Lilly Higgins, sister of Cobh comedian Maeve, has just published her first book and is due her first baby in 2012. “In the game of sisters,” says Maeve, “this means she is ahead.”

Truth is, there has been a lot more sibling co-op... read

‘It's better to be king for a night, thank schmuck for a lifetime.’ So said Robert De Niro’s character, Rupert Pupkin, in the excellent and underated film from 1983, The King of Comedy. Three of Ireland’s own ‘Kings of Comedy’ come to Cork next week for... read

Earlier this year while reading Billy Bragg’s autobiography, Still Suitable for Miners, I came across a chap called Porky the Poet, who gets a job as a general gopher for Bragg’s record label, Go! Discs. A young and rather large man, Porky was obviously held in great affection by ... read

What is on Cian Nugent’s i-Pod of late is very much at odds with the music contained on his new album Doubles. The brooding guitarist has been listening to the boogey rock of Canned Heat and Steely Dan on heavy rotation, far from the atmospheric and at times edgy sounds on his... read

Every now and then, an Irish album comes along that literally stops you in your tracks and takes your breath away with its imagination and scope. Though the standard of Irish music is generally pretty high, these gems only surface sporadically and are usually the work of seasoned campaigners ... read

The wonderfully named Benjamin Francis Leftwich sounds like he has sprang from the pages of a Dickens’ novel. It conjured up a mental image of a small man, bent over a desk with reading glasses, scribbling furiously into a ledger.

Instead, Benjamin Leftwich is one of the rising s... read

Canadian songwriter Owen Pallett has got opinions and he’s not afraid to share them. Refreshing honest about the music business, music journalism and his home country, Pallett shoots from the hip in a manner that most modern interviewees are recluctant to do.

For the re... read

“When Ian (Curtis) died and Joy Division finished, we packed everything up in a big box and never touched it,” says Mancunian Peter Hook ahead of this weekend’s Cork X South West festival.

“There was too much pain in that box and none of us could open it for lo... read

Ballymaloe's Rory Allen says that he ‘realised a dream’ when he opened the doors of The Grain Store for business. The centuries’ old building had been lying dormant for years, gradually falling into a state of utter disrepair, when he decided to follow his passion for mu... read

THE musical journey from Pat Lynch and The Airchords 1967 Eurovision Song for Ireland entry to Jedward in 2011 has been a long one with a few twists and turns. In ’67, Bishopstown man Pat Lynch was pipped by a vote by a certain Pat McGuigan, who would later become world renowned for bel... read