also refined its voice search, so you can find personalised recommendations while gorging on Harry Potter. Sky Go added more access

to Master’s Golf, EFL and Nations League matches. Pick up Sky Q, Netflix, and Sky TV for €30 a month on a 12-month contract via sky.com/ie/tv Its potential ability to upend the world notwithstanding, tech remains – more than anything else – a tool for escapism. The launch of 4K next gen consoles – PS5 and Xbox Series X/S – is the stuff of dreams.

2020 closed the door on the last generation with remarkable titles such as The Last of Us Part II, Ghost of Tsushima and FIFA 2021.

With Assassin’s Creed Valhalla, Watch Dogs: Legion, and the upcoming Cyberpunk 2077 in store for the new gen, there’s more worlds to disappear into in 2021.

Between streaming and gaming, it’s a good time to invest in an outrageously massive TV. Sony’s 4K HDR A9 BRAVIA OLED, and LG’s CX introduce real world visuals into your living room. Don’t forget your friends, though: 5G’s super-fast speeds have bolstered phones such as Google Pixel 5, iPhone 12 Pro and Samsung Galaxy S11.

Sorry, conspiracy theorists.

Artists in 2020 swapped the live stage for streamed concerts; and gadgets provided the connection between them and their fans.

Three.ie has a Chrimbo selection of treats on offer, such as the Huawei FreeBuds Pro, Huawei’s wireless earphones, and JLab GO Air True Wireless Earbuds. Three.ie is also retailing the ION Air LP Record Player for a cool €99. Disinformation divides but tech, like music, has the power to connect. Over to you…

LIFESTYLES

THE YEAR OF LIVING VICARIOUSLY

2

020: the Year of the Screen or the Year of Sexual Frustration? Well, for some.

It was certainly the year of Zoom calls and staying at home. Zoomfriendly fashion trends flourished – business on the top, tracksuit on the bottom. Bra sales declined by 12%, while in May pyjama sales surged 143% in the USA. Dating also became pretty much illegal.

Tinder and Bumble installed video chat functions for the first time, so singles could mingle without the fear of spreading a potentially deadly virus. Interestingly, pornography viewing also drastically increased this year.

Netflix received 16 million new subscribers thanks to lockdown. The streaming service released one of the most popular and horrifying ruminations on power and white privilege in recent memory (yes, we’re talking

about Tiger King), which was viewed by 64 million households.

There was also – briefly, it must be said – a push to return to the simple life. Toilet paper wasn’t the only thing grocery shops ran out of. There was a dearth of flour, too, as people experimented with baking, and everyone went on the hunt for the greatest sourdough recipes.

Still, the human capacity to empathise does not seem to have been diminished by all that stay-at-home time. From the appreciation of frontline workers through concern for the plight of small businesses, to support for the Black Lives Matter movement, and the willingness to help struggling artists and musicians, we’ve shown that people retain an innate ability to band together in tough times.

Let’s be thankful for small mercies!

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THE WHOLE HOG

PA N DE M IC

The Year We Were All Treated Like Children Again

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Our test and trace system was less of a running joke – or perhaps sore would be a better word – than the equivalent in Britain.

But it was never really properly fit for purpose either. The media gave ample airtime to zero Covid zealots who cited countries like Vietnam as examples of how we could clear the virus forever. But nobody bothered to see precisely how they did it – and just how central has been their rigorous testing and tracing.

There has also been growing unease and, in many quarters, rising anger at how our ruling health junta has largely ignored the impact of lockdowns on the economy, on society and, increasingly, on mental health.

Leo Varadkar made the point that wellqualified, well-heeled and insulated public officials and academics are not at any personal economic risk from the brutal lockdown medicine they prescribe. A wag in Hot Press thought that Fergal Bowers should ask them would they be willing to work on PUP payments for the next six months.

Everyone knew what the answer would most likely be.

They’ve been so intent on the arithmetic of definable Covid illness that they’ve missed the deeper truth: that there are (at least) four separate public health emergencies.

Covid fatalities had underlying conditions.

Chronic heart disease was the most common (44% of cases); others included kidney disease, liver disease, neurological disease, respiratory disease and diabetes. The median age at death was 83. Of the 133 deaths among those aged between 25 and 64, 87% had underlying conditions. So what does that really tell you? That a certain number were whisked through the departure lounge on the express shuttle. But their tickets had been booked.

It would be absolutely and utterly wrong to measure the effectiveness of lockdowns, without properly assessing the unintended consequences. The Director of Public Prosecutions says that there has been an astonishing 87% increase, so far this year, in the number of files submitted to her office related to domestic violence or the breach of a court order.

Meanwhile, almost 150,000 fewer people attended Ireland’s main cancer screening services in the first half of the year, due to a reduction in non-Covid related care; and up to 2,000 cancers may have been “lost” as a result of the disruption caused by the Covid-19 pandemic. Might we be killing thousands to save hundreds? It is a very pertinent question.

“WE DON’T TALK ABOUT IT VERY OFTEN, BUT THE INESCAPABLE REALITY IS THAT WE GOT SOME THINGS VERY WRONG.” In mental health, directly as a result of lockdown; in domestic violence, also as a result of lockdown; in cancelled and postponed treatments and scans that will inevitably see people dying who would otherwise have survived for many years to come; and, of course, in the Covid-19 emergency itself.

Almost half-way through December, the pandemic looks like the least of them and the most manageable. The latest wave of Covid is proving less deadly. Rates of hospitalisations, intensive care admissions and deaths are a fraction of those during the first wave.

Meanwhile, in August the outpatient waiting list exceeded 600,000 for the first time. So, in locking down to save people, are we more likely to kill them? It is beginning to look increasingly like it.

There are also issues with the statistics we’ve been fed. According to the last CSO, Deaths and Cases Bulletin, over 93% of

People have also been really irritated and aggravated by NPHET leaders telling us that if we don’t behave ourselves, the restrictions will return and we’ll lose Christmas. It’s been described as a form of infantilisation and that’s a pretty accurate assessment. They’re treating us like bold children who need to be kept under control.

NPHET stands for National Public Health Emergency Team. If it had done what it says on the tin, it should have been involved in properly considering all four concurrent and inter-related health emergencies, right? But it hasn’t. NPHET’s only acknowledgement of these other crises was a mournful St Bernard nod.

You’d have thought the media might go studs-up on ‘em, wouldn’t you. You know, like they would with any ruling elite? But you’d be wrong. They have been given a relatively easy ride. As more chickens come home to roost, that might just change.

PHOTO BY KAREN KELLEHER

A

nd so, after the summer, Saint Anthony returned and got stuck in. Having reduced significantly during the first lockdown, the case numbers had increased. A variety of factors might have explained it: far more tests being carried out; those tests being better targeted; test and trace being operated more effectively; young people being tested in numbers for the first time.

Or was it just that fatigue had begun to set in, and that people were behaving more normally?

When Tony Holohan re-entered the ring, it was clear that he wanted a more dictatorial regime put in place. NPHET wanted to over-ride the oversight committee that the Government had set up and go straight for the jugular. Politically speaking, it was a direct challenge to the Government and it had to be rejected.

One view is that Holohan and associates had few qualms about subverting Government intentions. What they wanted, they would get. For their part, the Government hired consultants to furnish separate statistics. Battle was joined.

Make no mistake, there was real anger and frustration about the second lockdown among large swathes of the general public – and especially among those involved in the desperately hard graft of trying to run a business without access to customers. Was it needed? It was quite clear, after all, that the levelling off of infections had begun with Level 3. While the medics may pat themselves on the back, others identify the many failures in our approach.

We don’t talk about it very often, but the inescapable reality is that – even in the early days of the pandemic – we got some things very wrong. Our worst failure was in relation to nursing homes and care settings. Why did our various experts – so good at lecturing us all as to what we should be doing – fail so badly to see the threat to the lives of our elderly citizens? We will probably never know, but it would have behoved them all to sound a little bit less smug, condescending and – what’s that papal word? – infallible as they hogged countless hours of airtime.

There were observations they might have usefully made but didn’t: for example, that the virus may not respect borders but it uncannily targeted the less well-off, those working in care settings, meat plants and direct provision centres: places where people – often immigrants – are poorly paid and, as a result, badly housed.

THE WHOLE HOG

The Highs And The Lows Of Social Media 2020 Style

I

n a time of social distancing, social media has taken on a new centrality.

It’s a way to stay connected and to be entertained. The formats are changing. New influencers and trends are popping up everywhere. Politicians and scientists are taking to Twitter in droves. It isn’t all good.

Conspiracy theories spread like wildfire this year across myriad online platforms.

The Plandemic “documentary” promoting misinformation about COVID-19 quickly went viral on Facebook and YouTube, pushing claims that the coronavirus was created in a

lab. QAnon, a bizarre right-wing conspiracy theory claiming the world is run by a cabal of Satan-worshipping paedophiles plotting against Donald Trump, made its way from the depths of the anonymous message boardhellscape of 8kun to the mainstream social media giants. A recent study from King’s College described how those dependent on social media for news and information were more likely to believe in such conspiracies and ignore official health advice. Quelle surprise…

Facebook, YouTube and Twitter all took measures to cut down on the spread of conspiracies, but they seemed half-baked and grudging. The only thing that really matters is the bottom line. The Twitter-like “free speech” app Parler surged in popularity due to its lack of so called “censorship.” It’s one to keep your eye on.

TikTok arrived in a big way, with everyone from A-list celebrities to Jane Soaps participating in dance trends. 16-year-old Charli D’Amelio has amassed almost 100 million followers for her dances. Idaho factory worker Nathan Apodaca was able to

move out of an RV and into a house after a 30-second video of him skateboarding to Fleetwood Mac’s ‘Dreams’ while drinking cranberry juice went viral. There’s even a new TikTok community of musical theatre fans crowdsourcing a virtual production of Disney’s Ratatouille that’s quickly gained the attention of both Disney and Broadway. The power of the new format is undeniable.

As followers of Hot Press Instagram will know, live-streaming took on a new and often wonderfully exciting role this year. There were intimate living room sets and heavilyproduced streams from empty concert venues, as artists and promoters took to the new format to fill the hole left in our hearts from the cancellation of live events. Even Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez dabbled on the streaming platform Twitch playing a game of Among Us with some of the platform’s most popular users to encourage voting. It ended up being one of the website’s most successful streams ever.

Social media is still a minefield. It is a constant source of dangerous misinformation.

It gives far, far too much power to unelected people, who trade in surveillance capitalism and want to track your every move. At the same time it enables and encourages connections that otherwise could never happen. How to make it work by the people and for the people: that is the question.…

THE BRUTAL MURDER OF GEORGE FLOYD WAS A TIPPING POINT

BLM PROTEST PHOTO BY MIGUEL RUIZ; PHIL HOGAN BY VALERIE KUYPERS

M

ay 25, 2020. A police officer is photographed looking towards the camera, his left knee planted hard across the neck of a man lying prone on the ground underneath him. Even in a year of untold misery, in which awful scenes were recorded on camera in war zones and amid Covid panic alike, this is, without a doubt, the most enduring, brutal, and sickening image of them all.

Looking at the image, you know what the outcome is. You know that this is murder in the process of happening. You want to jump into the picture and knock the police officer off. But that’s impossible. And so you are left with the horribly real, nauseatingly ordinary, brutal nature of what is happening.

Murder.

It is an image that enshrines the reality of racial hatred. Of casual police brutality. Of white supremacism. And also of something else, something biblical: of sheer and utter mercilessness.

George Floyd, a 46 year-old black man, had been arrested for allegedly using a counterfeit bill in a local shop. Routine stuff.

No big deal.

The police officer Derek Chauvin handcuffed George Floyd. Even while he was standing, Floyd had complained about being unable to breathe. On the ground, Chauvin knelt, with what many would see as evident

malice aforethought, on George Floyd’s neck.

Floyd complained about not being able to breathe. Still Chauvin applied the pressure.

In evident distress, Floyd audibly said he thought he was going to die. Chauvin applied the pressure. In a moment that will live forever in the memory of millions of people across the world, Floyd then called for his mother. Chauvin applied the pressure.

George Floyd fell silent. Still Chauvin applied the pressure. Minutes passed.

Another police officer, J. Alexander Kueng, checked George Floyd's pulse and found none. He was dead. Finished. Lifeless. Still Chauvin applied the pressure. He refused to take his knee off George Floyd’s throat until he was instructed to, by medical staff.

It was a tipping point. The shocking murder of George Floyd sparked protests against police brutality all over the world. The Black Lives Matter movement gained millions of new followers. There were running battles on the streets of cities in the US, where racism is so deeply embedded that a long and hard battle will be needed to challenge and ultimately change, it. The hope now is that the momentum for change will be impossible to resist.

In Europe, Ireland and the UK, there were impassioned debates about institutional racism. In Bristol, England, a statue of the slave trader Edward Colston was toppled by a crowd of 10,000 and dumped in the

harbour, amid scenes of joyous celebration.

Within days a statue of another slave trader Robert Milligan was quietly removed from outside the Museum of London Docklands.

In the Premiership, players took the knee in solidarity. Black musicians and artists made their voices heard.

The fight against racism will not be won overnight. Racism is deeply embedded, in every aspect of institutional life in the US, the UK and across Europe. But a new emerging generation has not swallowed that pill. The impetus towards change is strong. There is room for a sliver of optimism that the brutal murder of George Floyd may ultimately be viewed as the moment when equality started to become real.

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THE WHOLE HOG

Golfgate Attendees In The Rough

I

n late August, the Government were plunged into a fresh media storm.

It began when the Irish Examiner reported on the attendance of 81 leading lights of Irish public life at the Oireachtas Golf Society dinner, at the Station House Hotel in Clifden, Galway. In a year when indoor gatherings of all types were operating under severe restrictions, the dinner going ahead at any time would have raised eyebrows. That it proceeded as planned, the day after the government had announced a new limit on indoor gatherings to six people from no more than three households, made it all the more absurd.

Amidst volcanic levels of public anger that there was one rule for the establishment and another for the great unwashed, the story quickly became a real-time Thick Of It episode. Following the swift resignations of both Fianna Fáil deputy leader Dara Calleary and Seanad Éireann Leas-

Cathaoirleach Jerry Buttimer, attention swiftly focused in on the attendance at the event of EU Trade Commissioner Phil Hogan.

Fitting his reputation as a nonpareil political enforcer, Big Phil – who’d reportedly won a George Foreman grill at the Clifden bash – was prepared to try and weather the controversy. In the end, it was death by a thousand cuts. First it emerged that on his way over to Clifden – where, according to The Irish Times, the starter options included soup, pate and “some vegetarian or salady thing” – Hogan had stopped off to pick up work documents at his apartment at the K Club in Kildare, whilst the county was still under lockdown.

Then, it was reported that Hogan had been stopped by Gardai for using his mobile phone while driving in Kildare.

With the government unable to force an EU Commissioner to resign, Commission President Ursula von der Leyen faced a growing crisis. She spoke to Phil and she finally defused the situation by tendering his resignation.

Remarkably, this proved to be only chapter one in the fallout from the Golfgate saga. Also in Clifden was newly appointed Supreme Court judge Séamus Woulfe, whose attendance prompted a nonstatutory review by ex-Chief Justice Susan

Denham. Denham recommended an informal resolution process between Woulfe and Chief Justice Frank Clarke.

Correspondence subsequently released into the public sphere by Clarke showed the Chief Justice saying he believed Woulfe should resign. The latter was having none of it. At year’s end, the controversy continued to rumble on, with the manner of Woulfe’s appointment by Minister for Justice Helen McEntee also coming under the spotlight.

Meanwhile, RTE suffered its own mortifying embarrassment when several of its most high-profile presenters were pictured at a leaving do for a colleague, failing to wear masks or observe social distancing.

Apparently, the Gardaí are making inquiries.

My 2020 Peggy Seeger Folksinger Your Hero of 2020?

Still David Attenborough.

Villain of 2020?

Still Donald Trump.

Best Personal Moment?

Too many to sort out one!

Best Movie or TV show?

The Queen’s Gambit Best record?

Too many to sort out one!

Best book?

The Hidden Life of Trees by Peter Wohlleben.

Your hope for next year?

For the human race to come to its senses and save the planet.

What tickled your funny bone?

Randy Rainbow videos.

108 HP. AN.21

Best thing you saw online?

Anastasia Tyurina 7 years old, playing the balalaika.

CHECK OUT THE VIDEO HERE:

• Peggy Seeger's First Farewell Concert tour with Calum MacColl will take place in 2021.

THE WHOLE HOG

S P OR T

Ireland Fail To Realise Euro Dream Ireland’s failure to reach next year’s Euros - where a number of games are due to take place in Dublin - presented another headache for the beleaguered FAI. Meanwhile, Tipp and Cavan made GAA history and things took a nosedive for Irish rugby.

By PAUL NOLAN

STEPHEN KENNY BY ВЯЧЕСЛАВ ЕВДОКИМОВ

T

he financial toll Covid exerted on football was, with perhaps a handful of exceptions, more acutely felt in Ireland than anywhere in Europe. As brilliantly detailed in Mark Tighe and Paul Rowan’s Champagne Football - a predictable shoo-in for Sports Book of the Year at the recent Irish Book Awards - Irish football had been mismanaged for more than a decade, and it all came home to roost in 2020.

As could only happen in the FAI, the post-John Delaney era had yielded another series of media storms. There seemed to be considerable grassroots scepticism about Niall Quinn’s “Visionary Group”, a stand-off which briefly threatened the badly needed government funds required to keep the domestic club game afloat in the absence of crowds. If harmony had briefly threatened to break out with the securing of financial support and the appointment of ex-FA commercial director Jonathan Hill as FAI CEO, the autumn would prove that Irish football is never very far from controversy.

First, despite a spirited display in which Ireland had spurned a couple of glorious goal chances, we would exit the Euro playoffs - with the attendant severe financial consequences - on penalties to Slovakia after a tense nil-all draw. The obligatory pre-game kerfuffle had seen promising duo Aaron Connolly and Adam Idah forced to withdraw from the squad due to a Covid scare after swapping seats on the plane over.

This would be the start of a seemingly endless round of player withdrawals during the autumn Nations League schedule, with Covid mostly culpable along with the usual quotient of injuries and suspensions. One of Hill’s first main duties, meanwhile, would be to conduct an internal review, after a back-room staff member was apparently unhappy with a video shown

by Kenny before a friendly with England at Wembley, which reportedly touched on

the political history between both nations.

Ultimately, the matter was resolved relatively quietly, despite predictable hysteria in The Daily Mail.

Kenny had undoubtedly achieved a serious shift in the way in Ireland played, prioritising possession and creative attacking football.

The emergence of a new generation of Irish talent, including goalkeeper Caoimhin Kelleher - who made his Champions League debut in Liverpool’s win over Ajax - also gave genuine grounds for optimism.

But the stats don’t lie: Ireland have now failed to score in seven matches under Kenny, putting us well on the way to equalling Northern Ireland’s world record of games without a goal, extending to two years from 2002 to 04. It all leaves the manager badly needing a positive start to next year’s qualifiers for the 2022 World Cup, when we'll be battling it out with Portugal and Serbia.

IN TIPP-TOP SHAPE In GAA, Dublin cast an ever-lengthening shadow over the football landscape in 2020. The five-in-a-row champions’ 22-point demolition of Meath in the Leinster final was enough to prompt an intervention from ex-Westmeath player John Connellan, who - in an open letter that quickly went viral stated that other counties in the province may soon be forced into a boycott if more equitable funding was not forthcoming.

None of which was to detract from the sheer magnificence of Dublin’s performance: an awesome display characterised by the kind of icy ruthlessness that had become the team’s trademark. The game had been preceded by one of the Irish cultural moments of 2020: a commemoration of the 100th anniversary of Bloody Sunday. In an empty Croke Park, with the stadium illuminated solely by the torchflames in a small corner by Hill 16, Brendan Gleeson delivered a powerful spoken word contribution, followed by a haunting musical performance from Colm Mac Ion Iomaire

“THE AUTUMN WOULD PROVE THAT IRISH FOOTBALL IS NEVER VERY FAR FROM CONTROVERSY.”

STEPHEN KENNY

and Lisa Hannigan.

As fate would have it, with Dublin playing on the night, the other county who participated in the Bloody Sunday game, Tipperary - wearing special commemorative jerseys - the following day defeated favourites Cork to win their first Munster championship in 85 years. It was directly followed by Cavan seeing off a highly fancied Donegal to land their first Ulster title in almost quarter of a century. Quite simply, it was an incredibly emotional weekend that will never be forgotten by GAA followers.

In hurling, meanwhile, defending champions Tipperary were defeated by Limerick in the All Ireland quarter finals, with John Kiely’s charges proving equally ruthless in dispatching Galway in the semi-final. The other semi-final found Waterford seeing off a typically dogged challenge from Brian Cody’s Kilkenny, thus setting the scene for hurling’s Messi, Austin Gleeson, to again strut his stuff in an All Ireland final.

THE DOWNWARD SPIRAL In 2020, if the apparently inexorable rise of Irish rugby didn’t grind to a shuddering halt, the project was certainly taking in water.

Following on from a colossally disappointing World Cup outing in 2019, Leinster and Ulster both made underwhelming Heineken Champions Cup exits at the quarter final stage, while the national team slumped to yet another Six Nations tanking at the hands of England, whilst also making hard work of seeing off an unheralded Georgia in the Autumn Nations Cup. The mood music had undoubtedly taken a turn for the ominous. IRFU performance director David Nucifora was asked at a press conference if a recent Leinster squad selection - with nine players sourced from the same Dublin school - meant the sport’s appeal was becoming more selective.

Nucifora retorted he was too busy focusing on the professional game.

Despite the angst, hope springs eternal and Irish coach Andy Farrell will be aiming for a vastly improved Six Nations performance in 2021, while the IRFU would dearly love the financial boost that would come with fans being admitted to stadiums again over the next 12 months.

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THE WHOLE HOG

HUSKY RESCUE Against all odds, in 1920s Alaska, a pack of huskies delivered a vaccine consignment to the local community in Nome. It was a remarkable saga that changed the way people looked at medical innovation.

M cCA N N

“The need for the vaccine was desperate, and desperately urgent.”

W

LEONHARD SEPPALA WITH TOGO FAR LEFT

hat’s surprised me most about the covid pandemic is that people I thought were wellsussed dudes turn

out to be tin-foil hatters.

I remember coming home from school one day long ago to find about 20 people clustered in silence outside Meenan’s, two doors up from us. Christina had died. She was about 13, black hair in ringlets down to her shoulders. Her death didn’t come as a total surprise. We all knew she was sick with diphtheria.

You don’t hear much about diphtheria these days. Few will have a memory of it haunting their home. But we knew all about it back then, or thought that we did, and it was terrifying. Every now and again, you’d hear in a hush that some local boy or girl had caught diphtheria and died. Parents said prayers to keep diphtheria away.

A vaccine invented in the 1880s was gradually to beat the disease down. By the beginning of this century diphtheria had for practical purposes been eliminated. But it hadn’t been smooth progression everywhere.

In 1924, Curtis Welch, 28, the only doctor in the small town of Nome in Alaska, population 2,000, two degrees south of the Arctic Circle, maximum winter temperature well below zero, noticed the beginning of a

110 HP. AN.21

trickle of deaths from diphtheria. The town was totally isolated. Welch knew that calamity was almost upon them. Three Inuit children were dead, other children were sickening.

The need for the vaccine was desperate, and desperately urgent.

But the dome of the sky was solid with ice. Airplanes were grounded. The nearest rail-head to Nome was at Nenana, 674 miles away. The only way in or out was by dog-sled, which would take 20 to 25 days, which they definitely didn’t have.

A consignment of the vaccine was put on a train at Anchorage and carried express to Nenana, to be picked up by musher Leonhard Seppala with a 20-strong pack, his lead husky Togo out front. They set off with a parcel of units of the vaccine wrapped in layers of bearskin, racing across the frozen wilderness, blinded by blizzard, putting all their trust in their dogs driving across the endless ice, climbing 5,000 feet to cross McKinley Mountain, descending to the tiny settlement of Golovin where Seppala passed the vaccine to Gunnar Kaasen, whose lead dog Balto guided the pack on the last miles home to Nome. Travelling non-stop, the mushers and dogs had made it in five and a half days. All arrived more dead than alive. They saved the town. It would be underselling their achievement to describe it as epic.

Radio was in its infancy as a means of mass communication. The story, perfectly set up for romantic sensation, was the top item and

carried in tones of high excitement on every station in North America and beyond. The coverage gave a huge boost to awareness of the vaccine, stilled doubts as to the safety and efficacy of vaccines in general, changed the way we, or most of us anyway, look at medical innovation.

The publicity spurred the first massive inoculation campaign, in the US and then in the wider world, beginning the dramatic reduction in the threat of diphtheria which in our own time has culminated in the liberation of humanity from another lethal menace.

A statue of Balto was commissioned by the city council of New York from Frederick Roth, one of the most celebrated US artists of the era. Balto was brought to New York for the unveiling.

In 2011, Togo was named by Time magazine as “Most heroic animal in American history”.

Last year, Disney released Togo, a bio-pic of Togo and Sappalo, directed by Ericson Core.

Another thing about Nome is that it was the settling for the 1960 adventure movie North To Alaska, directed by Henry Hathaway and starring Stewart Granger, John Wayne, Capucine, Ernie Kovacs and Fabian.

The film evokes Nome in its short heyday, during the Alaskan gold rush of 1890s when its population rocketed from around a thousand to 25,000 in a single summer, a wild melee of fortune-hunters converging in chaos with glittering eyes. But whatever gold was in the ground was gouged out within a couple of years. The influx was reversed as rapidly as it had arisen, leaving Nome a scattering of derelict shacks.

It was to be a quarter of a century before Nome returned to the world’s attention.

The saga of Togo and Balto made the town a minor tourist attraction. The more recent fashion for adventure holidays has further boosted its fortunes.

The theme-song from the movie has become the town’s anthem. “I’ll build for my lover/A honeymoon home/Below the old white mountain/Just a little southeast of Nome/Where the river is winding/Big nuggets they’re finding/North to Alaska/ We’re goin’ north, the rush is on.”

Well worth a listen. Think about Togo and Balto as you do.

Balto’s statue stands today on the main path leading to the Children’s Zoo in Central Park in New York.

He is a miracle dog, made of solid stone but capable of pissing on any anti-vaxxer who dawdles within range of his plinth.

Good dog.

Media

207

Loved and Lost

Marian Finucane Aaron Govern

Bones Hillman

Diana Rigg

Longtime Hot Press subscriber

Bassist, Midnight Oil

Adam Schlesinger

Bonnie Pointer

Actor, The Avengers, Game of Thrones

Singer, Fountains of Wayne

Singer, The Pointer Sisters

Alan Merrill

Brendan Bowyer

Singer-songwriter, ‘I Love Rock n’ Roll’

Singer, The Royal Showband and The Big Eight

Alex Trebek

Brian Black

Longtime Jeopardy host

Former UTV presenter

Andre Harrell

Brian Dennehy

Uptown Records founder

Fabled American-Irish screen and stage actor, Rambo

Derek Fowlds

Legendary producer; key to 80’s acid house movement

Bruce Williamson

Diego Maradona

Singer, The Temptations

Argentinian football player

Anthony Chisholm

Buck Henry

Ditch Cassidy

Tony-nominated actor, Radio Golf

Screenwriter and actor, The Graduate, Catch-22

Dublin bluesman

Actor, So Awkward

Carl Reiner

Dubstep DJ

Barbara Martin

Legendary American comedian, The Dick Van Dyke Show

Andrew Weatherall

Archie Lyndhurst

Singer, The Supremes

Betty William s Northern Irish peace activist; winner of the 1976 Nobel Peace prize

Betty Wrigh t

Those who left us in

2020

Caroline Flack TV host/presenter, Love Island

Cecil Nolan Dublin DJ

Soul singer-songwriter, ‘Tonight Is The Night’

Chadwick Boseman

Bill Withers

Chynna Rogers

Singer-songwriter, ‘Lean On Me’, ‘Ain’t No Sunshine’

Rapper; part of A$AP mob

Billy Joe Shaver

Singer, ‘You Never Know’

Actor, Black Panther, Da 5 Bloods

David Olney

Dame Vera Lynne Singer

David Prowse Actor, Star Wars and the Green Cross Code Man

Denise Johnson Singer, Primal Scream, Electronic

Actor and Basil Brush’s bestie

DJ Cookie Monsta Earl Cameron Actor, The Interpreter

Eddie Hassell Actor, The Kids Are All Right

Eddie Van Halen Guitarist, Van Halen

Elizabeth Wurtzel Author, Prozac Nation

Ellis Marsalis, Jr. Jazz pianist; music family patriarch

Elsa Raven

Country singer-songwriter, ‘Honky Tonk Heroes’

David Roback

Bob Kulick

Guitarist; founding member of Mazzy Star

Ennio Morricone

Guitarist; worked with KISS, Alice Cooper, Lou Reed

Des O’Connor

Florian Schneider

Bobby Ball

English comedian; chat show host, The Des O’Connor Show

Musician, Kraftwerk

Comedian, Cannon and Ball 112 HP. AN.21

Chadwick Boseman

Actor, Back To The Future

Italian classical composer

R E M E M B E R I N G t h e G R E AT S Fred Willard Actor, Best In Show, Waiting for Guffman

Gar Kane David Keenan band member

Geoffrey Palmer Actor, The Fall & Rise Of Reginald Perrin, A Fish Called Wanda

Gordon Haskell

John Hume Northern Irish SDLP leader; winner

of the 1998 Nobel Peace Prize

John Lewis

US congressman; civil rights activist; organiser of 1963 March on Washington

John Prine

Mary Pat Gleason

Seamus Mallon

Actor, Mom

Former NI deputy first minister

Max von Sydow

Sean Connery

Swedish actor, The Exorcist

Actor, Goldfinger

Mike Huckaby

Stirling Moss

American techno DJ

Formula 1 driver

Naya Rivera

Silvio Horta

Actor and singer, Glee

Ugly Betty creator

Spencer Davis

Singer-songwriter, ‘How Wonderful You Are’

Singer-songwriter, ‘Angel from Montgomerey’

Neil Peart

Grant Imahara

John Saxon

Nick Cordero

Singer, ‘Gimme Some Lovin’’; founder of The Spencer Davis Group

Broadway

Stephen Clements

Nikita Pearl Waligwa

Breakfast Show

Mythbusters host

Actor, A Nightmare on Elm Street

Hal Ketchum

John Sessions

Country singer-songwriter, ‘Small Town Saturday Night’

Comedian, QI, Whose Line Is It Anyway?

Harold Budd

Johnny Nash

Iconic minimalist ambient composer; known for 'soft-pedal' styles.

Harry Gregg Manchester United / Northern Ireland goalkeeper

Harry Hains American Horror Story actor

Helen Redd y

Singer-songwriter, ‘I Can See Clearly Now’

Justin Townes Earle

Singer, son of Steve Earle

Kelly Preston

Actor, Jerry Maguire

Ken Hensley

Musician, Uriah Heep

Singer-songwriter; musician, ‘I Am Woman’

Kenny Rogers

Honor Blackman

Kenzo Takada

Country singer, ‘The Gambler’

Actor, James Bond, The Avengers

Japanese fashion designer

Hillard ‘Sweet Pea’ Atkinson

Kieran O’Connor

R&B singer, Was (Not Was)

Cork Gaelic footballer

Ian Holm

Kirk Douglas

Actor, Lord of The Rings

Actor, Paths of Glory, Lust for Life

Ian Mitchell

Kobe Bryant

Guitarist, Bay City Rollers

NBA basketball player

Irrfan Khan

Larry Gogan

Drummer; songwriter, Rush Broadway star, Bullets Over

Actor, Queen of Katwe

Nobby Stiles

English footballer

Olivia De Haviland

Actor, Gone With The Wind

Orson Bean

Actor, Being John Malkovich

Pamela Hutchinson Singer, The Emotions

Northern Irish radio presenter, Q

Terence McNally

Playwright, Ragtime

Terry Jones

Comedian; actor; Monty Python

Thomas Jefferson Byrd Actor, He Got Game

Tommy DeVito

Singer, Four Seasons

Tony Allen

Senagelese footballer

Drummer; musical director of Fela Kuti’s band Africa ‘70

Pat Collins

Tony Dunne

Trad rock fiddler, Mushroom

Irish footballer

Patrick Quinn

Tony Scannell

Papa Bouba Diop

Ice Bucket Challenge activist

Actor, ITV’s The Bill

Pat Smullen

Tony Wyn-Jones

Irish champion jockey

Former BBC Radio One DJ

Paul Matters

Toots Hibbert

Former AC/DC guitarist

Peter Green

Reggae singer of Toots & The Maytals

Irish broadcaster; DJ

Guitarist; Fleetwood Mac founding member

Ty

Actor, Life of Pi, Slumdog Millionaire

Jack Charlton

Lee Kerslake

Drummer, Uriah Heep, Ozzy Osbourne

Pop Smoke

Una O’Connor

American rapper, ‘The Woo’

Irish Camogie champion

Rance Allen

Wayne Fontana

English football player; manager of the Republic of Ireland national team 1986-1996

James Lipton Interviewer/Inside The Actor’s Studio host MARIAN BY KIP CAROLL; SEAN BY ROB BOGAERTS/ANEFO

Democratic and Labour Party

Jan Howard

Lexii Alijai

Rapper, ‘Anthony’

Gospel singer, ‘Ain’t No Need of Crying’

English singer, ‘Game of Love’

Little Richard

Ray Clemence

South African ambassador to Denmark, Nelson Mandela’s daughter

American soul musician, ‘The Girl Can’t Help It’

Country singer-songwriter; Grand Ole Opry cast member for 49 years

Lynn Cohen

Jerry Jeff Walker

Lynn Shelton

Country singer-songwriter, ‘Mr. Bojangles’

Director; filmmaker, Laggies, Touchy Feely

Jerry Stiller

Mac Davis

Actor, Seinfeld; father of Ben Stiller

Joe Morgan Major league baseball player

John Dallat Northern Irish politician for Social

British rapper, ‘Turn Me On’

Actor, The Hunger Games, Across The Universe

Footballer, Liverpool

Rhonda Fleming

Actor, Pony Express

Riley Gale

Metal singer, Power Trip

Ronald Bell

Singer; co-founding member of Kool & The Gang

Singer-songwriter, ‘Texas In My Rearview Mirror’

Ronan O’Rahilly

Marian Fincuane

Ruth Bader Ginsburg

RTE radio presenter

Zindzi Mandela

Radio Caroline founder US Supreme Court judge; women’s rights pioneer Sean Connery

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FILMS of the YEAR

Press Pause.

WORDS: ROE McDERMOTT

It’s

safe to say that like in all areas, 2020 has not been a good year for cinema.

With cinemas closing down temporarily and permanently, films having their release dates consistently delayed and production being stalled on upcoming releases, Covid has impacted filmmakers and film lovers on many levels. But as ever, art perseveres, and there were still some gorgeous offerings this year. In fact, the cinematic world facing major upheaval meant that many films getting released were more diverse in nature, with many foreign, independent and genre films having some time to shine, without huge blockbuster films eclipsing them. This diversity did not always translate to diversity of tone – most of the best films of the year did have a certain bleakness, a tension, containing haunting questions about the nature of grief, class, love and the future of our planet.

Thought-provoking and emotive films are released every year, but given our new Covid existence and without the influx of lighter film fare, these messages hit a bit harder this year. However, let’s not take this as a cue to avoid powerful cinema, but instead use the incredible films that did manage to hit the big and small screen this year an opportunity to really consider what kind of world we have created, and what type of world we want to rebuild when this is all over. Hence a few of our top ten films are literally about rebuilding our world; about embracing diversity and friendship; and about working on our senses of empathy, always.

There was one lighter film released in 2020 that also deserves a mention, both for its pure, silly escapism, and for the kindness that is and always has been the foundation of its beloved characters. Earlier this year, Hot Press interviewed Keanu Reeves and Alex Winter about their warm-hearted sequel Bill And Ted Face The Music, and while the film did not manage to squeeze its way into our Top Ten Films Of The Year, we feel a special commendation must go to the film’s famous quote and philosophy, as it’s one we’re trying to really embrace moving into 2021: "Be excellent to each other."

1 PORTRAIT OF A LADY ON FIRE

Director: Céline Sciamma “Do all lovers feel they’re inventing something?” asks Céline Sciamma’s sumptuous, sensual and superbly elegant drama Portrait Of Lady On Fire. Lovers do, of course; and they’re both right and wrong. Love may be a universal emotion, but each experience of it is unique. The same could be said for Sciamma’s film; a familiar story about falling in love, but shot with such a rapturous gaze that it feels like she has indeed invented something. Set in 1770, Marianna (Noémie Merlant) is an artist assigned to secretly paint a wedding portrait of Héloïse (Adèle Haenel); the daughter of a countess resisting her betrothal. As Héloïse and Marianne walk together, Marianne’s eyes drink in every detail of her subject.

The intimacy of her gaze – and Sciamma’s – is palpable, but as the two women get to know each other, the gaze becomes mutual, changing from that of artist and muse to that of equals, and lovers. But their shared equality is not matched with the patriarchal rules binding all the women onscreen. Sciamma’s visuals are staggeringly beautiful, shots composed like luminous, textural paintings. The soundscape is also intimate; the film’s rhythm created by the sounds of brushstrokes on canvas; rustling skirts; howling wind; and the sound of held, heated breath finally escaping. We need a different word for masterpiece.

"Sciamma’s visuals are staggeringly beautiful, shots composed like luminous, textural paintings."

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FILMS of the YEAR

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PARASITE

Director: Bong Joon-Ho

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From his opening shots, Bong Joon-Ho establishes the upstairs/downstairs dynamic of his razor sharp, bleakly funny, unmistakably furious skewering of capitalism and class divides. We meet the Kim family living in a purgatorylike half-basement apartment in South Korea. The family is scrambling to survive when they all scam jobs working for the wealthy Park family and living in their des res notably elevated and spacious, set atop staircases and behind security fences - like cuckoos in a very privileged nest. But soon the story of two families from different classes reveals another lurking underneath. And this revelation creates a bleak and bloody pandemonium underscored by a bitter truth: the class system and the Sisyphean lie of aspiration can make monsters of us all.

Parasite is filled with acidic humour, entertaining shocks and brilliant performances, but what is so insidious is how politely the Park assert their dominance and strip their staff of their humanity. A fanged exploration of the protection of the wealthy, systemic abuse of workers and the oppressive, dehumanising force of capitalism.

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UNCUT GEMS

Directors: Josh Safdie, Benny Safdie

In a year defined by constant anxiety and justified paranoia, it was nice to be able to experience those emotions in the context of a film rather than our own lives for a few hours. The Safdie brothers’ propulsive thriller about the street-level misadventures of a petty crook sees Adam Sandler put in the performance of his career as Howard Ratner, a gambling addict and jeweller in New York’s Diamond District. But when a self-inflcited catastrophe involving an Ethiopian opal sends him down a spiral of danger and personal humiliation, Ratner not only has to save his skin, but watch his facade of a life come crumbling around him. As threats to his life collide with relentless (yet deserved) upheavals in his personal life, Uncut Gems becomes the ultimate anxiety nightmare, complete with sensory overload: the camera is constantly moving, voices scream over each other, the discordant score is unsettling, and the garish colours assaultive.

It’s not enjoyable exactly, but masterfully visceral and intense – and somehow makes you so grateful for the banality of your own life - which is a certain kind of gift right now.

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THE LIGHTHOUSE Director: Robert Eggers

It would be a lie to say that The Lighthouse dives straight into its genre-bending reality. It would be more accurate to say that Robert Eggers’ film violently throws you into its depths, and demands you learn how to breathe in its dark, stormy, infested waters. Gnarly lighthouse keeper Thomas Wake (Willem Dafoe) and his new enigmatic assistant Ephraim Winslow (Robert Pattinson) try to survive the loneliness and isolation of their tiny, inhospitable island. But for such a simple story, Eggers’ filmmaking style is maximalist, from the claustrophobic 1.19:1 aspect ratio, the rhapsodically salty Shakespearian dialogue, and the increasing use of beguiling fantastical imagery and metaphor. This approach is brilliant and necessary, completely immersing you in the uncanny world he has created. Pattinson and Dafoe are similarly committed, giving ferocious, embodied performances. As the men’s interactions become fuelled by alcohol, suspicion, desperate snatches for power and the weaponising of their body odour and emissions, Winslow succumbs to deterioration – but is this due to Wake, isolation, his own secret shame, or maybe some internal power of the lighthouse itself? A knowingly outrageous combination of muscular theatre, traditional folklore, psychosexual exploration and supernatural horror, The Lighthouse’s real power is its defiance of any easy categorisation.

MOVIES OF THE YEAR

FILMS of the YEAR

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DAVID ATTENBOROUGH: A LIFE ON OUR PLANET

Directors: Jonathan Hughes, Alastair Fothergill, Keith Scholey

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“I am David Attenborough and I’m 93. This is my witness statement.” There’s something both terrifying and inspiring about David Attenborough’s beautiful, sobering documentary, that is marketed as a retrospective of his 60-plus year career.

Attenborough is aware that he, and the planet, may not have more time. So he’s giving his witness statement in a court where we are "Truly breathtaking judge, saviour, but also perpetrator. visuals of lush Attenborough’s career provides a rainforests and beautiful, emotive visual for these luminous coral questions, as footage of him as a habitats are young producer highlights how rare juxtaposed with global air travel was – and how we grey rows of oil had more ecological balance. Truly palms and fish breathtaking visuals of lush rainforests gutted for market" and luminous coral habitats are juxtaposed with grey rows of oil palms and fish gutted for market; the contrast proving truly distressing to watch. We’re paving over paradise. Attenborough also has sobering predictions for future disasters, highlighting what young activists like Greta Thunberg have noted – that he won’t be alive to experience them, but that doesn’t mean he doesn’t need to care. We all should. But there are also small moments of hope, of inspiration; scenes showing sustainable farming in the Netherlands, and huge rebounds in marine life in the Pacific archipelago nation of Palau after fishing restrictions were implemented. The world can regrow, recover. We just have to let it.

LITTLE JOE

Director: Jessica Hausner

The visuals of Jessica Hausner’s subtle and unsettling sci-fi psychodrama are immediately intruiging, as Alice (Emily Beecham) is styled to resemble the exotic flower at the heart of the film; her hair is a bright, opulent orange bouffant, her labcoat a sickly mint-green. As she scurries around the laboratory in which she and her colleagues have genetically engineered a plant that emits happiness hormones when you talk to it, she looks for all the world like a moving flower atop a green stamen. And yet just as Beecham’s costume design is unsettling, there’s something amiss with this revolutionary plant, nicknamed Little Joe. Like a femme fatale in a red petal dress, Little Joe lures its victims in with the promise of joy, a beautifully perfumed scent – but then its agenda starts to unfurl. Ben Wishaw stars as Beecham’s co-workers, and the clipped, coldly delivered lines echo the clinical nature of both the lab and the numbing depression they’re hoping to cure. But as Alice begins tapping into her desires that go against the professionalism of her workplace as well as social and gendered norms, the film becomes a fascinating exploration of both the ethics of science but also the social and gendered dynamics we have all created, and how we constantly clone them. Layered and unsettling.

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KOKO-DI KOKO-DA

Director: Johannes Nyholm

After Ari Aster’s deeply unsettling, emotionally layered Scandinavia-set horror film Midsommar comes another layered Scandinavian horror that blends folklore, psychology and arresting visuals. But be warned: if your Covid self-care plan involves panning a lot of picturesque camping holidays around Ireland, maybe avoid this one. Following a life-changing personal tragedy, struggling couple Tobias (Leif Edlund) and Elin (Ylva Gallon) go on a camping trip to try to reconnect and build bridges. But as they get caught in a nightmarish Groundhog Day loop of torment, terror and death, the film becomes an unsettling horror as well as a fable about the experience of grief and loss. Director Johannes Nyholm is a master at creating tension and dread in the most banal places and interactions. Conversations about ice-cream are filled with mounting tension; dogs and cats becomes utterly haunting; the sounds of buzzing mosquitos and the lilting title song feel like ear worms designed to drive you mad. Interspersed throughout the film are shadow puppet sequences, where a rabbit family play out Tobias and Elin’s heartbreak, adding another haunting slice of emotional resonance.

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THE PAINTED BIRD Director: Václav Marhoul

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Not for the faint of heart, early screenings of The Painted Bird had audiences running from their seats. Based on Polish-American Jerzy Kosiński’s 1965 novel, this bleak portrayal of a Jewish boy’s passage across an unnamed European country during World War II is vicious, "This bleak nihilistic, and beautifully shot. The book is portrayal of a extraordinarily adapted and directed by the Jewish boy’s Czech Republic’s Václav Marhoul, who cuts passage across little from the original text - at nearly three an unnamed hours long, there is little respite. There is European also no score and no sentimentality, and the country during films uses the semi-constructed Interslavic World War II is language for most of its characters, vicious, nihilistic, simultaneously making blame impossible and beautifully and universal. He might be avoiding shot. " blaming particular countries, but in so doing the blame falls at all of humanity’s feet. The film starts on a debasing note, as a young boy is chased, beaten and forced to watch while his pet ferret is tortured, and it gets increasingly gruesome from there – and Vladimír Smutný’s utterly gorgeous, black-and-white 35mm cinematography, with lyrical shots and flawless use of light and shadows, will ensure you never forget the grisly images onscreen.

A BEAUTIFUL DAY IN THE NEIGHBORHOOD Director: Marianne Heller

In this quiet, empathy-laden character study from Marianne Heller (Can You Ever Forgive Me?), Tom Hanks plays Fred Rogers, aka Mister Rogers, the sometimes unnervingly serene, endlessly patient, boundlessly empathetic children’s television presenter who – not unlike Hanks – became an American institution. In America’s living rooms every weekday, ever loving, ever honest, ever encouraging, he was a constant for generations of children. He was America’s Dad. Based on writer Tom Junod, Matthew Rhys plays Lloyd Vogel, a journalist estranged from his own Dad. Cynical and emotionally walled, Lloyd has become known for writing scathing articles, his writing fuelled more by the desire to justify his disillusionment with humanity rather than a desire to serve it. What Lloyd discovers is that Fred Rogers’ transcendent power is connecting people with their childhoods; the joy, the innocence, the curiosity – and also the formative wounds that follow them into adulthood.

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THE PERSONAL HISTORY OF DAVID COPPERFIELD Director: Armando Iannucci

Bringing a contemporary sensibility and fitting absurdism to Dickens’ semi-autobiographical bildungsroman, Armando Iannucci casts Dev Patel as the wide-eyed, open-hearted young Copperfield. Patel brings a likeability, youthful romanticism, and gawky comic styling to the young orphan who creates a found family of oddballs and misfits through his attempts to become more upwardly mobile.

As Copperfield moves from between a bottle factory, seaside respite, law chambers, and the rural home of his aunt, Betsey Trotwood, cinematographer Zac Nicholson brings a colourful carnivalesque energy to the film, heightening the irresistibly (often unsuitably) gorgeous sets and the zany energy of the supporting characters. Peter Capaldi brings gusto and mischief to debt-ridden fibber Mr. Micawber, Tilda Swinton is glorious as the donkey-chasing Betsy, and Hugh Laurie is a delight as the kind-hearted, utterly daft Mr. Dick. e This consistently entertaining, crowd-pleasing, madcap film finds the joy both in Dickens’ words, and the wealth of British talent on display – in all its diversity.

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Covid may have hampered our ability to visit the cinema this year, but there was still a feast of top class Irish movies to check out. Roe McDermott selects the top homegrown movies of 2020.

SONGS FOR WHILE I’M AWAY

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Dir. Emer Reynolds Born in Birmingham to a single mother, Philomena Lynott, and eventually raised by his grandparents in Crumlin, Philip Lynott was a major artistic force and a groundbreaking figure in rock history. Emer Reynolds’ documentary Songs For While I’m Away uses Thin Lizzy’s songs and Lynott’s poetic lyrics as a way of illustrating the complexity of his thinking, and his desire to connect with a worldwide audience.

While the documentary features interviews with Lynott’s friends, bandmates, and music experts – including our own Niall Stokes! – it also embraces artistic visuals and archive footage. Reynolds’ empathetic approach to filmmaking means that Thin Lizzy’s rise to fame, Lynott’s personal struggles with addiction and his fear of abandonment are all handled sensitively. The film captures the excitement of Irish audiences seeing a biracial kid from Crumlin on television playing music, but also captures the complex man behind the public appearances.

• Songs For While I'm Away opens in cinemas December 26

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A GIRL FROM MOGADISHU Dir. Mary McGuckian

Dir. Michael McCormack Winner of Best Irish Documentary at the Galway Film Fleadh 2019, Breaking Out acts as an intimate journey into the heart and soul of renowned musician Fergus O’Farrell. O’Farrell was a charismatic Cork man and member of glorious '90s cult band Interference, whose talent for writing beautiful melodies and ability to put on legendary live performances didn’t translate into the commercial success he and the band deserved.

Then, when O’Farrell was diagnosed with muscular dystrophy, his music career seemed to be in jeopardy, as he lost the ability to hold a guitar or move his hands across piano keys. However, his determination to create gorgeous music never waned. He performed across Europe, sharing the stage with Glen Hansard, who went on to use O’Farrell’s timeless song ‘Gold’ in the soundtrack to the Oscar-winning Once. O’Farrell sadly died in 2016 at the age of 48, and Breaking Out is a deeply affecting film that pays tribute to his unique talent.

This inspiring drama of female empowerment is based on the testimony of Ifrah Ahmed, Female Genital Mutilation activist, who is a founder member of the United Youth of Ireland, gender advisor to the Prime Minister of Somalia and a collaborator with UNICEF, Amnesty International and the Irish Refugee Council. Aja Naomi King plays a version of Ifrah, and the film sees her fleeing a forced marriage in war-torn Somalia in 2006.

When she is trafficked to Ireland, a medical examination when seeking asylum reveals the extent of her injuries as a child. Traumatised by the memory, she channels the experience into a force for change. A film that will educate, enrage and hopefully inspire action, A Girl From Mogadishu’s greatest gift is telling more people about the powerhouse that is Ifrah Ahmed, a woman we can all look up to.

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FILMS of the YEAR

CALM WITH HORSES Dir. Nick Rowlands Masculinity, loyalty and family lie at the heart of Nick Rowlands’ crime drama, adapted from a Colin Barrett story by Joe Murtagh. Cosmo Jarvis plays Douglas ‘Arm’ Armstrong, a former boxer who has both taken and received too many harsh blows in his lifetime. Douglas is now the enforcer for the vicious Devers clan, who deal in drugs, violence and intimidation and are led by the sociopathic Paudi (Ned Dennehy.)

Paudi’s nephew Dympna (Barry Keoghan) is desperate to prove himself, and has an unbreakable hold over Arm, ordering him to beat people to a pulp and pushing him to get high. Douglas is torn between wanting to be a better father to his young son Jack, and wanting to keep his distance so Jack and Douglas’ ex Ursula (Niamh Algar) are safe – but good decisions have never been his strong suit.

Rowlands' strengths lie in character study and tension in this gritty drama.

WOLFWALKERS (Directed by Tomm Moore and Ross Stewart)

RIALTO Dir. Peter Mackie Burns

The third animated feature from two-time Academy Award nominee Tomm Moore (The Secret of Kells, Song of the Sea) and Ross Stewart is a stunning Irish folktale steeped in superstition and magic and it may be Cartoon Saloon’s finest feature yet. Wolfwalkers follows Robyn Goodfellowe, a young apprentice hunter who journeys to Ireland with her father in a time of superstition and magic to wipe out the last wolf pack.

While exploring the forbidden lands outside the city walls, Robyn befriends a free-spirited girl, Mebh, a member of a mysterious tribe rumored to have the ability to transform into wolves by night.

The characters are also richly drawn, the action fun, the ideas thought-provoking.

What more could you want?

Peter Mackie Burns’ Rialto side-steps stereotypes about masculinity and sexuality in favour of a much more complex and empathic portrait of loneliness, grief and identity. Tom Vaughn-Lawlor plays Dubliner Colm, who is struggling to process the death of his abusive, adulterous father and a possible redundancy.

Mild-mannered with a habit of constantly apologising, Colm’s bereavement and anxiety has made him retreat further into himself.

He pushes away wife Claire (Monica Dolan), snaps at his emotional mother, and stops making an effort with his belligerent son Shane (Scott Griffin.) When Colm begins paying cocky 19-year- old Jay (Tom GlynnCarney) for sex, his motivations are complex. He’s fulfilling his father’s legacy by betraying his family, but his conversations with Colm imply a desire to find himself outside of his conventional life.

PIXIE Dir. Barnaby Thompson

HERSELF Dir. Phyllida Lloyd A deeply prescient examination of the housing crisis as well as surviving abusive dynamics, Herself follows the story of Sandra (Clare Dunne), who on the surface is a young Mum struggling to provide her two young daughters with a warm, safe, happy home to grow up in. Beneath the surface, Sandra has a steely determination to change their lives for the better and when it becomes clear that there are no other options left to her, she decides to build a house herself from scratch, drawing together a community of friends to support her.

Featuring a powerhouse performance from Clare Dunne, the supporting cast includes Harriet Walter (Succession), Conleth Hill (Game of Thrones) and Cathy Belton (Philomena). This is an essential and thought-provoking film.

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Colm Meaney. Dylan Moran. Pat Shortt. The Young Offenders’ Chris Walley. And Alec Baldwin as a deadly gangster priest. What more could you want from your early cinematic Christmas present? This Irish-set crime caper also stars Peaky Blinders’ Dylan McCormack, Bohemian Rhapsody actor Hardy and Bates Motel actress Olivia Cooke in a fun and twisty film. Cooke plays Pixie, the step-daughter of a smalltime gangster in the west of Ireland.

Using her wits and charm to convince a series of silly men into helping her rob a million euro’s worth of MDMA from some local drug dealers, Pixie’s plan is to run away to the States – but judging by the misadventures she finds herself on, Ireland has just as much excitement. Pixie has echoes of In Bruges and a Father Ted-meets-Tarantino vibe, making it a perfect film for a well overdue, safe and sanitised trip to the cinema.

VIVARIUM Dir. Lorcan Finnegan Lorcan Finnegan is a critical darling after releasing this intriguing sci-fi thriller on VOD. Starring The Social Network’s Jesse Eisenberg, Green Room’s Imogen Poots and Irish actor Eanna Hardwicke, it sees a young couple trapped in a mysterious, labyrinthine, Kafka-esque suburban nightmare. All attempts to escape end in failure, culminating in the discovery of a baby with the instructions ‘raise the child and be released’. Reminiscent of Get Out and Black Mirror, Vivarium is a thrillingly provocative effort.

LACY MOORE:

RETURN OF THE AGE OF THE LIVING DEAD

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ZOMBIE FIGHTER of the YEAR

Lacy Moore is one of Ireland’s unsung acting greats. Here, she discusses her unconventional upbringing, becoming a burlesque performer and her new Amazon Prime show Age of The Living Dead.

I N T E RV I E W : TA N I S SM I T H E R PORTRAIT: BARRY McCAUL

A

s the Covid-19 pandemic was starting to wreak havoc across the UK, Lacy Moore was shooting Age Of The Living Dead, a TV series about an (un)deadly virus. You could say that the second series of the Amazon Prime show was shot in the nick of time.

“It was possibly the oddest thing I’ve ever done,” the Dublin-born actress laughs.

“And I’ve done some odd things in my life! I think there were 22 cases in the North of Ireland when we were due to start filming.”

A surreal experience to be sure, but Moore maintains that the bizarre synchronicity enhanced everyone’s performances.

“People could really relate to the scenes in the script,” she says, “because it was happening right outside the door. The atmosphere on set was really eerie.”

PIRATE RADIO STUFF Age of the Living Dead is set in a world where vampires and humans have to coexist in America. “The East coast is where the vampires are quarantined, and the West Coast is where you have the humans,” Moore explains. “The space in between is called ‘no man’s land’ and no one is allowed to go in there, save for a few militia – who are stationed there, in case the vampires ever break quarantine. They have a treaty signed up between the humans and the vampires which is called the Bloody Sunday treaty.”

Moore chuckles. She plays the Minister for Defence, working alongside the Prime Minister to develop a strategy for handling teh crisis when the treaty is broken. Chaos – and I’m sure more than a little bloodshed – ensues.

“I always thought that if I were to ever get into a sci-fi drama I would find it really tricky,” Moore reflects. “I don’t know, normally, how you would relate to those supernatural ideas. But because I was filming these scenes in the midst of a pandemic, I didn’t really have to do any digging. I was genuinely anxious, so in the series, on this occasion, I was drawing a lot from what was happening outside.”

Moore also landed a part in Allan Cubitt’s serial-killer drama The Fall back in 2016. Though the show is years old, it gained an entirely new audience – and millions of fans – when it became available on Netflix. It was a dream come true for any actor, but initially Moore wasn’t so sure she would get the part.

“It’s Alan Cubitt, so I prepped as much as I could,” she says. “I love playing really passionate characters. I also love any show, film, or book to do with serial killers.”

Moore had a less than conventional upbringing – her parents used to run a pirate radio station out of her bedroom.

“They were doing the pirate radio stuff from the time I was

born until I was six or seven,” she recalls. “It’s strange. I have really vivid memories of being one and two, and I think it’s because of the situation I was growing up in. My bedroom doubled as the studio, and that’s what they were broadcasting from. I remember that like it was yesterday – and I can only put it down to the fact that it was a very vibrant time in my bedroom.”

FROM BURLESQUE TO ROAD TRIPS Later, fleeing from a conservative Ireland, Lacy Moore moved to San Francisco,. It turns out she did it in an adventurous and freedom-loving devil-may-care spirit, becoming a burlesque dancer.

“I worked in a burlesque club. I was also a bike courier at the time, and I was working 9 hour days, six days a week. I had a friend who was a Burlesque dancer and she said, ‘Why don’t you just do burlesque – you can do it 2 or 3 times a week and earn 3 times the amount’.

“Because I was quite into performance as well,” she adds, “I used to love getting up on stage and dressing in these 1940’s costumes.

I did that for the whole rest of the time I was there.”

Does that take confidence?

“I think so,” she laughs. “In the 90s in Ireland, everything was very conservative and conventional for my upbringing. When I got to San Francisco, I wanted to do everything that was crazy, from burlesque, to acting, to road trips. Anything wacky and zany.

“But you definitely have to be a bit of an extrovert to do burlesque. I was always a bit of an extrovert as a child. I’d come from these kooky parents, and I just wasn’t conservative at all.”

She began to train as an actor in the San Francisco New Conservatory Theatre, but later graduated from the Manchester School of Theatre, which also was the spawning ground for greats like Julie Walters, Steve Coogan and Richard Griffiths.

“I didn’t know how hard acting really was, until I studied it,” Moore reflects. “I thought it was just getting up and performing, but the craft itself is such hard work. When I started training, I learned quickly that it’s very complicated to create a show or a piece of theatre.

“And to be convincing,” she adds.

“Acting doesn’t look on the outside how difficult it is on the inside. It encompasses your whole soul. You’re working on an emotional, psychological, physical level.”

She pauses.

“You’re using everything inside of you,” she adds, “so it’s very delicate work.”

Especially when there’s a deadly virus around...

“I used to love getting up on stage and dressing in these 1940’s costumes.”

• Age of the Living Dead Season 2 will air January 15th, 2021.

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1. THAT OLD COUNTRY MUSIC Kevin Barry canongate

If you read Night Boat To Tangier – and you certainly should have – you already know Barry can knock out the dialogue, but it’s the characters that shine in this quite brilliant collection of stories, and none more so than the West of Ireland, which deserves top billing in the dramatis personae. One of the stories even has a happy ending for Christ’s sake, although this should not be taken as a sign that Barry’s mellowing, as the Hemingway western, cops and robbers game of ‘Ox Mountain Death Song’ might be the best thing he’s ever written, and that is certainly saying something.

2. LOVE

Roddy Doyle johnathan cape

Fans of Doyle’s Two Pints series will find a lot to – eh – admire here as the gas dialogue that he’s been peddling since The Commitments is very much present and correct when Davy and Joe get back together. Yes, on the surface, it’s just two auld lads catching up in the pub, but Love is so much more than that. It’s a celebration

It was a year when people engaged with books as never before - and there were plenty of brilliant works to choose from. Pat Carty here selects his literary highlights of 2020.

of life, and a life that has no love in it isn’t really a life at all. You’ll laugh, you’ll cry, and the last thirty-odd pages will leave you in bits on the floor.

3. THE PULL OF THE STARS Emma Donoghue picador

As timely as the arrival of a bus in the rain, Donoghue’s novel takes place in a Dublin beset by a pandemic: the Spanish flu of a century ago. The city is also still in recovery after the shock of The Rising as Nurse Julia Power does the best she can in an understaffed maternity ward. Nothing is held back in detailing the mechanics of how we come into this world, which isn’t easy to read, but that’s probably the point. Even the love story that emerges emphasises the hardships of the time, which make our own emergency look quiet comfortable in comparison.

4. THE DIRTY SOUTH John Connolly hodder

&

stoughton

A stand alone Charlie Parker adventure that takes the detective back to near the start of his story – just after the tragedy that makes and breaks him – and reminds readers new and old what a bad, arse-kicking bastard he really is. By removing nearly all traces of

the supernatural, Connolly constructs a tough western that satisfies like a drink on a hot day. It also cleverly provides an entry point into one of the most brilliant on-going series in genre fiction for those who might have felt left out or intimidated. Kerching!

5. THE SEARCHER Tana French penguin/viking

There’s a perfectly good plot in French’s eight novel – The Searcher is not a part of her Dublin Murder Squad series – involving a missing brother and small town ne’er do wells, but it’s the local colour that wins her the medals.

Cal, a retired Chicago cop, buys a house to do up in rural Ireland but when he befriends bedraggled urchin Trey, he is dragged into some dark goings-on.

The craic with Cal’s neighbour Mart and local shopkeeper Noreen is a delight – there’s a night in the pub that had me all misty eyed – as is French’s unerring ear for chat.

Also Highly Recommended 6. Hamnet – Maggie O’Farrell (Tinder Press) 7. Snow – John Banville (Faber & Faber) 8. The Cutting Place – Jane Casey (Harper Collins) 9. A Thousand Moons – Sebastian Barry (Faber & Faber) 10. Highfire – Eoin Colfer (Jo Fletcher Books)

PICS: LOUISE MANIFOLD; KATHRIN BAUMBACH; AVA HOLTZMAN; MIGUEL RUIZ

T H E

Brought To Book

BOOKS of the YEAR

Irish Non-Fiction 1. OK, LET’S DO YOUR STUPID IDEA Patrick Freyne

penguin books ireland

Deservedly admired for his witty work in The Irish Times, Freyne turns his hand to the more personal for his first book. In a series of biographical essays, he introduces us to his Army Ranger Da, his feminist Ma, his life growing up in small town Ireland, and his close friends. There’s some hoot and snort stuff about “working” in Germany with his mates, playing in a band, and the madness of jumping out of planes, but there’s tears of another stripe when he tackles care working, mental health and his childless marriage. Freyne’s honesty and humanity shine through.

2. FLANN O’BRIEN: GALLOWS HUMOUR

Ed, Ruben Borg and Paul Fagan cork university press

Collections of critical essays can sometimes miss the point and kill the joke, but this is an endlessly fascinating compendium on Ireland’s greatest writer – all complaints to the usual address – that is guaranteed to put a light bulb over the heads of hardened Flannatics.

The main themes are the body – you know, prosthetics, syphilis, the whole bit – and death and how these notions are addressed in O’Brien’s work. I was particularly taken with Katherine Ebury on the death penalty and Siobhán Purcell’s connecting of The Third Policeman and Beckett’s Molloy, but each entry will have you reaching for the source material again.

3. WALKING WITH GHOSTS Gabriel Byrne

DAVID MITCHELL BY PAUL STUART

picador

I’d forgive Byrne anything because he was the star of Ireland’s greatest TV show – all complaints to the usual address – Bracken but I expected this to be hard work, thanks to the advance blurb. I was wrong. Adopting a non-linear structure sees Byrne as the worst plumber in history one minute, and lording it in Hollywood the next. There’s some weird stuff about fame – what’s the story with yer one and the aran jumper? – and some wellpublicised darker stuff too, but this is really a remembrance of the Ireland he left behind, one which is no longer there.

4. A GHOST IN THE THROAT Doireann Ní Ghríofa tramp press

How does one describe this book? Is it autobiography? Ní Ghríofa takes us through how a newborn changes her life. Is it a work of scholarship? After some serious bumps in the road, Ní Ghríofa – a poet herself – works on translating ‘Caoineadh Airt Uí Laoghaire’, a poem of mourning from the 18th century by Eibhlín Dubh Ní Chonaill, and her translation is included here. She becomes obsessed and the lives of these two women intertwine across the centuries, and that is where this remarkable, lyrical, and wholly original work of art takes off and becomes something else entirely..

5. NEVER MIND THE B#LL*CKS, HERE’S THE SCIENCE

where not a single comma is wasted, elevates these everyday events to epic levels.

2. TROY

Stephen Fry

penguin/michael joseph

Fry could make a bank statement riveting, and the rise and fall of the city of Troy is the greatest story ever told so you can’t go wrong here. As well as recounting the events in Homer’s Iliad, Fry also fills us in on the very bad apple, the vows for Helen, and the arseholery of Paris that caused all the problems. Far from being some sort of stuffy academic’s wet dream, this is fantastically exciting romp with all the gods, heroes, sex, violence, magic, wooden horses and dodgy heels that anyone could ask for.

Luke O’Neill gill

The pandemic made a bit of a hero out of the plainspeaking O’Neill – although selling his company for a fortune made you want to kick him in the shin out of envy – and his easy manner on the airwaves has earned him the nation’s trust. Who better then to tackle the big questions such as is there a difference between men’s and women’s brains (don’t, Carty. Just don’t – Ed)? Should we vaccinate the kids? What about euthanasia? Good questions all, but the best thing about this book, and O’Neill himself, is that it seeks to divert the landslide of bullshit that threatens to bury us all.

Also Highly Recommended 6. Beyond The Tape – Marie Cassidy (Hachette) 7. Break The Mould - Sinéad Burke (Wren & Rook) 8. The Running Book – John Connell (Picador) 9. Diary Of A Young Naturalist - Dara McAnulty (Little Toller Books) 10. This Is How We Dance – David Diebold (Monument Media)

International Fiction 1. SORRY FOR YOUR TROUBLE Richard Ford bloomsbury

The weird and wonderful thing about Ford’s writing – in this collection of short stories at least – is that nothing much seems to be happening until it hits you that lots of things are happening. Major events like Clinton’s election and the Iraq war happen just off screen as the real lives of the characters trundle on. People go shopping, they have affairs, they go to concerts, they get punched in the jaw, they get on with the business of living, and Ford’s masterly use of language,

3. UTOPIA AVENUE David Mitchell sceptre

On the one hand, this is an enjoyable ramble through the music scene of the late '60s, as Mitchell’s titular band rise up the ranks and encounter everyone from Lennon, Jagger and Bowie to Francis Bacon and – maybe - Samuel Beckett. On the other, it’s the latest entry in the ‘uber novel’ that he’s been building since his 1999 debut Ghostwritten. The clever thing is, it works both ways. Mitchell also attempts the impossible and comes close to capturing the magic of music with the written word.

There’s a great playlist to be extracted from this too, although he will always be wrong about Rush.

4. THE SILENCE Don DeLillo picador

Where will you be when the lights go out? In the dark, of course. DeLillo’s short novel – it could serve as a bookmark should you decide to read Underworld again – describes the aftermath of some undisclosed event that has turned off the power. Might have been the Russians, the Chinese, or even aliens, but our screens have gone blank so “what remains for us to see, hear, feel?” It’s a dig at our device dependence, a reflection on the pandemic, mentioned in retrospect as the book is set in 2022, and a warning about our “more advanced, more vulnerable” world.

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BOOKS of the YEAR

5. V2

Robert Harris hutchinson

Harris is, as it says on the cover, the master of the historical/political thriller, and he proves it again with this gripping tale set against the backdrop of the German V2 rocket attacks on London that took place near the end of World War II. The main characters are British analyst Kay CatonWalsh and German scientist Rudi Graf, but this is really all about the rockets themselves and their physical and psychological impact on a city that thought its enemy all but defeated. A riveting mix of fact and fiction, from an endlessly fascinating period in history.

Also Highly Recommended 6. Piranesi – Susanna Clark (Bloomsbury) 7. The Kingdom - Jo Nesbo (Vintage) 8. The Mirror & The Light – Hilary Mantel (Fourth Estate) 9. Broken – Don Winslow (Harper Collins) 10. The Last Day – Andrew Hunter Murray (Hutchinson)

International NonFiction 1. THE RATLINE: LOVE, LIES AND JUSTICE ON THE TRAIL OF A NAZI FUGITIVE Philippe Sands w&n

Nazis on the lamb, American and Russian agents in post-war Rome as the Cold War dawns, foul-play from the church – how could this story be anything other than riveting? Sands switches between recounting the life of Otto von Wächter, the Austrian who served as Nazi governor in Krakow and Galicia during the war before going on the run, and his encounters with Horst, von Wächter’s son, who still wants to see his father as an honourable man. The more Sands investigates, the clearer it becomes that Horst’s faith in his father is misplaced in this history lesson disguised as a thriller.

2. RAGE

Bob Woodward simon

&

schuster

Even if you’ve been in an enviable coma for the last five years, you wouldn’t have to get too far into this book to realise that Trump was, as Woodward states, with considerable understatement, “the wrong man for the job.” The journalist who helped bring down Nixon pulls back the curtain to show us what we already knew; Trump, referred to as “a moron” and “an idiot” by those in close proximity to him, is 126 HP. AN.21

an egotistical, intellectually bereft, soulless aberration. Has there ever been anyone in history who boasted so much about so little?

3. SEX ROBOTS & VEGAN MEAT Jenny Kleeman picador

You’re right, that is the best title of the year and it delivers what it promises on the jacket.

Kleeman takes a look at inventions and developments that are very nearly here. How about AI-equipped sex robots for the sad and lonely (where were they for the last ten months? etc.), or a device that you can knock up on your nearest 3D-printer so that you might euthanise yourself using liquid nitrogen?

Not to mention “clean meat”, i.e. lab-grown chow that will end the livestock industry that’s killing the planet, and functioning artificial wombs. Truth is stranger than fiction.

4. MORE THAN A WOMAN Caitlin Moran ebury

In this sequel to 2011’s hugely successful How To Be A Woman, the always good-value Moran tackles the war zone that is middle age.

Oh yes, it’s coming for you too, kids. Due to an irreparable birth defect, I don’t know much about being a Mum or smear tests, and I’m not that worried about the size of my arse, although I am middle aged so I do know it’s bigger than it was. Despite this handicap, I still find Moran laugh out loud funny on occasion because I’m a human being, with teenage offspring, who finds hangovers more debilitating with every year that passes.

5. AGENT SONYA: LOVER, MOTHER, SOLDIER, SPY Ben Macintyre eiking

Macintyre has good form here – The Spy And The Traitor was one of the books of 2018. The Sonya in question is Ursula Kuczynski, recruited as a communist spy when she was a bored architect’s wife in the Shanghai of the early 1930s. That sentence should be enough to make you want to read the book, and the added facts that Kuczynski moved to Russia with her children in tow, and then to England where she was crucial in securing the scientific knowledge that would help the Soviets create their own atomic bomb, should seal the deal.

Also Highly Recommended 6. The Splendid And The Vile – Erik Larson (William Collins) 7. American Sherlock – Kate Winkler Dawson (Putnam) 8. Until The End Of Time – Brian Greene (Allen Lane) 9. Hidden Valley Road: Inside The Mind Of An

American Family – Robert Kolker (Quercus) 10. Facebook: The Inside Story – Steven Levy (Penguin)

Sports Book Of The Year CHAMPAGNE FOOTBALL: THE RISE AND FALL OF JOHN DELANEY AND THE FOOTBALL ASSOCIATION OF IRELAND

Mark Tighe and Paul Rowan penguin

Even confirmed sport-o-phobes who can barely spell ‘Football’ like me couldn’t help but eat this up with a spoon. I don’t want to land Hot Press or myself in front of our learned friends, so let me say that this book – one which will have you shouting ‘Jaysus!” several times – alleges that Delaney used the coffers of the FAI. as his own personal ATM, funding a lifestyle that might have had even Mariah Carey going “ah, here!” What really boils my britches is the fact that Delaney is my cousin’s cousin, yet I couldn’t get my snout anywhere near the trough.

Music 1. ONE TWO THREE FOUR: THE BEATLES IN TIME Craig Brown fourth estate

Surely there are no more stories to tell about the fab four? If that’s true, nobody bothered to inform Craig Brown, so the Private Eye man went ahead and dug up some new ones.

Well, new to this reader at least. How about Macca nearly taking the job with Massey & Coggins? Mal Evans and the condiments on the plane from Nairobi? The original lyrics to ‘Eleanor Rigby’? There’s no way you knew any of that. Brown is funny too, especially when he puts the boot into Yoko’s ‘work’, which rankled some but seemed perfectly fair game to me.

2. WILLIAM S. BURROUGHS AND THE CULT OF ROCK N’ ROLL Casey Rae

white rabbit books

A thorough and expert examination of the influence that Burroughs’ writings, cut ups – “when you cut into the present, the future leaks out” – and audio collages have had on the artier end of rock n’ roll. Rae follows Burroughs’

BOOKS of the YEAR

beat adventures around the world, through more exotic locales than your average Bond movie, with guns and drugs (lots of drugs) and even a bit of writing. The supporting cast includes, but is not limited to, The Beatles, The Stones, Bowie, Lou Reed, Patti Smith, Kurt Cobain and a load of other heads. A trip.

3. SMALL HOURS: THE LONG NIGHT OF JOHN MARTYN Graeme Thomson omnibus press

“Did any musician in the seventies fly so free as Martyn did,” asks Thomson, “only to fall quite so far?” It’s a fair enquiry as we are reminded of the unassailable beauty of masterpieces like Solid Air and One World, only to have them compared, unfavourably of course, to lesser later works. Thomson doesn’t shy away from painting a warts and all picture of Martyn the man either, and while there are laughs to be had from his adventures with partner-in-crime Danny Thompson, genius provides no excuse for some of the behaviour recounted here. He brought that fall on himself.

HP Towers Personal Choice INVENTORY

Darran Anderson chatto

Anderson’s beautifully written memoir is testament to how normal Derry life managed to be in the most abnormal of Troubles-era circumstances.

It’s the juxtaposition of Saturday afternoon trips into town to buy records with your school pals being shot, blownup or abused by squadies, which strikes such a “There by the grace of God goes I” chord.

To this day suicide rates in Northern Ireland are higher than they are in other parts of Ireland and UK, a legacy perhaps of all that bloodshed.

As war raged in Derry – and make no mistake, it was a war – Anderson still managed to get his teenage kicks, which shows there’s joy to be had even when the bastards are working overtime to grind you down.

STUART CLARK

EXCITING TIMES Naoise Dolan weidenfeld

&

nicolson

A highly perceptive examination of the neurosis of modern love, Naoise

4. 75 VAN SONGS: INTO THE VAN MORRISON SONGBOOK Stuart Bailie bloomfield

Stuart Bailie takes a trip down memory lane and around the streets and avenues of Belfast to present a personal celebration of the work of Van The Man in his 75th year. As it says on the tin, he takes the 75 Morrison songs that mean the most to him and expands on them, with everyone from TS Eliot to PJ O’Rourke giving him a dig out. They’re presented in alphabetical order, which is fair enough, for picking favourites is nigh on impossible when every one of these songs is touched by greatness. Bailie’s reminiscences do them all justice.

5. OVERPAID, OVERSEXED, AND OVER THERE David Hepworth bantam press

Mick Jagger used to say something about how he and Keith never considered song writing in the

Dolan’s debut novel proved a stylishly written effort with three memorable characters at is core. The story follows Dubliner Ava, who relocates to Hong Kong in search of new adventure, and quickly strikes up a relationship with go-getter English banker Julian.

In one of the novel’s most adroit observations, Ava notes that Julian works for exactly the kind of financial institution that caused the crash in Ireland – but this push-and-pull seems to be at the core of their relationship. Indeed, their chemistry appears perfect as they explore Hong Kong together, only for the situation to be complicated by Ava’s growing attraction to half-Chinese, half-Singaporean lawyer Edith.

Filled with moments of wit and insight, Exciting Times offers a fascinating take on politics, class, urban life and the ex-pat experience. A true zeitgeist novel, it was deservedly one of the year’s big cult hits.

PAUL NOLAN

NIAMH CAMBELL This Happy W&N

It wouldn’t be far off the mark to talk about this being a golden age of Irish women’s writing.

We all know about Sally Rooney and the extraordinary impact of her two powerful novels Conversations With Friends and Normal People. But she is not operating in isolation – far from it. Among the genuinely fresh and wonderfully invigorating novels I read this year were The Butchers by Ruth

early days because who would want a rock 'n’ roll song from England? Most of the world, as it turned out, would very much want them, and America in particular. Hepworth is on familiar ground here, detailing the remarkable fashion in which bands from the “British Isles” – which allows the inclusion of U2 – ruled the Americas from the arrival of The Beatles in 1963 to the turning of the tide led by Michael Jackson, Madonna and Springsteen. David Coverdale? A million dollars? Preposterous. Marvellously entertaining.

Also Highly Recommended 6. Sympathy For The Drummer: Why Charlie Watts Matters – Mike Edison (Backbeat Books) 7. Broken Greek: A Story Of Chip Shops And Pop Songs – Pete Paphides (Quercus) 8. Sing Backwards And Weep – Mark Lanegan (White Rabbit) 9. Not For You: Pearl Jam And The Present Tense – Ronan Givony (Bloomsbury) 10. Confess: The Autobiography – Rob Halford (Headline)

Also see page 80 for our interview with Donal Ryan, Irish Novelist of the Year.

Gilligan and Exciting Times by Naoise Dolan. Both should be on everyone’s endof-year recommended lists.

But the one that most captured the imagination, for me, was the very brilliant This Happy by Niamh Campbell.

There is a tendency on occasion to use fiction as a way of letting the world know that women are regularly and cruelly traduced in relationships. And it does happen of course. But one of the qualities that these three writers – four if you include Sally Rooney – have in common is their unwillingness to sugar-coat the attitudes and the actions of their central female characters. They, it seems, are as capable of being wilful, obstinate, unpleasant and – when it comes to it – treacherous as any of the men that are depicted.

This is especially true of Niamh Campbell’s heroine in This Happy, Alannah. She is brilliantly drawn, and oddly attractive despite the extraordinary selfishness that is her dominant characteristic. Niamh Campbell is good on sex and sexuality – and on the complexities that surround it far more often than is conventionally acknowledged. You are not meant to like Alannah, but she has an irresistible quality.

Which is true, too, of Niamh Campbell’s writing. She is sardonic, brave and funny.

There are lots of laughs in This Happy.

But she is also a fine stylist, someone who knows that every word has a part to play.

She weighs them exceptionally well. And you are left with the impression of a writer who is herself both wise and liberated.

NIALL STOKES

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THE PHANTOM

2020

T H E S O C I A L D I S TA N C I N G S C E N E

CLOCKWISE FROM TOP: Dating Amber: CMAT; Rolling Stones Zooming; Modren Moore; Billie Eilish; Nick Cave; Bono

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W

hile we’re counting down the moments until 2020 fucks right off with itself – and then keep fucking off some more – the year wasn’t without its silver linings.

Top of the list being the tsunami of great music made in lockdown bed/living rooms and then beamed round the world.

While Hot Press cover star Denise Chaila was going to get noticed regardless, it was online word of mouth coupled with that amazing Songs From An Empty Room performance in July on RTÉ2, which turned ‘Chaila’ into one of the new abnormal’s biggest Irish hits.

Also seizing the pandemic moment was CMAT, AKA Ciara Mary-Alice Thompson, whose ‘Another Day (kfc)’ started an astonishing run of effervescent pop singles and bagged her a spot on the Hot Press Lockdown Sessions line-up.

Variously supported by Grace O’Malley Whiskey and the Department of Culture, Heritage and the Gaeltacht, there have been over a hundred gigs, which are all archived on our Insta.

See the hotpress.com Virtual Gig Guide for details of CMAT’s special Christmas revue on December 17 in Whelan’s…

Also treating us to a lockdown moment in March was a raw-voiced and bleary-eyed Bono who stayed up all night writing ‘Let Your Love Be Known’ and treated us to a livingroom premiere before hitting the leaba.

Michael Stipe was less sleep deprived but just as eager to get it out there when he performed ‘No Time For Love Like Now’ in his own Georgia, Athens des res…

The Rolling Stones discovered Zoom as a way of virtually getting the band back together in April when they performed ‘You Can’t Always Get You Want’ on split-screen for Lady Gaga’s One World: Together At Home bash, which raised $127 million for coronavirus relief.

Bob Dylan gifted us his best song in years, ‘Murder Most Foul’, in March and Gary Lightbody, Margo Price and Josh Ritter were early adopters of the intimate fireside gig…

We spent many a night glued to the Twitter listening parties thrown by Tim Burgess, still a Charlatan but one with a heart of gold and an intuitive understanding of rock ‘n’ roll community.

From Adam Ant, The Pogues and Kate Nash to Bonnie Tyler, The Cure and Sophie Ellis-Bextor, there has nary been a dull moment. Come Christmas it had better be Lord Tim of Twitterdom or Liz may have to fend off her own social media mob…

While nothing will ever replace the magic of queuing for the toilets or having beer spilled over you by a blubbery bloke in a county jersey, Fontaines D.C. did an excellent job of easing our festival withdrawal symptoms in July with their incendiary Kilmainham Gaol performance…

And in November we got shivers on the sofa watching the respective Billy Eilish, Nick Cave, Kylie and Foo Fighters livestreams. A hundred and twenty-five thousand people also stumped up fifteen quid each to watch Niall Horan beaming in from the Royal Albert Hall, which raised a tidy sum for his road crew and the wider #WeNeedCrew relief organisation. Stellar work, Mr. H….

A doff of The Phantom’s headphones too to Offaly man Harry Prendergast, AKA Modren Moore whose lockdown public service announcements in a Christy stylee (“Stay Inside Ye Pricks”) and Kildareified versions of ‘Bullet In The Head’ and ‘Regulate’ made us laugh like drains. You’ll find them all archived on YouTube…

Along with musical sustenance, Twitter also provided us with such unlikely foodie heroes as Amnesty International Ireland’s Colm O’Gorman and book publicist Cormac Kinsella who treated us to daily recipes and pictures of their wondrous creations...

Not content with breaking records with their TV adaptation

“Knowing Philip they would all be on his next collaboration. Pain in the bloody arse he’s not around to see all this exciting new Black Irish talent.”

JIM FITZPATRICK

of Sally Rooney’s Normal People, Element Pictures in June snapped up the rights to Louise Nealon’s debut Snowflake novel.

It’s being published on April 12, 2021 by Manilla Press, a new imprint who’ve acquired it and a follow-up book for a six-figure sum.

Twenty-seven year old Nealon combines writing with working on the family farm in Kildare…

And the Best Supporting Actor of the Year award goes to…. the Hot Press Drugs In Ireland: What The Hell Is Going On? cover!

Yep, June saw our 1995 pharmaceutical special appearing in Dating Amber, a very, very funny and very, very moving LGBTQ coming of age comedy set in Kildare, and which also features Féile t-shirts, Blur vs. Oasis arguments, the Divorce Referendum and Pulp songs.

If the Fionn O’Shea, Lola Petticrew, Sharon Horgan and Barry Ward co-starring yarn flew under your radar, it’s available on Amazon Prime Video…

In October, the High Court adjudged that Ian Bailey shouldn’t be extradited to France where he’d been convicted in absentia for the 1996 killing of Sophie Toscan du Plantier in West Cork.

Bailey, a former journalist who was interviewed

by Hot Press and appeared in our Electric Picnic Chatroom, has now confirmed his participation in The Murder At The Cottage, a Netflix five-parter which, making his documentary bow, will be directed by Jim Sheridan.

Also appearing, and doubtless telling a very different story, are members of Sophie’s family whose search for justice continues…

Thin Lizzy artist Jim Fitzpatrick was among those giving our Narolane Records/Phil Lynott

Flip Cover Issue the ‘thumbs up’.

“Philip would bloody love these guys,” Jim said after messaging his “well deserved” congrats to the aforementioned Denise Chaila, God Knows and MuRli. “Knowing Philip they would all be on his next collaboration,” he continued. “Pain in the bloody arse he’s not around to see all this exciting new Black Irish talent.”

That it is. Also delighted with Denise & Co. covering Hot Press with glory were rock ‘n’ roll professor Eoin Devereux who declared: “This is just brilliant. World Domination from Limerick!” and Shannonside electro poppers T.A. Narrative who added: “Unreal. Hup Limerick ta fuck!!”

We really couldn’t have put it any better ourselves…

Joining the list of those we sadly lost this year – see page for our full 2020 Roll Of Honour –is Cecil Nolan, the legendary Dublin DJ who sadly lost his battle with cancer last month aged 81.

Cecil was the man behind the Grove, which for thirty years was a hangout for punk, metal and indie-loving teens who got an excellent musical education from him.

The annual reunions, which always sold-out in double-quick time, are testimony to the regard he was held in…

The Phantom was also sorry to hear of the passing of Ditch Cassidy, the Dublin bluesman who shot to fame in the 1960s as a member of the King Bees showband and went on to work with the likes of Gary Moore and Thin Lizzy.

Our last sighting of him was at a 2019 Philo tribute gig in the Bloody Stream, Howth where Ditch absolutely nailed ‘Don’t Believe A Word’.

HP. AN.21 129

My 2020

Niamh Campbell Author

Your Hero of 2020? My baby niece Lani, born in January, who kept our spirits up all year by not having a clue what was going on.

Villain of 2020? In a year of many villains, it is hard to choose just one. Let’s say Dominic Cummings.

PHOTO STE MURRAY

Best Personal Moment?

Winning the Sunday Times Short Story Award. Being told via Zoom in the attic of my parents’ house.

My 2020 Daryl McCormack Actor

Your Hero of 2020?

My Grandfather Percy Thomas. He’s always been a hero of mine.

Villain of 2020?

Covid-19 Best Personal Moment?

Seeing myself on a cinema screen for the first time.

Best Movie or TV show?

I Know This Much Is True (HBO). Mark Ruffalo’s performance was so heartbreaking and such an incredibly made show.

Best book?

Don’t Touch My Hair by Emma Dabiri.

Best thing you saw

130 HP. AN.21

online?

Joe Biden delivering his first speech as President.

Best record?

Beautiful Faces by Declan McKenna Your hope/goal for next year?

Go on a scenic road trip with my Mum. What tickled your funny bone?

Video of a man placing a toy cowboy hat on the head of a Kookaburra.

CHECK OUT THE VIDEO HERE:

• Daryl McCormack stars in Pixie, out now.

Best Movie or TV show?

The gentle Rialto, by Mark O’Halloran and Peter Mackie Burns.

Best record? Maija Sophia, Bath Time.

Best book?

Doireann Ni Ghriofa, A Ghost in the Throat.

Best thing you saw online? (streamed gigs/ trending topic/something that caught your attention) Hugh Cooney’s ‘Sequel: Lockdown Musings of a Selfish Man II’.

Serpent of the Zeitgeist eating its own tail.

Your hope for next year?

A workable vaccine, or at least no more murder hornets.

What tickled your funny bone?

Learning that interview pull quotes will always be the most unfortunate things you said.

• Niamh Campbell's latest novel This Happy is out now

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