Gar Veteran Member Posts:1676  
| 4/12/2005 11:25 AM |
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Yes but he didn't mention any other singer/songwriter other than the norm. For example, Mark Geary has just been profiled in respected American Magazine Paste as one to watch in 2005. There are many more that are worth mentioning.
As for respecting someone's opinion, I think just because I disagreed with what he wrote doesn't mean I don't respect his opinion or look down upon him in any way. I just thought that the article could've been better written.
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aidan Advanced Member Posts:638
| 4/12/2005 11:30 AM |
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“Ireland is a great place to serve your apprenticeship...We love music and we love words.” “I don’t want to lapse into clichés, but it really does feel like everyone has a song in their hearts there,” - this is the usual stage-irishness and stereotypical view of the celtic countries as being wild and artistic; by inference, being illogical and emotional. I'm surprised that a good writer like mark edwards is recycling this sort of stuff; I thought it had died out with queen victoria. but then, john hughes has done well for himself by selling the 'oirish' product...
edwards' article is typical of the reviews/features that damien dempsey gets - always talking about how authentic and raw his subject matter is and how his accent embodies these same qualities; rarely any in-depth discussion (apart from rare instances like celine's review of 'shots' on this site, where she talks about intrumentation, styles, etc) of whether the music itself is actually any good; usually just patronising 'working-class hero' stuff - to which dempsey himself contributes e.g. by posing for photos as a boxer. fine, he boxes, but he's not slow to use this to contribute to his image.
however, edwards is spot-on when he talks of the 'male mid-life angst' market which laps up oversensitive, humourless singer-songers like paddy casey and damien rice. think of how we over-do celebrity mourning and are so zealous about football because we yearn for communal experiences to replace religion and our lost community-spirit - perhaps in a similar way we as a society have a need for expressing/sharing our feelings that can only be filled by whining, whinging singer-songers.... any sociologists out there who can explain this?
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jmc105 Basic Member Posts:188
| 4/12/2005 11:43 AM |
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sorry, i wasn't clear. didn't mean to suggest that you don't respect his opinion, in fact i wasn't referring to you at all. i was referring to the tendency some people have to go overboard in rubbishing genres/artists they don't personally like.
as for the article itself, yes, he could have mentioned some newer, lesser known, promising musicians - and mark geary would have been an excellent example, altho the writer's focus was more on the uk than the us, which is where mark has made the biggest impression outside of ireland.
i got the impression that this was a 'product-placement' type piece for this tara blaise character, and the sunday times is not a dedicated music magazine, so i'm guessing that he had to keep his references fairly 'mainstream', hence kitt, rice etc. so in that context i still feel he managed to raise some interesting points, especially the question of just why there are so many successful singer/songwriters around ireland at the moment.
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jmc105Basic Member Posts:188
| 4/12/2005 12:12 PM |
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quote:
Originally posted by aidan
“I don’t want to lapse into clichés, but it really does feel like everyone has a song in their hearts there,” - this is the usual stage-irishness and stereotypical view of the celtic countries as being wild and artistic; by inference, being illogical and emotional. I'm surprised that a good writer like mark edwards is recycling this sort of stuff
in fairness, that quote formed only part of the article's efforts to explain why there are more singer/songwriters per capita in ireland than is apparently the case in the uk - and i'm not sure every reader would share your view that the inference is that all irish people are wild, illogical, emotional and artistic. then again i remember a party i was at in london where an english girl asked me if i could sing, then said 'of course you can, you're irish'. she had recently graduated from the royal academy of music, where quite a few irish musicians study, and her impression was that irish people are, typically, better singers than english people. i didn't feel like i'd just been called wild, emotional and illogical tho...
quote:
Originally posted by aidan
however, edwards is spot-on when he talks of the 'male mid-life angst' market which laps up oversensitive, humourless singer-songers like paddy casey and damien rice. think of how we over-do celebrity mourning and are so zealous about football because we yearn for communal experiences to replace religion and our lost community-spirit - perhaps in a similar way we as a society have a need for expressing/sharing our feelings that can only be filled by whining, whinging singer-songers.... any sociologists out there who can explain this?
i take it you like your music hilarious and numb?
i wonder why it is that for some it is whining and whinging, and for others it is emotional honesty?
there is no doubt tho that music is, to some extent, a source of spiritual comfort for many people. gorecki's famous 3rd symphony and the recent popularity of plainchant (gregorian chant) are good examples from the world of classical music. |
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PilchardAdvanced Member Posts:699
| 4/12/2005 12:29 PM |
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quote:
Originally posted by aidan
“
edwards' article is typical of the reviews/features that damien dempsey gets - always talking about how authentic and raw his subject matter is and how his accent embodies these same qualities; rarely any in-depth discussion (apart from rare instances like celine's review of 'shots' on this site, where she talks about intrumentation, styles, etc) of whether the music itself is actually any good; usually just patronising 'working-class hero' stuff - to which dempsey himself contributes e.g. by posing for photos as a boxer. fine, he boxes, but he's not slow to use this to contribute to his image.
the whole damien dempsey thing to my mind is the most interesting singersongwriter development of them all. Forget the softshoe marketing of Damien Rice to british roses looking for a bit of stubbly rough or The Frames becoming the 21st century Sawdoctors, with "Shots", Damien Dempsey has crossed over to the mainstream - a Number One album, slots in all the usual places and i believe even a "guest spot" in Lillies Bordello. He is now as mainstream as Westlife or Royston Brady - and yes, I know how silly that looks.
However, despite the fact that Damien seems to all intents and purposes to be a very nice bloke, there has been no real indepth examination of what's behind him. For instance, the only reference I have read to his Sinn Fein fundraising activities came in The Irish Times - this to me is a very significant aspect of Dempsey's past yet no-one else has picked up on it bar that interviewer. Not even Hot Press, where the piece on him was as soft as s**te. Given what Aidan is saying about authenticity and rawness, this is where I would start and to hell with the boxing and the hard-chaw Dubbbbbbblinese. Just how does Damien Dempsey's SF sympathies effect the music? And does it matter a damn to his audience here or elsewhere?
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aidanAdvanced Member Posts:638
| 4/12/2005 12:42 PM |
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quote:
Originally posted by jmc105
i take it you like your music hilarious and numb?
i wonder why it is that for some it is whining and whinging, and for others it is emotional honesty?
there is no doubt tho that music is, to some extent, a source of spiritual comfort for many people. gorecki's famous 3rd symphony and the recent popularity of plainchant (gregorian chant) are good examples from the world of classical music.
hilarious and numb, yes!!! at LAST, someone who understands me 
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jmc105Basic Member Posts:188
| 4/12/2005 12:45 PM |
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pilchard - just curious about how much you know about damien dempsey's fundraising activities for sinn féin? haven't heard anything about this before...
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MullyAdvanced Member Posts:849
| 4/12/2005 12:56 PM |
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quote:
Originally posted by jmc105
pilchard - just curious about how much you know about damien dempsey's fundraising activities for sinn féin? haven't heard anything about this before...
He had a fundraising gig (in Liberty Hall, I fink) for a SF canditate that was running in Donaghmede in the local elections.
I was at the gig, but not as a condoning of SF.
Without steering the conversation (invarably) to politics, for me, as a National Party, I have no time for them, BUT I cannot deny that locally, they've done a lot of good where I grew up.
Damien has an opinion, & a vote.
Its his business what he does with them. |
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jmc105Basic Member Posts:188
| 4/12/2005 1:13 PM |
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well, it's an old debate - should the value of the art depend on the the actions of the artist. by all accounts wagner was a complete bollix, but in the history of western music, he is regarded as a giant of the 20th century.
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PilchardAdvanced Member Posts:699
| 4/12/2005 1:38 PM |
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quote:
Originally posted by jmc105
pilchard - just curious about how much you know about damien dempsey's fundraising activities for sinn féin? haven't heard anything about this before...
as above, he did a fundraising gig for Sinn Fein's Killian Forde (ex-Power of Dreams and Ultra Montanes manager, for those with long memories) in Libery Hall, Forde went to top the poll in Donaghmede in last year's local elections. Full piece at http://www.ireland.com/theticket/articles/2005/0225/863679432TK2502DEMPSEY.html
I dont want to get into a political discussion but while I agree with Mully that SF may be doing good things for some communities on the ground, the same might not be said by communities who are dealing with SF/IRA criminality in Belfast and, at the moment, the Liberties in Dublin,
I raised Damien Dempsey's SF connections really more to see if anyone thinks if this was better known would if effect his audience given his new-found popularity.
I wont get into any debate about jmc105's slighting of poor ol wagner.
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Rev JulesVeteran Member Posts:1041
| 4/12/2005 2:47 PM |
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quote:
Originally posted by jmc105
well, it's an old debate - should the value of the art depend on the the actions of the artist. by all accounts wagner was a complete bollix, but in the history of western music, he is regarded as a giant of the 20th century.
a) I wouldn't hoist Dempsey onto the level of Wagner
b) the political affliations of musicians do matter, why else would Neo Nazis be so interested in developing a skinhead music scene ?
c) I read somewhere over the weekend, Sunday Indo, Paul Brady being critical of a Sinn Fein rep because he castigated artists because they didn't rally behind the party line. |
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UnicronVeteran Member Posts:1696
| 4/12/2005 2:55 PM |
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I've never really had much time for Dempsey's music, I find his singing style grating, don't have much time for how he plays guitar and find him massively naive as a political songwriter (but negative vibes is a pretty funny song), to me he will always be "that comedy rap asshole", but have only heard good things about him as a human being.
To be honest I'm not really surprised to learn that he has SF sympathies, he's a working class guy and his lyrical content (on Seize the day anyway, I haven't really been forced to listen to Shots much in work yet) seems to cover the right "the rich are bastards/it's all the Brit's fault" bases.
But this is a free country and he's entitled to support whoever he wants and personally I think that so long as he doesn't wave it in peoples faces it's his own business. As to whether or not if this knowledge was more widely known it would affect his audience/popularity it would really depend on the individual views of his fans, if someone was a SF supporter I'd imagine they might welcome the news but I would assume that some people would lump him in with the Wolfe Tones.
I think it's probably an issue that is unique to Sinn Fein (and I understand why), do people hold it against David Kitt that his dad is a FF TD?
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UnicronVeteran Member Posts:1696
| 4/12/2005 2:59 PM |
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Jules,
Am I right in thinking that this isn't the first time that Brady has upset republicans? I believe that "The Island" annoyed a few people upon it's release.
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PilchardAdvanced Member Posts:699
| 4/12/2005 3:16 PM |
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quote:
Originally posted by Rev Jules
c) I read somewhere over the weekend, Sunday Indo, Paul Brady being critical of a Sinn Fein rep because he castigated artists because they didn't rally behind the party line.
really? was it definitely the sunday indo? i'd like to read that. do u have a link by any chance? |
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PilchardAdvanced Member Posts:699
| 4/12/2005 3:20 PM |
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quote:
Originally posted by Unicron
I think it's probably an issue that is unique to Sinn Fein (and I understand why), do people hold it against David Kitt that his dad is a FF TD?
not comparing like with like - has Kitt Jr ever done any fundraisers for Kitt Sr? Ever canvassed for him? I dont think so, I think David Kitt is fairly apolitical. Its like Ardal O'Hanon and his father Dr Rory O'Hanlon the TD, Mundy and his relations in the FG family, that dreadful comic Dave McSavage and his father/brother the TDs - just because theyre family, we should not assume they have the same political beliefs. |
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Rev JulesVeteran Member Posts:1041
| 4/12/2005 3:41 PM |
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quote:
Originally posted by Pilchard
[br really? was it definitely the sunday indo? i'd like to read that. do u have a link by any chance?
Will see if I still have magazine and, if so, will scan and email page to you.
All the best  |
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Rev JulesVeteran Member Posts:1041
| 4/12/2005 3:43 PM |
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quote:
Originally posted by Unicron
Jules,
Am I right in thinking that this isn't the first time that Brady has upset republicans? I believe that "The Island" annoyed a few people upon it's release.
Oh defo, and in particular that well known republican Christy Moore, who made reference to it on his ordinary man album. |
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PilchardAdvanced Member Posts:699
| 4/12/2005 4:59 PM |
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quote:
Originally posted by Rev Jules
quote:
Originally posted by Pilchard
[br really? was it definitely the sunday indo? i'd like to read that. do u have a link by any chance?
Will see if I still have magazine and, if so, will scan and email page to you.
All the best
cheers jules, much obliged, even if u just have a link, that would be good |
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