BBC Radio Ulster John Peel documentary

Colin Murray narrates a new BBC Radio Ulster documentary highlighting some of the Northern Irish musicians whose careers were aided by the support of BBC Radio 1 DJ John Peel. ‘Alternative Ulster – John Peel’s Favourite Music Scene?‘ features interviews with members of Stiff Little Fingers, The Undertones, Therapy?, Ash, Tunic, Boys of The Lough and Joyrider as they start their John Peel journey as listeners, then hearing their records played on his show and once on his radar, securing that all important Peel session. Episode 1 of the two part series is available on the BBC Sounds website. We have a recording of Episode 2 so drop a line if you can’t track it down. We’d love a documentary featuring artists from the other half of the island and of course why not something on the Fanning sessions..

John Peel

David Cavanagh – Tom Dunne Interview (2015)

We were saddened to learn of the death of David Cavanagh, respected music journalist and author whose work graced the pages of Sounds, Select, Mojo, Uncut and Q. His book on Creation Records (My Magpie Eyes Are Hungry For The Prize) received widespread praise and we much enjoyed ‘Goodnight and Good Riddance‘ his novel around the radio shows of John Peel preserved for posterity by the folks at the Peel Wikia. Below is an interview with Tom Dunne on Newstalk on the occasion of that books’s publication which we thought you might enjoy. Rest in peace David.

Really sad to hear about the death of David Cavanagh. A little piece he wrote about loving @TheTriffids, called Hell of a Summer, is one of the most perfect pieces of writing about being a music fan. And My Magpie Eyes Are Hungry for the Prize is one of the great music books.

Michael Hann

David Cavanagh – Tom Dunne Interview (2015)

Keeping It Peel Podcast – Irish Peel Sessions

Sterling work here and we get a nice mention..

#KeepingItPeel

Just as with the Fall podcast (published on Mark E.Smith’s 60th birthday) this pod is released with impeccable timing for the St. Patrick’s Day weekend…

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The Sewing Room (1996 Peel Session)

To celebrate John Peel’s birthday we recently shared some old posts on facebook and twitter and that prompted one reader to enquire about The Sewing Room. We did some digging and now thanks to Eamonn Davis of the band we have their 1996 session for John Peel. The Sewing Room were Stan Erraught (guitar & vocals), Eamonn Davis (guitar & vocals), Colm Fitzpatrick (bass & vocals) and Dez Foley (drums & vocals). Stan was of course previously a member of The Stars Of Heaven, Eamonn and Colm were in Hey Paulette while Dez was in Wilder and Crumb. For more background on The Sewing Room check out the excellent post by Stephen Rennicks on his ‘Abstract Analogue’ site. PS If anyone has a recording of the as yet unlocated RTE Dave Fanning session please get in touch..

Rope (1996)

Ghost (1996)

Borderline Vice (1996)

Slide (1996)

John Peel – Dave Fanning Interview (1990)

Dave Fanning interviews John Peel (at the BBC studio?) in London. Thanks to a comment we know the interview took place late March 1990. John’s 50th birthday celebration the previous year gets a mention. Not sure how much if any of the interview is missing as Dave had a 3 hour show from 10pm – 1am at that time. If anyone has memories of this broadcast please share. Dave plays a session track from Honeythieves while John chooses ‘Born Annoying’ by Helmet and a romanian folk song.

John Peel Interview (1990)

Good Night and Good Riddance: 35 Years Of John Peel

David Cavanagh talks to Dave Fanning about his book ‘Good Night and Good Riddance‘ on legendary BBC DJ John Peel. It’s an interesting interview for a number of reasons one of which is that David himself listened to Dave Fanning’s radio show while growing up in Belfast. And also because Dave could be considered our John Peel and has possibly suffered the same fate at the hands of RTE that Peel did at the BBC. The book wouldn’t exist without the excellent John Peel Wiki which has been archiving and cataloging all Peel radio shows for too long too mention.

David Cavanagh (2015)

John Peel Day 2013

It’s hard to imagine now what the landscape was like 30 years ago. Imagine you’ve just moved to a foreign country with very limited access to media in your native tongue and even less of a clue where to hear good music. Imagine the shock and delight when you stumble by accident at an ungodly hour across the unmistakeable voice of John Peel and realise that he has a monthly show on a local radio station. These shows become something you look forward to, record and listen to over and over until the next edition. This day 9 years ago John Peel left us. If you are in Dublin tonight you might like to check out the festivities at this event. For more John Peel action check out this list of Irish John Peel Sessions, John playing Teenage Kicks twice in a row or the Peel sessions of The Vipers, Hey Paulette, or all John Peel related posts. There were Irish radio tributes last night on Tom Dunne (Newstalk) and Paul McLoone (TodayFM) and tonight from Dave Clarke (RTE 2fm).

If you havent already check out the John Peel Wiki. These folks have been digging out recordings of John Peel shows for years and have catalogued and shared a large number of John’s shows and much more besides. There is a Yahoo mailing list and they are always open to helping track down or identify recordings. Their work as well as the work of Ken Garner, author of ‘The Peel Sessions‘, shown above, inspired the creation of this site.

John Peel plays ‘Teenage Kicks’ twice in a row (1978)

I saw ‘Good Vibrations‘ a second time and enjoyed it just as much as first time round. Favourite scenes include Terri’s first listen to ‘Teenage Kicks’ and John Peel playing said record. Congratulations to all who played a part in making the movie a reality. As a tribute here’s something I came across recently..

It’s been well documented over the years both in magazine articles and various TV interviews that John Peel played this record twice in a row stating, ‘I’m going to do something I’ve never done before’. This is also what he says in the excellent ‘Good Vibrations’ film. It’s sort of gone down in Undertones folk law. Interestingly though (unless he played it twice in a row on two occasions which I don’t think he did) he didn’t actually say that – as this clip proves. I believe there are two reasons why this misconception has arisen. Firstly, as far as I am aware, this sound bite has not been available to hear since its broadcast in 1978 and, secondly in subsequent interviews Peel stated that he played the record twice in a row and hadn’t ever done that before. So this statement became part of what he actually said at the time with nothing to prove otherwise.

It’s all semantics of course. All that matters is that he played this awesome record twice.

Irish Peel Sessions

Compiling a complete list of Fanning sessions is almost as elusive as finding the holy grail. Much easier is a list of Irish acts who recorded sessions for the late great John Peel. Some of these have been released officially on the Strange Fruit label and I may start tracking down a few more of those that didn’t. If a band recorded more than one session the number of sessions recorded follows in brackets. The names are linked to the BBC page for that artist. One day RTE might take a leaf out of the BBC’s book.

Ash (4), Bees Make Honey, Big Self, The Bothy Band (3), Boys Of The Lough (7), Boomtown Rats (2), Paul Brady, Cane 141, The Chieftains (5), The Cranberries, De Danann, Dr Strangely Strange, Eire Apparent, Eleven, The Fatima Mansions (2), Finbar & Eddie Furey (3), Frank & Walters, Rory Gallagher (2), Christie Hennessy, Hey Paulette, The Hitchers, Horslips (3), A House (2), In Dust, Joyrider (3), The Johnstons, Jubilee Allstars, Luggage, Microdisney (6), The Moondogs, My Bloody Valentine, Na Fili (3), Nirvana with the Syd Dale Orchestra, The Outcasts (2), Pet Lamb (2), Planxty (3), The Pogues (2), Protex, Rollerskate Skinny, Rudi, Rumble ?, The Sewing Room, Sharon Shannon, Skid Row, The Stars Of Heaven (4), Stiff Little Fingers (4), Stump (4), The Sultans Of Ping FC, Taste, The Tearjerkers (2), That Petrol Emotion (3), Therapy? (2), The Undertones (6), Thin Lizzy (9), Tir Na nOg (4), Tunic (4), The Vipers, Gay & Terry Woods, The Would Be’s, Xdreamysts, Zerra 1 (2)

Corrections welcome, e.g. missing bands or those incorrectly flagged as Irish.

Artwork via @hitoneie for John Peel Day 2005

Irish Peel Sessions YouTube playlist:

John Peel Day

It is hard to believe that seven years have past since John Peel left us so suddenly. Thanks to the folks over at the John Peel Wiki there is no shortage of John Peel material to listen to, their efforts and those of Ken Garner have long been an inspiration round these parts. On 13th October 2005 John Peel night was celebrated in The Hub, Dublin with performances by 3 acts who featured on John Peel’s BBC Radio 1 show. House of Mexico, Female Hercules and playing their first gig in 13 years Hey Paulette featured along with DJ sets by Leagues O’Toole and The Dudley Corporation. The image above is from a postcard that Niall McCormack of Hitone created for the night and lists all Irish bands who recorded sessions for John Peel. The Hot Press review of the night can be found here.

See also Pat’s 2010 John Peel Day post ‘Peeling In The Years‘.

Thanks to Laura for kicking this all off.

Hey Paulette (Peel Session)

A couple of excellent articles in the newspapers this weekend by Nick Kelly and Sinead Gleeson have given me cause to think of Derrick Dalton and by extension the music of his band Hey Paulette. In the case of this band it was John Peel and not Dave Fanning who was to first bring them to our attention. On 13th October 2005 Hey Paulette reformed after fifteen years to pay homage to John Peel at a John Peel tribute night. Derrick died two years ago but to celebrate his life, his wife Laura James has organised a benefit gig in his honour. The gig is tomorrow night in Whelan’s and features The Dinah Brand (which count Stephen Ryan ex The Stars of Heaven and The Revenants) alongside Thread Pulls, Richer Than Astronauts and Little Beauties. The €12 admission includes the Aeromodeller album ‘First Flight’ and an unreleased copy of Crumb’s ‘Like Goodbye’ single. All proceeds go to Aware.

Recorded 25/6/1989, lineup: Darren Nolan (Drums),Colom Fitzpatrick (Bass), Derrick Dalton (Guitar, Backing Vocals), Eammon Davis (Guitar, Vocals)

Our Immeasurable Differences (1989)

I Really Do Love Penelope (1989)

A Pet Day (1989)

Erstwhile Wet Blanket (1989)

The Cranberries – Them (1991)

From Limerick, The Cranberry Saw Us were formed in August 1989 by brothers Noel Hogan (guitar) and Mike Hogan (bass) with Fergal Lawler (drums) and Niall Quinn (vocals, guitar). Niall Quinn was already drummer with The Hitchers and two months after The Cranberry Saw Us recorded their first demo in Jan 1990 he left to concentrate on that band. Niall remained on good terms with the band and was soon to hook the remaining members up with a young singer Dolores O’Riordan. The new lineup released 3 cassette EPs in 1990. At the end of 1990 they shortened their name to first The Cranberry’s and finally The Cranberries. Under this name they made their first vinyl / CD release ‘Uncertain‘ on Xeric Records in Oct 1991. Today’s song is the fourth and final song on that EP.

Them (1991)

Hey Paulette

Hey Paulette were formed in Dublin in 1987 by Eamonn Davis (guitar & vocals), Derrick Dalton (guitar) and Colm Fitzpatrick (bass). Recorded in 1988, the first single “Commonplace” was recorded with a drum machine and so impressed John Peel that he invited them to record a session which they duly did in 1989. Peel thought the session was “peachy”. Darren Nolan joined on drums “for a while” but then stayed till the bitter end. They were soon begged to do a Fanning Session. Stan Erraught of The Stars Of Heaven produced their ep “I Really Do Love Penelope” and enjoyed it so much that he joined the band. They split in 1991, Derrick Dalton went on to play bass with The Mexican Pets, Eamonn Davis, Colm Fitzpatrick formed The Sewing Room with Stan. Sadly Derrick passed away recently, nice tribute here, was in a band called crumb with Eamonn and they have a great bio of how it was back in the day. Must try and track down the 2006 release Long Ball Into Nowhere on Firestation Records. Watch them in action here and just came across this interesting piece on the Firestation blog.

Commonplace

Updated July 23 2009