Thursday, March 9, 2006

Barry Devlin spotted in the New York Times

FILM REVIEW; A Dublin Dreamer Confronts Reality

No writer was ever more urbane and sophisticated than Oscar Wilde, so it comes as a shock that Albert Finney has discovered Wilde's warm and fuzzy side. In "A Man of No Importance," Mr. Finney plays Alfie Byrne, a bus conductor in Dublin in the early 1960's. He wears Wilde's trademark green carnation while riding an emerald-green double-decker bus. He reads Wilde's plays and poetry aloud to his rapt passengers every morning, and he directs local productions of Wilde's plays at the parish hall. Mr. Carney, the rough-hewn butcher (Michael Gambon), usually plays the lead.

Alfie is almost as enamored of Wilde as he is of Robbie (Rufus Sewell), the handsome young driver of his bus, though he will admit this passion only to his own bedroom mirror. A repressed homosexual masquerading as one more Dublin bachelor, Alfie doesn't see why his little drama group shouldn't put on Wilde's "Salome," complete with the dance of the seven veils. He is one of the last true innocents.

This is an older article, but was sent to me. More at the link, and it did not appear to need subscription (as sometimes is the case).

Wednesday, March 8, 2006

Horslips in alt.music.jethro.tull

Rebecca569 writes

What about Horslips?

I always forget about the alt.music world of discussion! Looking around just now it seems much less riddled with commercial postings than in days of yore.

Also intrigued by the promising thread Did any women like Tull?

They did if they were dating my husband!

Sunday, March 5, 2006

Johnny Fean & Steve Travers on MySpace

An excellent site for the latest news on Fean and Travers as well as a link to their official site at www.feanandtravers.com.

So bookmark Johnny and Steve's MySpace page:

http://www.myspace.com/feantravers



Two new songs added yesterday. "King of the Fairies" and "Dingle Regatta;" both recorded live at Dolans, Limerick.

Thursday, February 16, 2006

Found another Horslips Fan! And a great Folk Music Blog too

Came across this one last night:

FusiveBlog.co.uk

There's a reliance here on the Wikipedia entry, which I've been told could use some vetting, but I was mostly impressed with how the history is up to date. The "RTE Television Program" described in the last paragraph is Other Voices and it aired just last night.

Dick Cheney could not be reached for comment.

Wednesday, February 15, 2006

Horslips on RTE's Other Voices TONITE

Sharing vocal duties, Barry Devlin (bass), Seán Fean (lead guitar) Eamon Carr (drums), Charles O'Connor (violin, mandolin) and Jim Lockhart (flute, tin whistle, keyboards) performed their first electric set in OVER 25 YEARS last December. Tonight, on the current season of the critically acclaimed Other Voices, this fantastic moment in Irish rock history will be shown on RTE 2.

After that, the rest of the world -- and that includes me -- will be able to watch online at the Other Voices Archive Site.

And don't forget tomorrow's live web chat with Barry Devlin and Jim Lockhart. Submit your questions online now.

Sunday, February 12, 2006

And Horslips Week is Off and Running with John Kelly's Mystery Train on RTE

John Kelly's Mystery Train has a feature called "The First Time:"

The First Time is just that - A Famous (or soon to be famous!) Person tells us about a piece of music that has stayed with them since that first time they heard it... Maybe they fell in or out of love, turned on to music, or just became besotted with a voice.

The Mystery Train carriage staff also hit the Other Voices festival in Dingle and we have a truck-load of First Times which we'll lash out on the next few months. "The First Time" on the Mystery Train Monday nights.

Now the astute web-surfer would note that it is a rather handsome picture of Horslips themselves that graces this feature!

The Mystery Train with John Kelly
8.30 - 10pm (Ireland Time, so 12:30 Pacific Time and 3:30 Eastern Time)
Monday - Thursday

Shows also archived on site above.

Tara Telephone Update & Horslips Week Begins

Back in October, I described my interest inTara Telephone, a music and poetry performance group important to the history of Horslips.

Work on the Tara Telephone site has continued, with a page devoted specifically to this up and running on a MySpace Tara Telephone tribute page. Amazingly, it was the discovery of the literary community of MySpace that encouraged me to explore that channel as a way to research and connect with other people who are interested in contemporary poetry. The Charles Bukowski tribute page here demonstrates what MySpace can also do for literature.

And it works. I've 'met' BP Fallon and have been absolutely intoxicated by his wild site.

I truly hope to use this MySpace page and the supporting site to draw attention to the significance of Tara Telephone, which had an influence on both the contemporary rock scene and the modern poetry scene of Ireland. My own interest in this is the realization that it then becomes part of the international beat movement, which had epicenters in San Francisco, New York, London, and Liverpool -- to name the few.

This following week will be a big week for Horslips news, with performance in Dingle airing on Wed. 15th Feb., on Other Voices RTE Two at 11.30pm. Fans of Horslips will be able to take part in a web chat with Jim & Barry on Thursday 16th Feb. at 2pm. All times are Dublin timezone times. Closer to the chat, I'll try to have up the timezone conversion.