A great piece by Colm O’Callaghan for The Blackpool Sentinel today tipped us off to a new music show in the RTE schedule. Like us Colm is a fan of Dave Heffernan and used watch ‘Anything Goes‘ religiously of a Saturday morning – for the music segment.
Ten years after the Des Bishop hosted ‘Reverb’, RTE television is once again dipping it’s toe into the music archives.
The multi-talented Pat Shortt raids the RTÉ music archives to unearth the most popular, rarely seen and occasionally wacky music and music-related items from over 60 years of programme making.
We know Pat has musical chops so fingers crossed he doesn’t play this one for laughs. Pat Shortt’s Music From D’Telly kicks off on RTE1 on Friday November 6th at 8.30pm. The series is directed and produced by Dave Heffernan.
For what it’s worth we’d love to see someone like Colm let loose on the RTE archive to dig out some of the treasures we know are there. Maybe time for the ‘No Disco‘ approach once again?
Update: Pat was on the Late Late show last week promoting the series, watch on the RTE player here:
Posted in TV with tags no disco, RTE on September 8, 2015 by Fanning Sessions
A great piece by Colm O’Callaghan for The Blackpool Sentinel, ‘This is No Disco‘ prompted us to create a playlist of interviews and sessions from the much missed RTE TV show. ‘No Disco‘ was a no budget TV show produced by RTE Cork and presented by, in turn Donal Dineen, Uaneen Fitzsimons and Leagues O’Toole. While VHS is not our forte we have in the past managed to dig out a number of ‘No Disco’ recordings e.g. The Divine Comedy, The Harvest Ministers. Colm’s loose talk of mythical sessions by The Revenants, Edwyn Collins and John Hegarty mean another trip to the dreaded attic awaits.
While on the subject of ‘No Disco’, producer Rory Cobbe was interviewed by Ray Wingnut for the first ‘An Ciaróg Eile’ podcast (skip to 29 min mark)..
I hate to criticize, especially when something innovative is being undertaken but I must admit to being slightly frustrated by the recent live webcasts of ‘Other Voices’ by our national broadcaster. This matter first arose back in December when I was excited to read that RTE was webcasting the popular music series. ‘Other Voices‘ for those who don’t know is a TV music series recorded over a number of nights in the town of Dingle in Co. Kerry. In early years tickets were sold for the very limited capacity event but in recent years these were only given to journalists and media outlets to be raffled online. Thanks to the wonderful introduction of Saorview many households our own included now lay claim to the possession of a “Smart TV” so yours truly was quite excited to hear news of an imminent webcast. Non musical family members suitably dispatched the music fans of the house settled in for a musical feast. And that was where the woes began..
The RTE Player was launched but ‘Other Voices’ was nowhere to be seen. ‘Live’, ‘Latest’, ‘Entertainment’ none professed any knowledge of that evening’s musical event. A visit to the search dialog also yielded no joy. Fear not, this Smart TV has a web browser – off to the RTE website we go. There finally was ‘Other Voices’ and the prize was in sight. Unfortunately as soon as the link was followed the we were greeted with a note that “A more recent version of Adobe Flash Player is required to play this media”.
Now on your computer this error message is quite benign and a quick download will resolve but on a Smart TV or tablet this message will send a shiver down your spine for it is an error to which there is no easy solution. Fortunately in this instance there was a happy ending to the tale.. by a stroke of luck the UK newspaper The Guardian was also streaming ‘Other Voices’ and once the correct website address was found we were happily in business..
Now why you might ask am I complaining about something that happened 2 months ago. Well this weekend ‘Other Voices’ made a return visit to Derry. That city first hosted the show in 2013 as part of their City Of Culture celebrations and once again RTE promised to webcast the event live. Yours truly being the intrepid curmudgeon that he is decided to investigate if matters had improved..
RTE Player – no mention
RTE Webcast – not compatible with Smart TV
Guardian stream – working perfectly
So if anyone at RTE is listening – please consider those of us with “smart” TVs next time round..
Borderline was a “young people’s show” on RTÉ Television from 1986-1988. The show’s presenters were Aonghus McAnally, Majella Nolan, Ronan Johnston, Eithne Hand and Maria Doyle. As part of their 50 years celebrations RTE has posted one complete show online. The show in question (1/3/1988) coincided with The Stag Hotpress Awards. Winners who popped into studio to chat and/or perform include Rory Gallagher, Mary Coughlan, Something Happens (‘Burn Clear’), Adam Clayton and Larry Mullen. Also performing on the show were The Sugar Rays (‘House In Order’) and The Stars Of Heaven (’28’).
Formed in 1990 in Dublin Forget Me Nots were Michelle Burrows (vocals, guitar), Eithne Flynn (vocals, guitar), Maurice McGrath (guitar), Mark Walsh (bass) and Justin Healy (drums). Justin was previously with The Golden Horde and The Glee Club. The band released singles ‘2 Fay Ray’ (1991), ‘Trouble’ (1992), ‘Soap Singer’s Beat’ (1992) and album ‘Hullabaloo’ (1992). While well received, the album didn’t achieve the level of success expected and following one further single ‘So Good’ (1993) parted company with Sony/Colombia Records. The quartet went on to release ‘Five O’Clock’ train in 1994 before calling it a day. This footage was recorded for the RTE programme ‘On The Waterfront‘ in 1992.
‘Anything Goes’ was a “young people’s show on RTÉ Television as part of development of young people’s programming”. First broadcast on 4 October 1980 it continued for 6 years. Presenters on the show were Kathy Parke, Aonghus McAnally, Mary FitzGerald, David Heffernan and Mary Frances Calayco. I will add to the list of musical acts who performed as I find them.
We’re regular listeners to Michael Mee‘s RTE 2XM show round these parts but are especially looking forward to this weeks show. Michael has managed to get the key to the RTE record cabinet and is threatening to do a vinyl only show. There are a few items I haven’t heard since I were a lad so if he doesn’t play them today I’ll be emailing him anonymously at pimpmyipod2xm@gmail.com to ask for a part two. I’m hoping to record the show so will update this post in the next few days with audio in case your wireless doesn’t pick up 2XM.
The Fuze – It’s A Sunday Morning
The Atrix – Treasure On The Wasteland
The Radiators – Dancing Years
Berlin – Over 21
Jimmy Mccarthy – Miles Of Eyes
Cathal Dunne – Danny
The Starjets – War Stories
Tokyo Olympics – Radio
U2 – A Day Without Me
The Brannigan Brothers – The Glitter And Gleam
The Bogey Boys – Friday Night
Billy Brown – Look What Jerry Lee Did To Me
Thin Lizzy – Waiting For An Alibi
Comedian and writer Michael Mee recently did a third show of Irish music on ‘Pimp My iPod’ his RTE 2XM radio show. Since 2XM keeps a low profile on the DAB side of the tracks and there is no listen back feature I figured I’d share it with y’all here. I keep discovering great shows on 2XM, other favourites are ‘C60‘ with Pat McGrath, ‘ABC to XTC‘ with author John Connolly and John Kelly‘s “noisy” show ‘Radio Clash’. Many shows have blogs and ‘Pimp My iPod‘ has now joined those ranks. Have a look at past playlists and check out some archived shows on soundcloud.
This Carndonagh Co. Donegal band based around Finbarr Doherty have featured here twice already but I’d never seen any footage of them performing. Until now that is. Watch them here on RTE’s live music show ‘On The Waterfront‘. I have quite a bit more where this came from so if you have any requests lets hear them. Thank you to the reader who sent me the DVD from whence this came.
From Waterford The Village were Paddy Jacob (vocals), Mick Heery (guitar), Paul Condon (bass) and Paul Moyser (drums). They released one single ‘Mental State’ in 1986 and they can be seen here performing that song on RTE’s ‘Visual Eyes’ that same year.
Belfast band One Deaf Ear were formed in 1984 and made their live debut supporting The Pogues at Queen’s University Belfast in September 1985. The band were Michael Madden (vocals, guitar), Brian O’Cuinn (bass, synths), Sean Quinn (synths, vocals, sampler) and Gerard ‘Soupey’ Campbell (drums). TV appearances on BBC Northern Ireland’s ‘Channel One’ and RTE’s ‘Visual Eyes’ followed. Courted by multiple majors, ultimately the band imploded before signing a deal. Read more at the Irish Punk & New Wave Discography. If you any ‘Channel One’ clips or memories please get in touch as I’m intrigued by the show and have very sketchy details. One Deaf Ear recorded a Fanning session on 17th Feb 1986, the tracks were ‘Been So Long’, ‘Giving Up The Ghost’ and ‘Ancient’.
Hot Press magazine has just celebrated it’s 800th issue and to commemorate RTE1 is showing a documentary ‘Hot Press: The Write Stuff‘ on Tuesday 1st Feb at 10.15pm.
Their hair was once shoulder-length and what’s left of it now is mostly grey. Two of them are still following the same path they started down in the late Seventies, in a country of soaring unemployment and inflation, where contraception was illegal and divorce was banned. Others of them are now household names, as writers, journalists and commentators. Back then, they were young, unknown and there was no obvious outlet for their talents. So they set about doing it for themselves: in 1977, Niall Stokes and Mairin Sheehy founded Hot Press.
It was a music magazine and it became more – a political and cultural rallying-point for alternative points of view of all kinds. Its writers, designers and production staff tapped phones, biked cheques from bank to bank and drove in relays to the Kerry train to catch the printers, after long nights of putting the magazine together fuelled by coffee so thick a Turk could trot on it. They became a family, a haven of mutual support and, like many families, a place too for dysfunction and, for some of them, excess.
Long before the internet, they created a community which stretched from Ballaghadareen to Bundoran, from Enniscorthy to Skibbereen, united by the music and by their writers’ and readers’ different visions of an Ireland in which they could feel at home, in which they could be free to be themselves. And their contribution to the success of that movement has also, in the way of things, made them part of a new establishment. But at the exceptionally advanced age – for an Irish magazine – of 34, Hot Press is still here, still looking out for new voices, fresh writing talents, music that needs to be listened to.
The documentary Hot Press: The Write Stuff tells the tumultous story of those early years, through the memories of its writers including Declan Lynch, Liam Mackey, Peter Murphy and John Waters, of its founders Niall Stokes and Mairin Sheehy, and of Harry Browne, Dave Fanning, Bob Geldof, Jackie Hayden and Michael D. Higgins. It’s a story about music and politics, about principles and ambitions, above all a story about being young and just going for it.
In the absence of an official RTE Fanning Session archive consider this blog a humble starting point. Any musical submissions would be gratefully accepted as are any corrections or recollections... click on the pic to send an email or even better comment on the post in question. We are interested in anything recorded from irish radio or TV in the 1980s and 90s.
The Fanning Sessions Archive 