Dublin Opinion

What the fuck did he expect? Richard Bruton to step aside and let Lee take his cabinet seat? Leo Varadkar to grow a heart and lose a spine? Enda Kenny to make shrewd and calculating choices?

It’s hard to know which is funnier: that George Lee thought Fine Gael knew (or cared) about the economy, or that the people of South Dublin (well, 27,768 of them) thought George Lee had the answers.

George said yesterday that:

It has been a very difficult decision, but it is one that I have taken after a great deal of reflection on my position and on the role that I have been playing in Fine Gael since I joined that Party in May last year.

The nine months since then have been a period of enormous economic upheaval. Throughout that period I have done my best to play a positive role in contributing to the national debate and to efforts to find a solution for many of the country’s economic problems.

The reality, however, is that despite my best efforts I have had virtually no influence or input into shaping Fine Gael’s economic policies at this most critical time.

The role I have been playing within the party has been very limited and I have found this to be personally unfulfilling.

When I entered politics last May I made it clear that I was doing so because I wanted to try to play a new role contributing to economic policy formulation. After nine months of trying within the political system it is now my considered view that the role available to me within Fine Gael is not a role I am happy to play…

I do not believe I would be serving the electorate honestly if I were to continue allowing my efforts and mandate to be used to promote and market economic policies into which I have had no input.”

Well, I tell you one thing, George, to walk away from a loveless relationship is never easy.

Keep the chin up.

This is for you.

[Thanks to Dave Kelly for the demos.]

According to Irish Punk and New Wake Discography, the Outpatients were:

[a] Finglas area quartet who recorded some demo tapes in 1987-88 described as ‘infectious’ by Hot Press. They appeared on Danceline’s Swimming Out of the Pool compilation in 1988, had a single on Danceline in 1989, and split in 1990.

 

 Pearl [2:53m]: Play Now | Play in Popup

 

 Cornershop [4:07m]: Play Now | Play in Popup

 

 Dog Eared Love: Play Now | Play in Popup

Here is a short seven-minute clip of Thomas Mac Giolla speaking at the Desmond Greaves School last September. I was there to record Brian Hanley and Mick Ryan for an audio podcast, but when Thomás got up to speak I grabbed my digital camera and filmed as much as I could before the memory card filled up.

By way of small tribute, the man in his own words.

There is a theory that all TV takes place within the mind of Tommy Westphall.

The idea is that characters (as opposed to simply actors) cross-over from different shows, reappearing and disappearing as thoughts in Tommy’s head.

There is a map of this universe, available here.

For my own small part, here’s a video showing the Homicide: Life on the Street character John Munch at the opening of his bar in season three of the show, followed by Munch in season five, episode seven of The Wire, talking about how he once owned a bar.

My choice for album of the year for 2009, Merriweather Post Pavilion from Animal Collective, was released fairly early in the proceedings; January, in fact. I had thought that the music industry wisdom was not to make new offerings in that month, as nobody is buying after Christmas. Perhaps that memo was rescinded and now, for some reason, January is prime time. In any case, for my money, with 2010 barely into its infancy, there have already been not one, not two, but three great new records in contention for album of the year this year.

It’s been almost five years since Four Tet last released a ‘proper’ album, and this year’s There Is Love in You is a cracker. Four Tet’s Kieran Hebden has been plenty busy in the interim with remixes, collaborative work, and side-projects; this new album, however, harks back to the great Rounds album in 2003 but with gliding vocals, dubstep, and a fuller but still very mellow sound. Here’s Plastic People:

I thought I had just lost track of Tindersticks, the way you sometimes lose track of bands when one album bleeds gently one into another, but it turns out that the band had broken up for a number of years. So it wasn’t me, it was them. In any case they are back, in a changed guise, a stripped-down personnel roster (now including our own David Kitt), and with a positively upbeat chipper sound on Falling Down A Mountain. Here’s Black Smoke:

And then, out of the blue we hear that Gil Scott-Heron has a new album out, this week in fact (OK, so it’s now no longer January, but work with me here…). This is really unexpected - Scott-Heron hasn’t really been around for the longest time (he’s been in prison, but his troubles are well documented so we’ll leave that alone). I’m New Here clocks in at an all-too-brief 28 minutes - from many artists this would seem lazy - here, though, it just means you’re going to be hitting ‘repeat’ a bunch of times. It’s beautiful, and while the voice is clearly that of a man pushing on in years, the authority is retained. This is him covering Robert Johnson’s Me And The Devil:

For a while, the entire album is being streamed on his website.

Musically, a great start to the year. The other 11 months have their work cut out for them.

[ Vikus Van de Merwe under the Muddership from IMDB Gallery ]

According to one of those pub myths (of the type The Brother might pass on to you) - no other than yer man Lenin spoke English with a pronounced Dublin accent. It could even be narrowed down to a Rathmines accent, due to the Rathmines-born English teacher who passed it on to him in the first place (or so sez de brudder). I had the eerie sensation I had been transported back to Dublin the other night through, of all things, watching ‘District 9′ on DVD.

This eerie sensation came from the film’s lead character Wikus Van De Merwe (played by Sharlto Copley) and his way of pronouncing every Dubliner’s (and apparently every Afrikaaner’s) favourite means of punctuation - the word fook Continue Reading »

Every so often the question comes up: why doesn’t Labour drop its links with the unions?

To which I usually reply: it should, as long as Fianna Fáil promises to do the same.

So much of Irish labour history is assumed, with the theories of what happened influenced by the British template of how organised labour functions in political life.

The reality in Ireland is a lot more complicated, with the labour movement split between Labour and Fianna Fáil, and with both camps heavily influenced by the Jesuits and Church teaching on social issues.

Anyway, have a read of this article from 1967. I hope it’ll help to illustrate just some of the strands which exist in the history of organised labour in Ireland.

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[ Photo from Dave Murphy & Friends MySpace ]
Dave Murphy is one of those Dublin institutions who has never really been on the media’s radar - and most likely prefers it that way. I was reminded of him during January when Kevin Courtney paid a nice tribute to him in the Irish Times (as if to prove my first assertion wrong straight away). All the nicer a tribute as DM is still alive and well and bringing his weekly singer-songwriters night into its 21st year - the article marks the 20th anniversary of the night in question.
Continue Reading »

UC Berkeley’s Harry Kreisler interviews historian and activist Howard Zinn. (2001) Series: Conversations with History

The future is an infinite succession of presents, and to live now as we think human beings should live, in defiance of all that is bad around us, is itself a marvelous victory.”