Monthly Archives: February 2011

The Party’s Over

Voting booths have just opened in 43 constituencies all over Ireland in an attempt to choose 165 representatives from 566 hopefuls to make up the next Irish government. Since 1932, Ireland’s largest political party, Fianna Fáil, has been the main government party for nearly 60 years in total and has been in power for all but 30 months in the last 24 years. This period of time coincided with the affluence of the Celtic Tiger, but also with its recent collapse. As a result, the party’s dominance in the opinion polls has also collapsed by almost two-thirds since the 2007 election. Fine Gael, historically the country’s second party, have benefitted the most, while Labour, Sinn Féin and Independent candidates have also seen promising increases in their support. What all this means is that Fine Gael will be the main party after the voting has been completed and will most likely form a coalition with Labour. For the first time in the nation’s history, the “Soldiers of Destiny” look like being relegated to third place. The party’s slump in popularity forced many of its members to jump ship before the election was called and will see many more lose their seats this weekend. This frightening scenario has seen at least one former government minister resort to desperate measures in order to hold onto his seat

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Watching the Detectives

Recently, I’ve been spending a lot of my time watching the detectives. Only on the telly, of course. I’ve always been a fan of detective stories, from Arthur Conan Doyle’s Sherlock Holmes tales on the page to the many British and American crime-solvers that have appeared on the small screen over the years. In particular, I quite enjoyed a number of American sleuths who possessed such exotic names as Kojak, Mannix, Cannon and Colombo. My favourite of these shows, however, was The Rockford Files, which starred James Garner as the eponymous sleuth. Over the last few years, I watched a good few episodes of that show as well as Colombo and it wasn’t difficult to see why I liked them. The stories weren’t bad, but the performances of Peter Falk as Columbo and Garner as Rockford were the real selling points for me

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Power Failure

It’s two weeks until Election Day 2011 and the political pamphlets continue to pop through my letter box. The latest one comes from the alliterative Peter Power, who is not only working for Limerick but also, apparently, for me. Now, I’m well aware that politicians have a tendency to manipulate the truth, but I must say that, to the best of my knowledge, Mr Power is not in my employ. Not only that, but I also have it on good authority that he’s not working for Limerick, either. You might be forgiven for thinking that Power is running as an independent candidate in Limerick city. Not so. Power is, in fact, one of two Fianna Fáil contenders for the four seats in this constituency. Power was unsuccessful when he first ran for the party at the 1997 general election, but he managed to get elected in 2002 and again in 2007. He only received half a quota on each of these occasions, but managed to get elected each time thanks to transfers from his party colleagues

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Some Kind of Wonderful

Gerry Goffin was born on this day in 1939 and he co-wrote some of the most enduring hits of the sixties with Carole King, who also celebrates her birthday this week. The pair married each other in 1960 and it lasted for eight years, a period that was a couple of years shorter than their professional partnership. Their first hit was the classic Will You Love Me Tomorrow by the Shirelles, which was the first of four US number ones for the songwriters in the early sixties. The other three were Take Good Care of My Baby by Bobby Vee, the Loco-Motion by Little Eva and (one I’ve never heard of) Go Away Little Girl by Steve Lawrence. In addition, the Everly Brothers had a top ten hit with Crying in the Rain, as did The Chiffons with One Fine Day and the Drifters with Up on the Roof. The pair wrote dozens of more songs that made the charts throughout the sixties and King herself had a minor hit in 1962 with It Might as Well Rain Until September. She went solo at the end of the decade and had massive success in 1971 with her debut album Tapestry

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Let’s Get Out of This Country

It’s two weeks until Ireland goes to the polls and election candidates keep electioneering and canvassers keep canvassing. You may remember the missing apostrophe on the leaflet from Kieran O’Donnell that popped through my door last week. Perhaps I shouldn’t have been so harsh on him as it’s only his second time running for the Dáil. This week it was Michael Noonan‘s turn to come around with a familiar-looking leaflet and an identical lack of attention to punctuation. O’Donnell’s fellow Fine Gaeler is the longest-serving T.D. in the Limerick City (formerly Limerick East) constituency. He was elected back in 1981 and was a minister in two departments in the eighties: Justice and Industry & Commerce. He was also Minister for Health in the nineties and even became Fine Gael leader from February 2001 to June 2002. He is currently his party’s Finance spokesperson and may be given that portfolio in the next government. He’s come a long way from his first appointment as spokesperson for Education in 1981 and even longer from his days as a schoolteacher in the seventies. If he’s the guy in charge of next year’s Budget, let’s hope he pays a lot more attention to his sums than he does to punctuation

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Musical Chairs

A chair painted yellow, yesterday

A chair painted yellow, yesterday

The Irish General Election is just over two weeks away and tonight TV3 will hold the first televised leaders debate. The independent TV station extended an invitation to the three leaders who have the most realistic chance of becoming Taoiseach (Prime Minister) next month. So, essentially they have invited the leaders of the country’s three largest political parties to come on the show. With the most recent government on its last legs, Fianna Fáil replaced Brian Cowen as leader, with Michéal Martin stepping into the big man’s not inconsiderable shoes. Even though this move was a bit like changing deck chairs on the Titanic, Martin will appear on the show tonight. So will the man a lot of people would like to see as our next Taoiseach, Eamon Gilmore of the Labour Party. However, the person who is favourite to lead the country for the next five years has decided to sit this one out

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Singing the Blues

Last week, Meg and Jack White split up for the second time. In 2000, the couple terminated their four-year marriage but the duo kept going as The White Stripes. The band formed in Michigan in 1997 with Jack on vocals, guitar and keyboards, and Meg on drums and sometimes on vocals. Their back-to-basics musical style was heavily influenced by blues and punk and they developed an equally simple visual style of red, white and black that featured prominently in the marketing of the group. They released six studio albums between 1999 and 2007, with White Blood Cells (2001) and Elephant (2003) being my own particular favourites. It’s not a complete surprise that they’ve split up as Jack, who writes most of the songs, has been busy recently as both a producer of numerous acts and as a member of The Raconteurs and The Dead Weather. Many of the band’s originals have been covered over the last decade and the Whites also put out their own versions of blues and country numbers

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Live It Up

Last week was Australia Day and I posted a few songs from New Zealand to commemorate the day. Today is Waitangi Day, New Zealand’s public holiday, so here are a few tunes from their Antipodean neighbours. Back in 1966, Sydney’s Easybeats were the first Australian band to earn an international hit with the still brilliant Friday on My Mind. Also from Sydney, Mental As Anything made the Top Ten in several European counties in 1985 with Live It Up from the soundtrack of Crocodile Dundee. Nick Cave and Kylie Minogue were appealing to very different audiences during the eighties, so it was a big surprise when the two collaborated on Cave’s Murder Ballads album in 1996. It was even more surprising that Where the Wild Roses Grow was so good. Darren Hanlon isn’t terribly well known outside his native country, but he has at least one big fan in my friend John and a smaller one in me. We both saw him about a decade ago when he supported Billy Bragg in Galway (I think). His own songs are lyrically witty and melodic, but I’ve chosen his cover of a song from Rumours

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