Volume XIX - Otwo - Issue 3

OTWO

16th October 2012 Issue III Volume XIX

The Arts & Culture Supplement of the University Observer

Mumford & Sons

OTWO talks to Ben Lovett and Marcus Mumford

Also inside >>

The Minutes | O

UYA | Hypnotic

Brass Ensemble

OTWO

contents

Mystic Mittens’ feline fortunes

Page 2 – Regulars

Our resident magical cat makes some undeniably accurate predictions, Anna Burzlaff vents about the never-ending infostream that is 24 hour news, and What’s Hot, What’s Not informs you how to think.

Page 4 – Travel

Virgo

Tales from the exotic lands of Paris and Budapest abound, as well as an update from Pat de Brún in this fortnight’s Postcards from Abroad.

August 23rd - September 22nd You’re on a cosmic roll this week as your key planet Venus slides into sweet harmony with outrageous Uranus. Need I explain this any further?

Page 7 – Hidden Gems

Aoife Loughnane scouts around Dublin from an array of hip and potentially trendy boutiques to check out.

Libra

Page 8 – Games

Two highly anticipated games, Resident Evil 6 and Borderlands 2, get put through their paces, while Steven Balbirnie chats to the people behind OUYA, an exciting new competitor in the games console wars.

Page 10 – Film

New releases Hotel Transylvania, Ruby Sparks, and Ginger and Rosa are all reviewed and Kevin Murphy investigates the trend of films being suspiciously similar to each other in Top 10.

Casey Lehman takes a look into the growing presence of female directors in Hollywood and Laura Bell looks at military in cinema.

Page 14 – Centre

Emily Mullen talks to the unique and wonderful Mumford and Sons.

Page 16 – Music

Otwo chats to Hypnotic Brass Ensemble, Andy Burrows, and The Minutes; Heathers return with their adventures; the unfortunate combination of terrible songs and beautiful people is explored in Mixtape; and the latest albums get the old one-two-music review.

Page 21 – What’s On

Muireann Dee gives us the down low on the mad cool club night, Residence.

Page 22 – Fashion

Which accessories do you need to become more sexually appealing? All and more is revealed this fortnight, while Edward Kearns takes a look at the world of menswear.

Page 25 – Special Feature

Anna Burzlaff pays a visit to the director of the Project Arts centre to check out some home grown culture.

Page 26 - Otwo Attempts

Conor Luke Barry attempts to make the world a better place with his new children’s TV show.

Page 27 – Fatal Fourway

The intellectual battle continues, this time squabbling over which Joseph Gordon Levitt film makes us feel the most warm inside.

the

University Observer Volume XIX Issue III Telephone: (01) 716 3835/3837 Email: info@universityobserver.ie www.universityobserver.ie

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Aries

March 21st - April 19th Don’t despair. Just because she doesn’t let you call her your Mot, doesn’t mean she doesn’t love you.

Taurus

April 20th -May 20th Avoid the lecturers tunnels in the arts building, unless you want to get caught up in a mad Harry Potter style adventure. And who would want that?

Gemini

May 21st - June 20th You are attracted to the edge of your comfort zone today, but the buzz may not be satisfying unless you go over the point of no return. Try to remember touching yourself in public will only lead to bad things.

Cancer

June 21st - July 22nd The emotional stress can be pretty intense today. Seek solace in a chicken fillet sandwich from the student centre.

Leo

July 23rd - August22nd Mittens is feeling poetic about your fate: You unfortunate mature student of UCD/Be doing you a BA or Phd/You’ve done all the reading from A-Z/But all you want is some first year gee.

Editor Emer Sugrue Deputy Editor Aoife Valentine Art, Design & Technology Director Conor Kevin O’Nolan

Music Editor Emily Mullen Games Editor Steven Balbirnie Chief Stylist Sophie Lioe

Chief Designer Gary Kealy

Chief Photographer Caoimhe McDonnell

Otwo Editors Conor Luke Barry Anna Burzlaff

Illustrator Emily Longworth

September 23rd - October 22nd Distractions may change the landscape of your day. Remember that the flickering light on the library third floor will not help you pass your midterms.

Scorpio

October 23rd - Novermber 21st Whatever you do, don’t eat in Cafe Brava. Not for any sort of supernatural reason, just general advice.

Sagittarius November 22nd - December 21st This week, a bizarre series of coincidences and celestial kismet will leave you in a Weekend at Bernie’s style escapade with your ageing elective lecturer.

Capricorn

December 22nd - January 19th Unfortunately, due to an even more bizarre series of events, you are going to end up in a farcical Weekend at Bernie’s 2 style escapade, where you won’t even be at Bernie’s.

Aquarius January 20th - February 18th

You will shine more effectively in your own space. Remember to stand upwind to avoid travelling odours.

Pisces

February 19th - March 20th Pro tip: If you fail any of your essays or exams, don’t panic. Just spend the rest of your life becoming a famous pop star, come back to college and rub it in your lecturer’s face.

Contributors Stephen Bance Laura Bell Pat de Brún Andrew Carolan Stephen Connolly Rory Crean Muireann Dee Heathers Edward Kearns Casey Lehman Emily Longworth Aoife Loughnane Kieran Lynch Mystic Mittens Eoin Moore

Catherine Munnelly Kevin Murphy Colm O’Neill Jack Walsh Special Thanks Guy, Colm, Orla and Rory at MCD Promotions, Laura, Chantal, Caroline and Amy at Universal, Ciaran at Warner Music, Pringles, Alex Day and Sopio, Puddles, Seamus and Oswald.

faaaaaaail What’s hot and what’s not

What’s Hot

OTWO

soapbox

CGI graphics, ‘Breaking News’ scrolls, and Kay Burley are all too much for Anna Burzlaff to take, as she explains why 24 Hour News is so awful

revisiting Bebo

Despite everyone’s constant disdain and put-downery of Bebo, we only need one mention of the “They’re deleting Bebo!” rumour for us to manually haul the entirety of our old account on to the current social network of choice. There is a place for bebo in all our hearts. So treat yourself this week, and check-up the Bebo page of anyone you’ve befriended this semester, then take their quizzes and respond to any status they’ve ever had with the new “OMG” or “That’s Funny” buttons. You won’t regret it.

Predictable weather patterns

Now that the weather has taken an official nosedive, we can all rest easy that fate dictates to us a solid six months of nuclear red noses, broken umbrellas, and the casual transformation of the UCD lake into an Olympics-worthy ice rink. Why does this warrant rejoicing?

Given the tendency of the Irish Summer to be completely shite, not to mention the fact that MET Eireann pick their forecasts out of a hat, this allows you to exchange the ‘Shorts-or-Scarf’ dilemma of July for a little bit of ‘Snow-or-Sleet’. It should be a nice change. For, like, at least a week.

onetwoonetwo film festival This weekend, Lighthouse Cinema (Otwo’s favourite cinema in the greater Smithfield area) will be hosting their inaugural music-themed rockumentary film festival. Highlights include Blur’s ‘No Distance Left to Run’ and the legendary ‘Stop Making Sense’ concert film from Talking Heads. Put the midterm study on hold and spend a whole weekend looking at music.

What’s Not renewable resources

With growing reports of large-scale unexplained farm-animal deaths in the vicinity of Wind Farms, ‘Turbine Syndrome’ is now an actual threat to anyone living near wind turbines. Meanwhile, biomass combustion is causing more air pollution than coalburning, and turbine blades from hydropower plants are depleting Salmon populations. Renewable resources are so out this season.

Pre-Halloween Christmas Decorations

Money never sleeps, and it seems that neither does the spirit of Christmas. Preferring to lie in wait for the last “Santa Ponsa 2k12” photo album to be uploaded to Facebook, festive cheer then pounces on poor, unsuspecting department stores in a flurry of twinkling lights and plastic greenery. A ‘sexy witch’ costume doesn’t quite look at home under the tree, but we don’t mind, because we know that it’s just what baby Jesus would have wanted.

Pathogens The debilitating and crippling virulence of pathogens is something we all feel negatively about most of the time, but the danger of inhabiting such a frail, organic shell is never felt more acutely than when the person next to you in Theatre L is hacking away like TB is this year’s Paul’s Boutique bag. Man’s self-preservation instinct is at its finest here, by showing a singular lack-of-care towards anyone who has fallen ill to the common cold.

The world can be an immensely depressing place.

As bleak and grim a statement that that is, it unfortunately contains a truth as arresting as it is upsetting. Those of us lucky enough to be observers as opposed to subjects of the world’s barrage of misfortunes are informed daily of these happenings through the media of newspapers, television, internet and radio. In the western world information has become as readily available as oxygen, as we enter an age where ignorance is about as justifiable as stupidity.

Perhaps the torch bearer of this ceaseless cycle of information comes in the form of the 24 hour news channel; that supposed paragon of knowledge, a constant force enlightening the average citizen with up to the minute updates. It would appear a force for good, a source tearing down those defences of ignorance and misunderstanding.

However, there is something inherently devious about rolling news. The entire concept upon which it is based is flawed as it turns the produce which it claims to disseminate into something of a wholly different nature. News by any general manner of understanding should be unbiased. It should be a retelling of facts designed to inform the viewer of events, without any agenda or agency on the reporter or company’s behalf. While all news falls foul of this aim, it is 24 hour news which falls so dramatically.

For all the misery the world has to offer, there is thankfully not enough of it to fill 24 hours of the day with. Therefore your average rolling news company finds itself trying to think of ways to keep the stories they have interesting enough to peddle them in an exciting manner and retain the attention of the viewer. What emerges is a wholly sensationalised version of events. A viewer finds themselves confronted with irrelevant interviews such as the ground-breaking testimony of the librarian that saw the kidnapper once, ten years ago, walking down the street.

There’s sweeping graphics, often of the 3D variety, and reconstructions that appear designed to terrify as opposed to inform. What you’re left with is the story itself being turned into some intensely political episode of Eastenders, only with slightly more attractive actors.

Perhaps it’s unjust to blame the news companies. They are, after all, simply providing what the viewer wants. It appears that the details themselves aren’t horrifying enough, we now require fancy graphics and CGI images to truly hammer home the issues of modernity and the 21st century.

We won’t allow the likes of Sky News to weasel out of their responsibility with the argument of simply catering for demand. The bombastically over-dramatised version of events, which at times seems to exploit the very tragedy upon which they are based, is degenerating journalism to the depths of a soap opera. Rolling news often erases any of the objectivity necessary to judge the facts and instead imbues the event with the same moral respectability as illegally tapping a mobile phone.

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OTWO

Just before class begins in Berlin, Pat de Brún reflects on what he’s learned about our drinking culture from his time in Germany so far

H

aving had enough time now to get a real feel for what Berlin is all about, it’s only natural to make some comparisons and contrasts with Dublin.

Of course, in many ways Dublin and Berlin are worlds apart, but one thing that they do have in common is that they are both generally seen as party-towns. Naturally, they’re different, but most foreigners associate Dublin with drinking, pubs, and as a good destination for a boozy weekend away. Something similar could be said about Berlin.

In Ireland, we hear almost on a daily basis about the ‘demon drink’ binge culture, either in the media, from politicians, or older generations.

We are all aware of it, and most of us participate happily in it. Coming to Berlin, I expected to find a similar drinking culture, but my experiences here so far have made me look very differently at our relationship with alcohol at home.

You only need to walk into a student apartment in Dublin at 10pm on a Wednesday night to get a flavour of the culture that I’m talking about.

First things first, they’re just back from legging it into Tesco before the dreaded 10pm deadline to stock up on cheap vodka, cans of Dutch, or whatever takes your (wallet’s) fancy.

This is followed by an hour or so of speed-drinking before making the trek into town, generally alongside the pour soul unfortunate enough to be driving your bus or taxi. Then it’s straight to the club, as prohibitively expensive pub-drinking isn’t even on the agenda. And you need to be in before 11.30 for ‘cheaplist’, duh.

We are then treated to the scenes on Harcourt Street that are replicated in every town across the country week in, week out: people falling, people crying, people fighting. There are ill-advised hook-ups and aggressive arguments aplenty. Full advantage is being taken of whatever drinks offers are available that night. You’re flailing about the dance floor, deep in concentration, thinking you look just like Justin Timberlake, before finishing up at 2 or 3 when the club closes.

The best you can hope for when

Postcards from Abroad:

events of the night together. Then comes the worst part of all: the dreaded onset of The Fear, as the alcohol finally leaves your system. The inevitable self-kicking and loathing that follows, as you pour over something stupid that you may or may not have said or done.

Before I go on, I should mention that I am in no way getting on my high horse on this issue. The reason I understand how the standard model for an Irish night out works is because I went about perfecting the art in my first couple of years in college.

Yes, it can be ugly, but I never said it couldn’t be fun.

With this being my standard experience of a Dublin night out, I pretty much expected to see more of the same in Berlin, but with longer club opening hours. What I have come to learn, however, is that the two party cultures are worlds apart. Since coming here, I am yet to see an alcoholinduced fight, tear or argument, which has been pretty refreshing. The German relationship with alcohol is completely different.

It’s perfectly normal to see people sipping a beer at any time of the day,

a few more in there. The club here is seen more as a venue to appreciate music, go dancing, and relax with friends, as opposed to purely being a reasonable venue in which to get tanked up.

The atmosphere on the streets and in the clubs is friendly and celebratory, and I’m yet to witness an aggressive incident. This is in contrast to the macho atmosphere that can prevail in Irish clubs, and particularly on the surrounding streets, where I often feel that you need to be on your guard if you want to stay out of trouble.

This marked difference got me thinking a little about the reasons the two types of ethos are so different. Is it purely cultural? Do we, as a people, actually have dhrinkin’, shmokin’ and fightin’ embedded in our genes?

Or are the reasons to be found in our laws and government policies?

All the talk regarding this issue being tackled in Ireland in recent times has been nothing short of idiotic.

Again and again, we hear certain people calling for shorter night club Since coming here, I am yet to see an alcohol-induced even opening ours, and minifight, tear or argument, which has been pretty refreshing mum pricing legislation for alcohol is currently being considered by waking up the next morning is a but as an alternative to a soft-drink the government. These arguments pounding hangover and the sickly as opposed to the most efficient way completely ignore the fact that we syrup of Jaegermeister gluing your of getting plastered. When I’m going already have one of the earliest mantongue to the roof of your mouth. out with friends, we would normally datory club closures in Europe, and You’ll spend the next couple of hours have no more than two or three beers that alcohol is already prohibitively scratching your head and piecing the before venturing to a club, and have expensive.

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Club Der Visionaere The fact that the clubs close so early only encourages our culture of speed-drinking, both at the ‘pre-session’ and in the clubs, which in turn leads to so many of the social issues that I’ve mentioned. My mother often tells me that during her own time in UCD, ‘pre-sessions’ didn’t exist, and that it was rare for someone to have a drink before heading to the pub.

Anecdotal it may be, but it leads me to believe that the problems we have now can definitely be reversed.

The real challenge would probably be the carnage that would follow in the immediate aftermath of more relaxed drinking laws. I have a feeling that if we were to allow public drinking, let clubs open all night, and reduce the legal drinking age overnight, the country would probably explode.

I would come home to find a postapocalyptic wasteland reminiscent of Mad Max, where only the most hardened sessioners survive.

In order to do it right, we would need to focus on education, along with gradual legal and regulatory changes that could affect cultural change. Right now though, I don’t hear anyone in political or media circles talking any sense on this issue. If we’re going to improve things, we’re going to need to have a reasoned debate. A knee-jerk tightening of regulations every time there’s an alcoholrelated incident featured in the media isn’t the solution.

TRAVEL OTWO

You don’t have to break the bank to visit Paris. Catherine Munnelly shows you how to make the most of the city on a budget

Paris on a Budget

W

hether you’re going with the girls, the lads or with that special someone, Paris is truly the place to be. The small isle of Île de la Cité is the birthplace of Paris in 53BC. Since then the city has become one of the biggest in the world, with 20% of France’s population living within the metropolitan area. Paris is also the most visited city ever with an average of 42 million tourists every year.

With so much to do and see, it’s not surprising why.

The most iconic symbol of Paris, the Eiffel Tower, is an immediate must-see. Opening in 1889 as an exhibit for the World Fair, Mr. Gustave Eiffel did none too shabby a job creating this incredible monument. The sights from the top of the Eiffel Tower at night are incredible. You really see why Paris is dubbed the city of lights.

Plus the queues at night are an eighth of what they are during the day.

No doubt the entry fee for a student is relatively dear at €12.50 to go all the way to the top, so instead, why not

view the light Eiffel Tower light show from a nearby park. Drinking publicly is also very tolerable in Paris, so grab a bottle of French wine and watch it sparkle all night.

Other budget friendly examples of Parian history include Notre Dame, with plenty to keep you intrigued with the immaculate architecture both inside and outside the church.

Art fans will also be delighted to find amazing paintings and terrific sculptures inside the world famous cathedral. The stain windows are a sight in themselves.

Next you should head over the La Conciergerie situated around the corner from Notre Dame to uncover the history of its hundreds of prisoners, including Marie Antoinette, all destined for the guillotine. If you’re exhausted after that, head down to ariver side where you can munch on a picnic, take in the scenery and wave at the tour boats go by.

Even if you’re not an artsy type, a trip to the Lourve comes recommended. But don’t just leave after seeing Da Vinci’s ‘Mona Lisa’. The

The louvre offers hours of endless beautiful paintings and sculptures

Louvre offers hours of endless beautiful paintings and sculptures. You might even come across one of the heads from Easter Island. It’s free on the first Sunday of every month and with an international student card, so if you plan it well, it won’t cost you a cent.

For fans of more recent art, a trip to Musee D’Orsay is a must. Also free for students, Musee D’Orsay is home to an impressive display of paintings by impressionist and expressionist painters such as Manet, Renoir, Van Gogh and Gauguin.

If your walking shoes aren’t worn out yet, try strolling down the Champs Elysees. Known as the most beautiful avenue in the world, this two kilometre stretch of road is home to some of the world most expensive retail stores such as Chanel and Gucci, as well some of the world’s most expensive real-estate. You may not be able to buy anything, but you wont find a more indulgent windowshopping experience.

Paris also offers a range of beautiful parks which are free to wander in

You might even come across one of the heads from easter island

should you want a break from the big tourist attractions. Jardin de Tuileries is one of the best in which to pop your feet up beside one of many enormous fountains after a busy day of sightseeing. Or if you’re a bit peckish head to a café in the bohemian Latin Quarter, pick up a coffee and a croissant and simply watch the world go by.

There are also plenty of cool and unusual art galleries in this area worth checking out. If you want to check out old school bohemian Paris head up to Montmartre. If the Moulin Rouge is a bit pricey, Montmartre offers a great amount of other Cabaret shows. Too risqué for you? Then visit the beautiful Sacré-Coeur Basilica. Located upon the summit of Montmartre, you not only get to see the magnificent piece of architecture but also a breath-taking view of Paris.

The Paris Metro will be your number one for transportation. Paris Visite cards are the best value option at €31.50 for a five day card, but they also have one, two, three and seven days cards. This works within the zones one, two and three: all around central Paris. You can also use it on the bus and RER (suburban train).

With so much to see, this card will save you a fortune on transport.

To make your trip really special, pop on the RER and head to Disneyland Paris. It’s cheaper to buy online, plus you get to skip to the large ticket queues when you arrive.

They’re not wrong when they say this is the happiest place on Earth. If you’re an adrenaline junkie then rollercoasters like Space Mountain and Aerosmith along with the terrifying Tower of Terror will quench your thirst. However if you’re scared of going on the teacups, Disneyland Paris is home to amazing shows, shops and Cinderella’s Palace. If you have the time and the money it’s a must do.

If you want to go to Paris anywhere from three days to a week, October is the best time to visit. This way attractions are not as busy, with the queues cut in half at least, and you’re not sweating from the blazing Parisian summer sun. Your body won’t be squashed on the crowded metro and accommodation is a third of the price.

There’s plenty to do in Paris but don’t rush, remember you’re on holiday so give yourself some time to relax and soak in all Paris has to offer.

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OTWO TRAVEL

Budapest for Beginners Colm O’Neill leaves no nook unexplored as he covers all the highlights of the Hungarian capital

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ivided by the Danube, the districts of Buda and Pest were combined in 1874 to form what may now be the continent’s most under-appreciated gem. Set into luscious green valleys, Budapest is a city brimming with culture and history. It boasts some of Europe’s most breath-taking architecture, and is home to numerous world heritage sites.

With a relaxed, almost Mediterranean atmosphere, it is easy to forget that Budapest is almost as far east as Warsaw, and with its bitter cold winters, Budapest is definitely a city to be visited in the summer months.

As with most major European cities, the advent of cheap airlines has

in a nice restaurant should set you back little more than 3,000 forint (€11), while the average cost of a pint of beer ranges from 300 to 500 forint (about €1.10 to €1.80).

Taking a bus tour near the beginning of the trip is a wise decision, as it provides a valuable opportunity to become acquainted with the general layout of the city, and a great chance to learn about its fascinating history, from the birth of the Hungarian nation to the fall of communism.

Hungarian history is equally tragic in its sufferings and inspiring in its triumphs, and if you are in any way interested in modern European history, then visiting Budapest’s House of Terror is a must. Chilling and unforgettable, this museum offers you a tour through Hungary’s communist

searching for some local cuisine will prove to be a highly rewarding venture. Hungarian cooking is nothing short of delicious made getting there easy and affordable. A trip is certainly possible on a tight budget. Finding a decent hostel for a good price is not a problem, with €15 being an average nightly rate, even in the peak months, and though Hungary has been an EU member state since 2004, they have yet to adopt the Euro, which is good news for Irish visitors. A good meal

Capitol Hill

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past, the effects of which are still very much ingrained in the city’s identity.

Though the city offers excellent public transport (including the second oldest underground railway system in the world, after London), this is a city best seen by foot. It’s worth immersing yourself in the city completely; wandering around charming side-streets, bravely trekking the

city’s steep hills, and getting completely lost on several occasions.

If there is one part of the city that is truly unmissable, it is the beautiful Castle Hill. Located in Buda, Castle Hill is home to some of the city’s most impressive and important buildings.

Getting a cable car up the valley allows you to watch the city emerge and expand before your eyes, and leaves you at the foot of some of the city’s most notable landmarks, including the Fisherman’s Bastion, an incredible white stone terrace built into the valley wall, which looks like something straight out of a fairy-tale, complete with towers and turrets.

Much of your time traversing the city will more than likely be spent crossing the city’s many bridges, which are among the most famous of Budapest’s structures. Perhaps the most notable of these is the incredible Chain Bridge, an iconic and intrinsic element of the city’s composition, comparable to being the Golden Gate Bridge of Budapest, and a very impressive feat of engineering for way back in 1848.

Along with its bridges, it is perhaps the outdoor public baths that are Budapest’s most celebrated feature.

Scented, medicinal, icy-cold or piping

hot, the various baths are the perfect place to escape from the world and slip into a state of total tranquillity.

You’ll be amazed to discover just how quickly searing heat can become absolute bliss, as all your worries slowly float away into the dreamy summer sun.

Dining in Budapest can be a very enjoyable experience, if you look for the right places. Searching for some local cuisine will prove to be a highly rewarding venture. Hungarian cooking is nothing short of delicious and it is never hard to find good value in Budapest.

The vibrant cafe and bar culture is one of the highlights of a stay in Budapest. The open air cafes of the squares and sidewalks are the perfect place to relax over a cup of coffee or a pint of beer. Subterranean bars can be found throughout the city, providing a novel atmosphere for a night out.

An interesting and original feature of Budapest’s nightlife is the various ruin bars found around the city. These are old abandoned buildings which have been converted into bars, each with their own unique personality and crowd, and are a must-see for anyone thinking of sampling Budapest’s nightlife. These bars have an exciting underground feel to them, and are a unique way to kick back with a beer is such a friendly and easy-going environment.

People tend to believe that a city can be friendly or unfriendly, with poor old Paris often considered on the negative end of the scale. Budapest is much like any other city in this regard: it is a great melange of the weird and the wonderful, the nasty and the nice. There is no point in trying to present an entire city’s inhabitants as being of one uniform personality.

Quite frankly, if that were the case it would be a rather strange and unsettling place to visit.

Budapest offers its tourists with the opportunity to make their trip authentic. The city does not cater for tourists at every corner like its more popular European counterparts.

Instead, tourists are left to dip into a culture and society that is nothing but welcoming. It is genuine and that is perhaps the city’s greatest appeal.

OTWO

Hidden Gems: Vintage Boutiques Aoife Loughnane shows that the high street isn’t the only option, as she looks at the best boutiques that lie off the beaten track Om Diva 27 Drury Street

Bow Powerscourt Townhouse

In its old location of Georges Street Arcade, Om Diva was sure to draw you in the second you spotted its girlie, hot-pink exterior, encrusted with colourful flowers. Now moved just around the corner, it’s still as deliciously quirky as ever. The shop is a haven for vintage buys with an array of flirty chiffon dresses, patterned shirts, handbags and shoes that make it all look like a relic from your very stylish granny’s attic.

If you’ve been embarrassingly caught one too many times in the same t-shirt as your classmate, Om Diva is sure too quiet any fears of fashion faux pas.

The shop has an eclectic vibe, with its signature hangers embellished with colourful balls and its shopping bags made from recycled dresses. The staff are extremely warm and friendly, and are always happy to discuss the clothing or even just have a little chat.

Not only does Om Diva boast a vast selection of garments, it’s also home to exquisitely bizarre jewellery, such as Twiggy brooches and Audrey Hepburn cocktail rings. A visit to Om Diva is not so much a shopping trip, as it is a transportation back in time.

This is one shop that merits a trip not solely for the clothing, but the experience as a whole.

Opened two years ago by Irish designers Eilis Boyle, Margaret O’Rourke and Wendy Crawford, Bow is cosily tucked away in the corner of the ground floor in Powerscourt Townhouse. Obviously prices won’t be inexpensive, as they are designer labels, however if you’re looking to invest in some classic pieces, Bow is worth the trip.

The stock includes satin evening gowns, rich scarves, hand-beaded coats, and beautiful jewelry pieces such as brooches and pearl necklaces.

It is also one of two Dublin stockists to have Cambridge Satchel and Co. On top of this Bow supplies stock from Fair Trade labels such as People Tree and Camilla Norback. You may even find yourself rubbing shoulders with the very creator behind your purchase as the shop also serves as a workplace for its designers who are kept busy knitting or making jewelry in the corner.

This quaint wonderland with its old items of furniture, canvases and animal heads is already catching the eyes of fashion magazines, such as Tatler and Irish Brides.

Bow is a platform for many young Irish designers and certainly merits support. The shop sells under their won labels; Margaret O’Rourke ( Mo Mu s e Je we l l e r y ) We n d y Crawford (Wendy’s Wardrobe) and Eilis Boyle.

This distinctive retailer deserves a visit, if not to purchase, just to ogle at its handsome delights.

The Harlequin 13 Castle Market This antiquarian second hand shop is the ideal place for fantastic old school buys, but it is more than a little bit pricey. However if you like a good rummage, it’s possible to nab a cute, one-off treasure to keep forever.

This little shop is crammed to the hilt with tea dresses, hats, and jewellery that glistens behind the glass counter. The sales rack starts around €10 but it never really has many decent pieces, unless it’s a green, ruffled ‘80s prom dress you’re looking for. Persistence and patience is key to finding the clothing gems Harlequin has to offer.

One sage piece of advice for the vertically challenged: bring a tall friend, they’ll prove invaluable when traipsing the upper section of the clothes rail.

Downstairs is home to a selection of menswear, offering a variety of shiny shoes, classic trousers and tweeds. In many respects The Harlequin is almost better for men, with more pieces you can see yourself wearing in reality in their selection of clothing.

The Harlequin has rare pieces tailored to quench the desires of hip young men and women but at a price.

Also be warned that the owner can display signs of terrifying rage; bargain at your own peril.

The 3rd Policeman 121 Lower Rathmines Road The 3rd Policeman is a shiny-yetvintage boutique. It is quite hidden as its narrow frame is next to a casino building and also blends into the charity shop next door. Its warm ambiance is due to the soothing orange colours, the soft jazz playing in the background and the lamps against the wooden cabinets. You may find yourself lingering in the store simply due to the relaxing atmosphere.

It’s hard to believe that this veritable Pandora’s Box lies in the heart of the take-away kingdom of Rathmines.

The 3rd Policeman is chock-full of vintage treats like luxurious fur coats, leather handbags, rings and pendants, and funky shoes. There are also little shelves of bric-a-brac and curious old-style travelling cases. This slice of time gone by unfolds just like the suitcase, tumid with old furs, as well as hat boxes seething with silk scarves.

To top it all off, The 3rd Policemen is reasonably priced, so you really can’t go wrong.

All things considered it’s extremely doubtful as to whether this will be a hidden gem for very long.

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OTWO GAMES

REVIEWS

Borderlands 2 Publisher Developer Platforms Release Date

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Resident Evil 6

2K Games Gearbox Xbox360, Playstation 3, PC Out Now

eveloping a sequel is something of a doubleedged sword. There are so many traps to fall into when it comes to rehashing material that developers can often hamstring themselves by trying too hard to prevent the gameplay from going stale.

Conversely, a sequel has a huge advantage when its source material is good. Thankfully, Borderlands was a top notch starting point and Borderlands 2 is an improvement on virtually every facet of that original experience.

That said, this game can at times feel a little too familiar when compared to its predecessor, with an opening and tutorial so similar to the original you’d swear you’d loaded up the wrong disc. Fear not, after a few minutes of gameplay you get to explore a completely new Borderlands, filtered through the beautifully underused cartoon aesthetic of the previous title.

The humour aspect of this game isn’t exactly subtle; probably the last time we had a robot make us laugh was Portal 2. While Steve Merchant (the voice of Wheatley in Portal) may not be around to grace us with his voice, the cast here do a great job with special credit going to Handsome Jack whose comical transmissions punctuate the main quest line. The sharpeyed player will notice some great references from Pulp Fiction to Hitchcock to TMNT. Less subtle is

an axe-wielding psychopath reciting the “O that this too too solid flesh would melt” soliloquy from Hamlet.

This is a game for gamers: the looting speaks to the most seasoned of players, but the whole atmosphere is lifted by the general tone of not taking oneself too seriously.

The upgrades, the weapon comparisons, the purported “bazillions” of weapons all speak to the veterans of the role-playing genre, those accustomed to spending a decent chunk of their playtime scrolling through lists and weeding out the best kit to be going on with. However, the user interface is minimalistic considering the sheer volume of information it has to deal with; this decision clearly being made in service to the frantic core of the game, gun’n’running, which is so much damn fun virtually anyone can pick up the controller and enjoy themselves.

It’s certainly recommended that everyone picks up a controller, because if there’s one way to improve the core game-play it’s to multiply that madness by four in the multiplayer mode. This game works as a single player title but its best served as a cooperative experience.

Ultimately this game sometimes veers a little too close to the original, but keeps enough of what was great from before and injects it with the vitality that courses through this title’s veins.

By Rory Crean

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he Resident Evil series has gripped horror fans since its debut in 1996, defining survival horror with the original Resident Evil before going on to define action horror with Resident Evil 4. The latest instalment is the most ambitious in size and scope to be released.

The story takes place across three continents with fan favourite Leon S. Kennedy dealing with a Raccoon City style zombie outbreak in Tall Oaks, USA, tough guy Chris Redfield tackling the bio-terrorist J’avo in China, while Sherry Berkin is tasked with extracting Wesker’s son, Jake Muller, from a war-torn Eastern European country. The different characters’ stories intersect with each other at various points, and it is only by completing them all that the game’s full plot emerges.

Resident Evil 6 is surprisingly large, with each of the game’s three main campaigns the length of a full individual game. Depending on the difficulty setting it can take between 15 and 40 hours to play through as Leon, Chris and Jake, without even including the fourth campaign which is unlocked once the others have been completed.

Beyond this are the game’s extra modes, the returning Mercenaries mode and the new option of Agent Hunt. Mercenaries isn’t as enjoyable as it was in previous games and is best played in co-op. Agent Hunt on the other hand is a lacklustre experience where you play as a zombie or J’avo and attempt to prevent

Publisher Developer Platforms Release Date

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Capcom Capcom PS3, Xbox 360 Out Now

another person from completing their campaign. The mode is very similar to the versus-modes in Dead Space 2 and the Left 4 Dead series, though nowhere near as polished.

Anyone who has played RE4 or RE5 will instantly notice that while the core gameplay mechanics have been retained, there have been some changes. The partner system has been retained though the AI has greatly improved. RE5 was so frustrating that it had to be played in coop since the AI Sheva was a suicidal kleptomaniac. In RE6 your partners can actually be trusted to look after themselves and help you out.

It’s disappointing that the weapons customisation has been replaced by skill sets, though the skills system should be easier for new players to adapt to. The inventory and health systems have been streamlined and combat options have been expanded, with a greater emphasis on handto-hand. However, the focus on cinematic set pieces with awkward camera angles and an extensive use of quick time events unfortunately detracts from the game’s combat experience and interrupts the fluidity of the action.

RE6 certainly gives you plenty of bang for your buck and while being an enjoyable action adventure, it is sad to see few traces left of the series’ survival horror roots.

Ultimately, Resident Evil 6 is a significant improvement on RE5 though it still pales in comparison to RE4.

By Steven Balbirnie

GAMES OTWO

Julie Uhrman, CEO of OUYA chats to Steven Balbirnie about breaking into the console market, enabling the average person to develop games and designing for hackers

New Console on the Block

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here’s a new console on the way and many of its features may surprise you.

Standing alongside the WiiU, Xbox 360 and PS3 will soon be the OUYA. The OUYA is an Android console, which anyone can develop for, anyone can hack, and it will retail for under $100. At a time when gamers are increasingly cash-strapped, such a competitive price could give the OUYA an edge over its rivals.

As OUYA founder and CEO, Julie Uhrman says: “Hardware and software are more accessible and affordable than ever before. Shouldn’t gaming be a little less expensive?”

Uhrman can speak with considerable authority, possessing an impressive CV including previous roles at GameFly, IGN and Vivendi Universal.

Support for her entry into the console market has come from a wide range of respected sources, including industry analyst Michael Pachter. “While it is certainly a bold move to take on the likes of Sony, Nintendo and Microsoft, I think there may be room for another player, particularly at this price point. It’s been a long time since a new console was introduced, and it is likely that pricing for consoles will go up. By coming in at a lower price point and challenging the existing pricing model for TV-based games, OUYA could hit a sweet spot with gamers,” says Pachter There is little doubt that many have agreed with him; OUYA is the fastest project to pass the $1million mark on Kickstarter. The goal for the campaign was to raise $950,000; by the time it had closed over $8.5million had been secured from over 60,000 backers. Uhrman attributes this massive response to “the surprise factor. For many folks, we came out of nowhere and we took on some big companies; nobody really does that.” She also points out that “the concept is very practical and the timing is right. It helps of course that we have a great team and some really fantastic developers, partners and advisors in our corner.”

Another element contributing to OUYA’s surprise factor is the fact that every OUYA console

includes a software development kit, which would allow anyone to develop and publish a title from the comfort of their own home. This is an aspect of console gaming that existed in the early days of the Commodore 64 and ZX Spectrum but died out over time.

After twenty years, OUYA is bringing this feature back. “That element of development pretty much faded out as more and more hurdles were put in place for developers. The more closed off consoles

There will always be hackers and tinkerers, people who take what’s known and push it to new limits became the less likely it was that a game could be made by a small team. We’ve done our best to remove hurdles. The only thing that will limit developers now will be their own imaginations.”

This approach has received ample praise from developers. Alex Schwartz of Owlchemy Labs has said “an open console is the next step in democratising game development.” Jordan Mechner, the creator of Prince of Persia, has also endorsed the OUYA, saying: “I love the idea of an open game console – it would be fantastic for players and developers alike.”

The OUYA is also an open console in the sense

that not only can anyone develop for it, but anyone can hack and modify the console without voiding their warranty. While Nintendo, Microsoft and Sony are intensely opposed to their consoles being hacked or modified, the OUYA was “built to be hacked.”

Uhrman explains the rationale behind this decision: “There will always be hackers and tinkerers, people who take what’s known and push it to new limits. It’s human nature. Instead of creating a console and constantly churning out software versions with the sole intention of battling hackers and modders, we accept the reality. People want to feel like they’re in control of something they’ve paid good money for. We understand that desire to see what they come up with, particularly hardware hackers making new peripherals. It’s going to be awesome.”

While OUYA will be launching in March 2013, the team behind it will have plenty of work to do in the meantime. “We’ve been totally inundated with messages from interested developers and we are trying to get back to each and every one of them,” says Uhrman. “That said, it’s too early for us to announce a launch slate. We want it to feel fresh, exciting and new.”

So far it has been confirmed that OUYA has been backed by, and will support, Vevo, XBMC, Tunein, iHeartRadio and Plex. Games confirmed for the console include Square Enix’s Final Fantasy 3, U4iA’s Offensive Combat and Human Element by Robotoki, with more titles and backers still to be announced.

OUYA will be taking on some industry heavyweights, but with its competitive price and its innovative approach to developers and hackers, it will stand out from its peers. As Uhrman says: “It’s a departure from the way traditional console makers have operated and I think maybe people like that we are challenging the status quo.”

OUYA is available to pre-order now at www.ouya.tv

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OTWO FILM

REVIEWS Director Starring Release Date

Genndy Tarakovsky Adam Sandler, Kevin James, Andy Samberg October 12th

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otel Transylvania is set in the present day and revolves around Count Dracula hosting a massive birthday party for his over-protected daughter in the titular hotel, a safe haven for monsters far away from the cruelty of human kind. All his plans go to pieces however, when a single human shows up at the door and begins to fall for his daughter.

Lessons are learned, songs are sung, and shenanigans ensue.

The animation in this film is fantastic, which should come as no surprise as it is the feature film debut of Genndy Tartakovsky, creator of the award-winning cartoons Dexter’s Laboratory and Samurai Jack. It’s also his first foray into CGI animation, though he retains his signature hyperkinetic style. Many scenes take place on a sort of faux-2D plain and there is a strong focus on rapid action throughout the film which is refreshing when so many modern CGI films tend focus more on

Hotel Transylvania extreme detail. Sadly, the high quality animation can’t cover the fact that virtually every other feature of the film is absolutely atrocious.

The entire package is so unintelligent, uninspired, and uninteresting.

It has a predictable plot populated by characters that are bland, annoying, or highly one-dimensional, with Adam Sandler as Dracula simultaneously managing to be all three.

The comedy is very much hit and miss, with every decent joke being outweighed by at least four poor ones. The majority of the amusing

ones are also a result of clever uses of animation, a reminder that the animators talents are desperately trying to bolster a sub-par script.

The movie stinks of being a soulless money-grab. It’s a shallow, pointless piece of cinema, which alternates between being completely unengaging and painfully cringeeducing, specifically with regard to the borderline abusive musical numbers. It’s tough to decide which is worse, Adam Sandler rapping in a Transylvanian accent or Adam Sandler singing in an auto-tuned

Directors Starring Release Date

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(Paul Dano) wrote a massively successful novel. In the years that have followed he has descended into a Salinger-esque rut, a limbo of hipster frustration in which he can only sit in front of his retro typewriter and bemoan his lack of inspiration.

It is upon the advice of his shrink (Elliott Gould) that he creates the character Ruby Sparks; an enchanting and beautiful young woman with whom Calvin begins to fall in love, only for her to come off the page and into his life.

Played by the talented Zoe Kazan (who also wrote the film), Ruby is

In a Nutshell: Only worth watching for the impressive animation, though waiting for the DVD would allow the privilege of the mute button.

By Eoin Moore

Jonathan Dayon, Valerie Faris Paul Dano, Zoe Kazam, Elliott Gould, Annett Bening, Antonio Banderas October 12th

Ruby Sparks ix years since the release of the indie hit Little Miss Sunshine, husband-wife directorial team Jonathan Dayton and Valerie Faris have returned with Ruby Sparks, a hilarious new indie flick that blends elements of rom-com and fantasy.

Somewhat reminiscent of Stranger Than Fiction, Ruby Sparks tells a story that is steeped in romantic irony, asking for a suspension of disbelief not just from the audience but from the film’s own characters as well.

As a teenager, Calvin Weir-Fields

Transylvanian accent. There’s been a string of quality children’s films this year with the likes of Brave and ParaNorman that may well be remembered in years to come. Hotel Transylvania isn’t one of them.

cute and quirky in just the right amounts. It would take a hard heart not to be charmed by Kazan’s creation; a character who has surprising believability and depth, despite the obvious setback of being a fictional character existing within yet another layer of fiction. The real-life couple of Dano and Kazan have wonderful chemistry, bringing great authenticity to their on-screen relationship. The natural dynamics between Calvin and his macho brother Harry (Chris Messina) are another of the film’s most enjoyable aspects, as they gleefully share in

their boyish excitement and confusion at the incredible events unfolding around them.

Along with pop-culture references and just the right amount of schmaltz, the film features an impressive score from Nick Urata (and a handful of French pop songs thrown in for good measure). The only notably weak points are the scenes in which Calvin and Ruby visit Calvin’s mother and stepfather (Annette Bening and Antonio Banderas). These scenes throw the action slightly off course and briefly threaten to enter Meet the Fockers territory. Thankfully the film quickly veers back on track, building its way up to the ever-looming denouement, allowing you to suspend your disbelief and be carried away by this charming love story.

In a Nutshell: For anyone who fancies themselves as a writer or a romantic, this clever and original love story will not disappoint.

By Colm O’Neill

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FILM OTWO

Suspiciously similar films

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Even the hotbed of original ideas that is Hollywood repeats itself from time to time. Kevin Murphy picks out some of the more blunt examples.

ondon, 1962: inseparable 10. The Truman Show (1998) / EDTV (1999) young teens Both EDTV and The Truman Show focus on men Ginger (Elle whose lives are broadcast 24/7 on TV, the two films Fanning) and pre-empting society’s obsession with reality televiRosa (Alice Englert) sion. One was lauded with awards and critical achave been raised in a claim, the other stars Matthew McConaughey and is society all too aware of boring. the destructive capabilities of nuclear war.

9. Braveheart / Rob Roy (both1995) As they grow from girls 1995 was the year of epic Scottish movies with solinto women and begin to diers. Braveheart was shot in Ireland with such Irish understand the threats in actors as Brendan Gleeson and Rob Roy stars Irish the world around them, man Liam Neeson. Apparently Scottish actors don’t their worries about their look Scottish on film so you have to use the Irish. troubled family lives clash head on with their 8. Babe / Gordy (both 1995) new political concerns.

History is a cruel mistress; such as the fate of the While Ginger and Rosa largely forgettable pig adventures of Gordy, who pales is, at its core, a family in comparison to the highbrow pig adventures of the drama, it’s very much filmic king that is Babe. Posters for the doomed rerooted in the politics lease claimed “Kids will squeal over Gordy”, which of the time rather than is true if by ‘squeal’ they meant ‘fail to show up to the just throwing it in for cinema entirely’. cultural context. In fact, the first shot of the 7. Deep Impact / Armageddon (both 1998) film is newsreel of the Director Sally Potter Lumps of rock hurtling towards Earth was seemingly Hiroshima bombing beStarring Elle Fanning, Alice Englert, Christina Hendricks quite a sexy topic from films in the late nineties. As fore switching to London Release Date October 19th the old saying goes ‘Always judge a disaster film by it’s for the birth of these two soundtrack’, pitting Tom Jones’ version of ‘Fly me to girls. Throughout the the Moon’ against Aerosmith’s unintelligible passionfilm there are constant ate death-cry ‘I Don’t Want to Miss a Thing’. updates of the state of the Cold War through 6. ParaNorman / Frankenweenie (Both 2012) radio bulletins and character conversations. It’s It’s rare to get even one stop-motion animation film a this aspect that saves the film from being a fairly year so to have two horror themed animations involving generic family drama, the threat of world destruczombies and Halloween is slightly suspect. tion constantly looming.

Though it can be said for all the characters, 5. Antz / A Bug’s Life (both 1998) Ginger is most blatantly confused by her situation.

Back in the proper rivalry days of Pixar and More interested in trying to save the world from DreamWorks, the two came out with the bizarrely siminuclear holocaust than going to school, she tries lar idea of the heroic lives of ants. DreamWorks must to make sense of her confusion by writing blunt, have thought they had this one in the bag when they awkward poetry. However, she’s equally helpbagged the voice talent of Woody Allen. Of course, they less in doing anything about the Cold War as she failed to consider that not many eight year olds enjoyed is with patching things up between her parents Annie Hall.

(Christina Hendricks and Alessandro Nivolla).

As her and Rosa drift apart, her fears of the 4. The Illusionist / The Prestige (both 2006) ‘end of world’ seem to become a reality with her ‘There aren’t enough films about magicians’ is probpersonal life. This level of depth is all the more imably what both of these groups of filmmakers thought pressive considering lead actress Elle Fanning was at oddly similar moments. Christopher Nolan’s The 13 at the time of shooting; outperforming the rest Prestige comes out on top with its captivating and mysof the competent cast to a ridiculous extent. terious story of rivalling magicians.

While the political aspects do add an interesting tweak to a personal drama formula the whole 3. No Strings Attached / Friends With Benefits (both 2011) thing still feels slightly empty, no strong resoluNothing sells cinema tickets quite like attractive people having tion reached one way or the other. This could be casual sex, a formula that both these films discovered simultaa positive or negative depending on what you’re neously. No Strings Attached went on to win an Oscar for ‘best looking for. film Hollywood has or ever will make’.

At times it dips into questionable melodrama and sometimes straddles the line between portray2. Melancholia (2011)/ Seeking a Friend for the End of the ing pretentious characters and just being outright World (2012) pretentious. But if you’re looking for an intelligent Two very different takes on the apocalypse. Melancholia is a seand somewhat thought-provoking female comingrious, sombre investigation while Seeking a Friend stars Steve of-age drama set in a very particular political Carrell and a dog and has throwaway jokes about taking heroin. context, your ultra-specific criteria have been met.

In a Nutshell: An interesting weaving of world politics and personal troubles that edge on melodrama but, on the whole, stays on track.

By Conor Luke Barry

1. Avatar (2009) / Dances With Wolves (1990) No amount of 3D or large blue people can hide the fact that Avatar is just a remake of Dances With Wolves. All of these accusations or unoriginality has no doubt forced James Cameron to wipe away his tears of shame with hundred dollar bills.

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OTWO FILM

Directing Diversity

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ainstream or independent, female directors have always occupied an inordinately small place in the cinema, though they have been involved since its very inception, For example, Alice Guy-Blache directed films for the France-based Gaumont Film Company beginning in 1896. Some nations, such as India and Japan, did not even let women perform as actors in the nascent years of film. Though in the 1960s and 70s, some female directors, such as Agnes Varda (whose Cleo from 5 to 7 was an important precursor to the French New Wave) and Chantal Akerman (whose avantgarde work stands out in a largely male-dominated world) achieved critical success, there has never been a sustained era of female-generated impact on mainstream cinema. This, it seems, may be changing in recent years. The critical and financial success of female-helmed features such as The Hurt Locker (2008), Twilight (2008), Tiny Furniture (2010), and Winter’s Bone (2011) could be laying the groundwork for a move towards greater equality in the cinema.

Kathryn Bigelow’s The Hurt Locker was acclaimed at the time of its release for its intense action sequences and tension-filled bomb defusing scenes on the order of an Alfred Hitchcock thriller. Having directed the oft-parodied Point Break (1991) as well as K19: The Widowmaker (2002), Bigelow’s action pedigree was already well established. Interestingly enough, all three films almost entirely ignore women, focusing instead on

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set by Hardwicke’s film type, raising her two young siblings (and Bigelow’s, for that in place of her mentally ill mother matter) four years ago. and searching for her absent father.

Independent cinema, Winter’s Bone also shows no intertoo, has shown itself to est in the heterosexual romance that be a proving ground for pervades the majority of mainstream young, female direct- Hollywood films. ing talent. With Tiny Given that framework, one might Furniture as her autobi- expect Ree to enlist the help of a ographical debut, writer, male friend (Josh Hutcherson and director and star Lena Liam Hemsworth come to mind) in Dunham sprang into finding her father and eventually find the consciousness of the love and stability in the protection indie cinema/art house that friend can offer her in the harsh crowd. The film, unlike world of impoverished rural America. the above two, features These expectations are not, by any a mother-daughter re- means, satisfied at the conclusion lationship, keeping men of the film, which essentially finds in its periphery. Since its us right back where we started. The triumphant premiere at People are starting to South by Southwest, The take notice to what Criterion Collection, a degree women are DVD company that calls or are not included itself “a continuing series in consideration for of important classic and the highest directing contemporary films”, honours picked up Tiny Furniture for its first publication on home video. This four Academy Award nominations, honor placed her first including one for Granik’s screenfeature among all the play (co-authored by Anne Rosellini), greats of World Cinema, once again gave Hollywood a glimpse Alice Guy-Blanche from Welles and Fellini of what it could expect from not only to Godard and Bergman. female-directed pictures, but also men in traditionally “macho” roles of In the surprisingly gushy essay ac- from female-driven narratives. authority (soldiers and policemen). companying the release, critic Phillip As it stands right now, the numRegardless, the biggest coup for The Lopate said: “Dunham is shaping up bers show that mainstream cinema Hurt Locker was Bigelow’s victory at to be a force to be reckoned with, and has in fact not made tangible, measThe Academy Awards, where she won is already a supremely engaging tal- urable progress as far as gender is the Oscar for Best Director (beat- ent”. So far this year, Lopate’s char- concerned. It is clear, however, that ing out ex-husband James Cameron acterisation of the Oberlin College the seeds have been planted. The who, to be fair, was nominated for graduate and TriBeCa native has combination of the critical success the abomination that was Avatar). proven accurate, with her television of The Hurt Locker, the financial sucNo woman had done so before or series Girls earning five Primetime cess of Twilight, and the crossover has since. This level of mainstream Emmy nominations. appeal of the indies Tiny Furniture acknowledgement of a female direcAnother independent film, Debra and Winter’s Bone shows that the tor has opened fierce debate over the Granik’s Winter’s Bone, made waves doors of Hollywood are indeed open selections at other awards shows and recently at last year’s Oscars, receiv- to women directors and the time is festivals. While Bigelow’s win has not ing four nominations. The film once ripe, now more than ever, to walk by any means opened the floodgates again has a woman at the centre of its through them. of talented female directors, people narrative but, unlike the disaffected, are starting to take notice to what de- aimless Aura in Tiny Furniture, Ree gree women are or are not included in Dolly is more of a strong, independent By Casey Lehman consideration for the highest directing honours, both in Hollywood and abroad.

The will be no presumption to make any quality judgements about Catherine Hardwicke’s Twilight or its literary source. For the purpose of this article, its $70.55 million opening weekend speaks for itself. The largest first three days for any female-directed film, Twilight showed Hollywood that even with lesser-known actors on-screen, women directors could turn a popular novel into a wildly successful cinematic franchise. Other numbers, however, are not as promising. According to a study conducted by San Diego State University’s Center for the Study of Women in Television and Film, women accounted for only 5% of the directors among the 250 top grossing American films last year. Hollywood, it seems, has been slow to notice the example Kathryn Bigelow: The Hurt Locker

FILM OTWO

Military and the Movies

Zero Dark Thirty: Contoversy

By Laura Bell

in the sci-fi blockbuster being touted as “the larg- troops; and when Captain America doesn’t come est joint-military movie ever made” by Lt. Col Greg off quite American enough, you know there’s some Bishop, an Iraq veteran who now serves as a liaison strict criteria in play. hen appraising an image of between the Army and the Hollywood studios. “If Perhaps predictably, and despite First Lady Megan Fox bending seductively you go down the list,” he continues, “Black Hawk Michelle Obama pushing ‘Joining Forces’, a White over the bonnet of a sports car, Down was just about all army, Top Gun was all Navy, House initiative which seeks to call public attenthe agenda of the United States Iron Man was predominantly Air Force.” tion to the lives of men and women in uniform, Department of Defence is hardly While this collaborathe first thing on one’s mind. Unbeknownst to the tion between branches The Pentagon simply wants the movie-going casual viewer, however, it is designed, at least sub- makes the film more reconsciously, to be the second. While the notion of alistic, the accepted art public to know that if ever science fiction became military propaganda may seem like a relic of a time of portraying the milireality, “This is how we’d do it.” long past; an age of stars, stripes, and bald eagles tary has less to do with that now holds little cultural relevance beyond content and everything confederate stereotypes and kitsch fourth-of-July to do with tone. In exchange for Bay’s use of Navy to Hollywood high-rollers and studio execs, the souvenirs; the machine is, perhaps, more powerful submarines, Marine hovercrafts, and just about liaison between the civilian and the martial is not than ever. The message is the same, but the medium every model of aircraft in the sky, he is asked only without its controversies and detractors. has changed. for token patriotism, and, well, to make the military Most recently, the upcoming picture Zero Dark In place of Uncle Sam pinning young conscripts look really cool. “In Transformers, we’re fighting Thirty was the centre of an investigation into the with the steely gaze of patriotism, the U.S. govern- alien robots, so realism is obviously out the win- leak of high-level classified intelligence to direcment now passes the baton of indoctrination to dow,” Bishop admits. The Pentagon simply wants tor Kathryn Bigelow and screenwriter Mark Boal. high profile movie makers like Jerry Bruckheimer, the movie-going public to know that if ever science The film tells the story of the six Navy SEAL’s Ridley Scott, and Steven Spielberg, all happy to sign fiction became reality, “This is how we’d do it.” (‘Seal Team Six’) responsible for the capture of away their scripts to the Pentagon in exchange for The massive amounts of money saved by stu- Osama Bin Ladin; with the production receivthe resources of one or all of the five branches of dios in extras, artillery, and attack simulations due ing detailed inside information which included the armed forces at their disposal. The ‘glory of war’ to military cooperation is a powerful bargaining the secret identity of the “planner, operator and has been given a makeover, with slick new packag- tool, and the U.S. administration certainly knows commander” of the real-life squad. The House ing, abandoning the grainy black and white news how to use it. The climax of Steven Spielberg’s Committee on Homeland Security chairman Peter reels of iron-backed troops marching to the drums $600,000,000 grossing War of the Worlds suffered King decried the collaboration as, “extremely an early stage rewrite in close, unprecedented, and potentially dangerous,” order to portray the story’s though the Obama administration maintained that Michael Bay has benefited immensely from the fictional Marines as more Hollywood’s access would do no harm. In light of post 9/11 social climate to which pro-military noble than foolish in their the Department of Defence’s goal and indeed, the approach to a large-scale level to which media influence penetrates our colpropaganda is so crucial alien invasion. lective unconscious, Bigelow’s movie is almost sure Nevertheless, sometimes to have the desired effect. of war, in favour of Robert Downey Jr. as Iron Man; a simple rewrite will not suffice; with the powers With studios benefiting financially, and the miliOptimus Prime vs. Megatron; and the NCIS team that be often making surprisingly selective choic- tary propagating their interests, it’s difficult to see on the trail of a new killer every Sunday night at 9. es. Marvel’s long awaited and massively successful where the boardroom back scratching begins and Michael Bay, who has helmed projects such as Avengers was ultimately rejected by entertainment ends. Audiences are fed high quality, supra-stylthe Transformers series, Armageddon, and Pearl liaisons after a tenebrous trial period, reportedly ised images of war, while patriotism, as with any Harbour, has benefited immensely from the post due to the dubiously structured chain of command commodity, is distributed and outsourced. As Joe 9/11 social climate to which pro-military propa- in the film’s fictional S.H.I.E.L.D organisation. It Trento writes: “To be a superpower, there is a basic ganda is so crucial. seems that in the fictional multiverse, as in recruit- belief that you must glorify war in order to get the The 2009 sequel, Transformers: Revenge of the ment propaganda, ‘treason’ is a four-letter word. public to accept the fact that you are going to send Fallen boasted the co-operation of a record four out Even the slightest confusion as to who’s giving the their sons and daughters to die.” of five branches of the U.S. armed forces, resulting orders is enough to justify literally withdrawing the

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OTWO

Mumford & Sons’ Ben Lovett and Marcus Mumford chat Guinness, white tigers and Babel with Emily Mullen

Deconstructing Ge T

he Westbury’s Marble Bar. Gathering my thoughts while a concerned barman, who had obviously been viewing my twitching and writhing at the idea of meeting Mumford and Sons, aided and abetted the situation by placing a fruity cocktail in my hand. The drink was possibly the most ostentatious ever made, with what seemed like ten straws accompanied by delicately arranged fruit on toothpicks, and complete with a two-toned fruity hue. It made it extra awkward when a jet-lagged Mumford and Sons were ushered into the room to behold me and my fruity cocktail.

Mumford and Sons are every inch the upper-class boys that the media portrays them to be; their plummy accents are no exaggeration and their manners not of the generated verity.

Dressed head to toe in west London chic apparel, each and every one looked and spoke as if they had just

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met up with Millie at the BlueBird café on the Made in Chelsea set.

Rocking up to the interview 45 minutes late, changing tables twice, and then finally ordering the first pint of Guinness of Arthur’s day (leaving my drink ever more shameful), the inter-

“

monologue is to it now.

Mumford and Sons, the band that brought folk to the forefront of popular music, are currently shrinking from the label. “We have tried to do everything we can to avoid putting ourselves into one genre at this stage,

We have tried to do everything we can to avoid putting ourselves into one genre at this stage, we still feel like we are figuring it out view had begun. My first few precious minutes with Ben Lovett and Marcus Mumford had been eaten away with jokey questions about Guinness consumption and a very formal game of musical chairs, they seemed to enjoy my banter, but I think it was as useful to my article as my fruity cocktail

we still feel like we are figuring it out and even though we’re two albums in, we really are just beginning,” says a somewhat irate Lovett.

Yet, this is a reasonable enough label to give their attitude a voice. The most natural thing to do when you hear the erratic strings of banjos, and

soaring harmonies,and see slightly hairy tweed-bedecked men, is to place them in the genre of folk, right?

Wrong. Mumford and Sons do not mess around on this matter.

The band have been defined by the term ‘fusion’ at numerous points, a term given to them by Emmylou Harris, is a contrite from of vernacular. “I suppose it is a fusion, I think we would probably be alright with that. A mixture of I don’t know what, but yeah sort of a mixture of personalities.”

The pressure placed on Babel, not just as an album, but as a signpost to the direction of Mumford and Sons’ music, was enormous. With an album that was perceived as so new, and so fresh as Sigh No More behind them, you cannot escape the feeling that Mumford and Sons preferred to steer away from the trappings of a radically different sophomore album, in favour of a slightly altered and matured sound when it came to Babel. To

OTWO use their own words this album is a “reaction as opposed to a revolution.”

Babel, a simple biblical title, one that may lead to questions concerning an emphasis upon religion, humanity and the greed that civilisation can accumulate, is for Mumford and Sons simply an album title: “Album titles are a weird thing you know, because they don’t really matter. It doesn’t really matter what you call your album, but people, specifically the media, attach themselves to it. I don’t think anyone who listens to our music or likes our music for what it is, gives a shit about what the album is called.

No one would really care if it was titled ‘A Piece of Shit’, but the media need something to write about. So I don’t know, maybe it’s not the best album title in the world, but it felt appropriate, it summed up the vibe that we were going for.”

Feelings of pressure or notions of discontinuity never surfaced during the writing process of Babel for Mumford: “I think we were just focusing on writing songs, we didn’t think about it too hard. We didn’t over-think it, we just recorded songs that came along and just focused on the sound really. We have never been very intentional with our sound as you might imagine, it’s just been quite organic. It hasn’t been really thoughtout or too calculated. We’ve just wrote the songs that have cropped up and tried to serve them as best we can within the limitations of what we have instrumentally and personally in the band.”

Lyrically the stance has shifted to an almost autobiographical stand-

literary themes to small citations, the great authors, past and present, are of cogent influence to them. “I think we all agree that we like Steinbeck’s approach to depicting relationships and stories, I think he writes in a very balanced manner. But there’s probably a thousand authors that we read. Steinbeck isn’t our torch bearer that we build music behind, he is one of many authors out there that writes in a way that inspires us, and I don’t think we would ever claim to write in the same realm of that.”

Controversy raged on whether Babel would or indeed would not be Mumford and Sons’ final album, after a throwaway remark made by Lovett set blogs and magazines ablaze with debate. “No, there definitely will be a third album.” Lovett’s words are sure to set many millions of fans’ minds at ease. “I just said it after the iTunes gig, something like, ‘If there will be a third album.’ It was meant to be more hopeful than that, it wasn’t supposed to be controversial,” he explains. “It felt a bit early to talk about a third record so I’d just back it up by saying ‘If there is one’, because right now we are focusing fully on Babel.”

Launching the UK and Republic’s Tour of Two Halves leg of the tour next month, talk of a third album must have been a tedious question for a band that had just released an album and were just about to go on tour with it, despite this they seem extremely positive about the tour: “It’s going to be great, a four week tour, and we are going to get to visit some completely new places like Carlyle and Llandudno in Wales playing theatres and then we are going to do some arenas as well and it rounds off in the O2 in Dublin. It’ll be a good place to finish.”

Performing live, something that the band have long been credited for, appears to hold a sort of metaphoric value for the group; as an act, it breaks down barriers between musician and viewer, leaving fans with the impression that Mumford and Sons are indeed just mere men. “I think it’s a weird thing isn’t it? Especially

enres point, with the heavy emphasis upon literary citations taking a back foot: “I think we were a bit more open with our citing and literary references on Sigh No More, and it’s something that we were keen not to do this time around, but it doesn’t feel like it’s been a massive shift in our approach to writing songs. It’s always been quite reactionary.”

From shifting from their reliance upon literary classics, on to a more autonomous self-motivated method of storytelling, the band as a whole are growing and learning. Accepting that Babel does not have a dissimilar sound to Sigh No More, Mumford and Sons are continuing along their own path at their own pace and are not answering or wondering what the public desire to hear. These ‘revolutionary’ changes that the media longed to hear were not apparent in Babel.

However, highbrow literature will always feature in their lyrics in one form or another, from profound

these days, the sort of cult celebrity status, whereon people have a very different impression of you just because you are on the stage. I think we are very different, we passionately disagree with being treated differently for being famous musicians, so yeah at gigs we do our best to engage, and we probably are sort of. I think we just try and break down that barrier between musician and fan. We for our own functioning as a band need to be real and need to be honest and sort of organic I guess.”

Does being ‘real’ and ‘honest’ have any altercations when it comes to the simple fact that they are extremely rich and famous? “I think we’ve had

“

Sigh No More, no one can deny their success and their allure. Handsome, intelligent and painfully well-bred, Mumford and Sons are perhaps the best kind of celebrity, simply because they don’t want any of it.

Giving interviews is a task, their hatred of journalists is deep, and the

For our own functioning as a band need to be real and need to be honest and sort of organic I guess our head down, and been working too hard to even fall into the trappings of fame, we haven’t even had the time to buy a white tiger like Akon.”

No white tigers is perhaps a disappointing realisation: “A white tiger might have taken up too much time. We’ve been working so hard recording and doing shows and we are hoping to get future recordings out swifter if touring allows and that’s our focus really and who knows where our lives will lead, but it’s pretty straightforward at this moment in time.”

Call them what you want, celebrate their new album, or call it a rehashed

critical analysis of their music is a watershed of discontent. They are steadfast celebrities, their intangibility and sheer awkwardness simply increases their intrigue. Trying and failing to get an understanding of the intent behind Babel really threw me, so too did the stonewalling that so many of my questions received, and so I bid adieu to Marcus and Ben, fruity cocktail in hand.

Mumford and Sons play the O2, Dublin on December 16th. Tickets are priced from €39.05. Their new album Babel is out now.

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OTWO MUSIC

Hudah from Hypnotic Brass Ensemble chats to Kieran Lynch about origins and making it to the top

Hypnotic Brass Ensemble

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hat’s the craic man?” asks Gabriel Hubert, more commonly known as Hudah, as he gives a warm greeting, clearly well versed in Irish colloquialisms. This is no doubt something he has picked up from the various dates they’ve played here.

The Chicago native is one of eight brothers in one of the hottest jazz acts today: Hypnotic Brass Ensemble. From first performing in 2007 at the Sugar Club, to playing multiple dates at the Button Factory, along with a slot at Electric Picnic, Hypnotic Brass Ensemble have made their mark in Ireland, leaving with them a trail of new fans each time they return.

Like many before, they started out busking on the streets of Chicago, slowly gathering attention.

While others would fall by the wayside, Hypnotic managed to make it, in no part thanks to their father’s support Their father, Keelan Phil Cohran, a respected Jazz musician, was the driving force behind the group. First playing as part of Cohran’s youth ensemble in a warehouse behind the family home, the eight brothers eventually formed their own group under influences of hip-hop and jazz. “My musical education, knowledge and inspiration all derived from my father’s teachings. When I hear tones, I hear them in a celestial form so they were a major impact on my development.” When you combine this with the fact that their other brothers, sisters and mothers are professional musicians and singers, it certainly seems they were destined for the stage.

Their name itself came from a commuter who stood in wonder, watching the group at a train station. “You guys just hypnotised me,” the suited man told them having watch them play for hours. This is certainly something that still rings true and aptly describes the effects created by the brothers as

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they’ve earned a universal reputation for dazzling live sets. “Our music is universal as opposed to a lot of others, our audiences range from elders to youngsters to babies; it all depends on the vision.”

Performing with the likes of De La Soul, Prince, Wu Tang Clan and Mos Def, Hypnotic are causing heads to turn across different genres. They were even asked by Damon Albarn to collaborate with Gorillaz on the track ‘Plastic Beach’ (2010).

Working with different artists is clearly important to the group. One of their many collaborations sticks out in particular for Hudha: “Playing with Prince was one of the highlights of my life, just being able to be on stage with that guy, to converse with him in any way.”

This is a band that has persevered to reach a certain audience around the world. Making the transition from Chicago to New York, and independent to label, has placed Hypnotic Brass Ensemble en route to global recognition, perhaps most markedly demonstrated in the use of their track, ‘War’, in the US blockbuster, The Hunger Games. When asked if they felt any vindication or increased attention post-release, Hudah admitted: “We are known across the globe, by a lot of different people and they’d go ‘Hey was that you guys? I think that was your song...’ If you didn’t know Hypnotic, then you didn’t know that we had a song in a movie.”

While the success of the movie wasn’t replicated for the band, a ripple effect was in motion. “It’s one of those innate feelings that you just know when you’re doing something right, it was just a matter of re-strategising.”

Since 2004, Hypnotic Brass Ensemble have released a record of some description every year, showing there’s no lack of originality inhibiting them. Bulletproof, their latest EP, has, much like its cover art, come out with guns blazing. Infectious energy with flagrant bass lines cause you to take note of how they make music.

Cohran placed them in a regimented upbringing with 6am starts, which they’re thankful for now.

With “dreams of becoming world renowned stars” it was always a case of when, not if, they’d make it to the world stage.

In a time where genres are blurred and recipes for success reciprocated, Hypnotic are passionate about doing their own thing. Moving to Handcuts, a Japanese label in 2007, Hudah realised that although they had more press and it was “very pivotal in that transition” helping them be taken seriously in the business sense, “financially it was a different story.”

Where they are today is a testament to the pragmatic approach Hypnotic have employed. Such is their influence, David Byrne and St Vincent’s new release ‘Love This Giant’ credits Hypnotic among others for the brass inspired album.

Working with both Childish Gambino and RZA on the track ‘American Royalty’, both of which whom appeared in front of the camera, the idea of making the same transition must play on their minds. Asked if there’s a possibility for expanding the Hypnotic résumé onto the big screen, Hudah certainly has aspirations: “The next part of our journey is radio and television to allow our music to continue to grow, to allow our movement to reach more people and to sustain that fan base we would need radio and TV.” At the forefront of the jazz revival (which is a hefty task in itself ) they have no intentions of leaving New York anytime soon. For the meantime, Hypnotic will continue to tour, promoting Bulletproof with a clear vision intact they’ll undoubtedly win over even more audiences across the globe.

Hypnotic Brass Ensemble return to Dublin to play the Meeting House Square on Oct. 20th, as part of the Becks Vier Rhythm Weekender. Tickets are priced €22.50.

MUSIC OTWO

Former Razorlight member and solo artist, Andy Burrows, talks to Andrew Carolan about Johnny Borrell, and band hopping

I

n 2009, Andy Burrows parted ways with the hit indie-rock band Razorlight, citing “personal differences” as his reason for the split. Today, he stands in a position where all things seem possible, musically at least. He is the drummer of We Are Scientists, has made an album with Tom Smith of The Editors and released two solo albums thus far, with a third due later this month, entitled Company.

The release of a new album these days is very precious in the process of an artist’s career. Albums take months to record, produce and mix before the publicity and touring schedules even start. Despite the pressure, Burrows is relatively calm in his outlook: “It tends to be fairly healthy, optimistic nerves. Also, I’m too long in the tooth to be worried.”

At 33, Burrows understands the business well; it has changed remarkably since 2004 when Razorlight released their first album. His passion for music began early on though; a “healthy obsession” with pop music led to playing the drums by age six or seven, and then the rest was history. Today Burrows listens to much of what he used to, but still manages to find time for current artists such as Lucy Rose and Alt-J. To discover a song, old or new, for him, is an equally exciting experience.

On the topic of his new album, Burrows felt that it was nice to write songs that were “honest” and “true.”

He is now under the record label Play It Again Sam, but the songs were written without the pressures of a release date. The album has taken form during this year mostly, with Andy coming to the fore.

Three songs have been released already with music videos; ‘If I Had A Heart’, ‘Keep On Moving On’ and ‘Because I Know That I Can’ display the talent and rejuvenated energy of a man who has arguably not had a chance to shine (his first solo album was a charity-affair, whilst his second went under the pseudonym of the I Am Arrows project). The music videos have a non-serious, light-hearted charm whilst the music proves poplike in many ways, brimming with a joyful optimism.

Burrows is somewhat ambiguous when it comes to commenting on the issue of comprise in his previous work. For the drummer, bands by their very nature are full of “agreements and disagreements or delicate situations.” For Burrows Company was simply an enjoyable affair, which saw him co-produce alongside Tim Baxter, his own boss in a partial sense.

It is a personal album in many ways, but also an artistic experimentation in another. The latest release ‘Because I

Keeps On Moving On Andy Burrows’ Next Move

Know That I Can’ echoes a “passiveaggressive” relationship, in the words of its singer amidst melodic layers of sounds. Whilst ‘Keep On Moving On’ brought Andy a neat little riff, which he felt “chuffed” about, he otherwise found them troublesome to come by.

Burrows summarises his song-writing process succulently, stating: “I just wanted to make an honest record.”

When it comes to Razorlight, the difference in material is not overly striking. Hits Burrows co-wrote, such as ‘America’ and ‘Before I Fall To Pieces’ lie along the lines of his current repertoire, however Johnny Borrell, the lead singer and “wild card” of the band, always brought his own element to the table, his “Johnnyness.”

Despite marked “personal differences” in the past however there is no bitterness on Burrow’s behalf towards his former band mate: “Johnny’s ambition often worked... and when it didn’t work, it was quite

entertaining.”

Razorlight’s last album to date, Slipway Fires, was released in late 2008 and failed to match the success of their previous efforts. “I think the band was okay. Bands try to evolve, they try to make their way through and sometimes it works and sometimes it doesn’t.” Admittedly, Burrows felt the album did not connect with Britain as much as Up All Night or Razorlight had, but still stood as a record that was “really great.”

Despite the fact that nowadays Burrows lives in New York and has a child, he still finds some time to “fall over like an idiot” on nights out at the pub. The youthful energy has never quite left the music industry which he counts himself as “very lucky” to still be a part of.

There has not been much idle time enjoyed in the last few years. Being the drummer of We Are Scientists, keeping up a solo career and working with Tom Smith has obviously been

time-consuming, though clearly beneficial: “You give a little and hopefully get a little.”

Late last year, he and Smith released the festive album, Funny Looking Angels, and Burrows hopes to work with Smith again on a “proper” record, though perhaps not for another year. Their friendship was key to their coming together.

Meanwhile, Burrows also has a new We Are Scientists’ album projected for release some time next year, and a solo tour to plan, the details of which he is currently hammering out.

It is a somewhat perplexing schedule but Burrows certainly seems optimistic about the future and hopes to “definitely” play in Ireland soon. We will certainly hold him to his casually spoken words.

Andy Burrows releases his new album, Company, on October 22nd.

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OTWO MUSIC

The Minutes As the success of Irish natives, The Minutes, is on the rise, they take some time out from messing around with saxophones to chat to Jack Walsh

T

he Minutes bassist Tom Cosgrave is on the other end of the phone, though the sound to be heard is not your usual ‘Hello? Tom here’, but a rather jazzy saxophone solo. Have The Minutes gone in the scat-cat direction, as a follow-up to their 2011 debut album, Marcata? Or has Cosgrave just put his iTunes on shuffle in-between interviews?

“A lot of the stuff that we are coming up with at the minute is the same type of energy in terms of it being a rock n’ roll piece, but there is also a lot of ones that we spent a bit more time with and not being afraid of not having a song that is three minutes because we’re now letting the song show us where to go.”

Beginning in 2006, lead singer Mark Austin, drummer Shane Kinsella and of course, Cosgrave, have gone from strength to strength, gaining popularity, a fan base and some epic tour additions to their curriculum vitaes respectively. Despite this apparent success, the band argue that their achievement was never aided by the Irish music industry in anyway, Cosgrave is quoted as saying: “It was as soon as we stopped listening to all the supposed Irish music industry

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heads that things started to happen to us.”

Cosgrave firmly sticks to his beliefs “that it’s the case that we were too self-conscious to do what an Irish band should be doing, and we were looking at other Irish acts that were getting written about in Hot Press and bigger bands like The Strokes, and we tried and it didn’t work for us. It worked for some bands who made careers out of it, but it wasn’t for us. It was literally a case of just locking ourselves away and doing our own thing.”

Despite this barbed comment on the entire expanse of the Irish music industry, Tom believes that “there is a lot being done out there, there’s a lot of blogs, bands are being written about in magazines like Hot Press, which makes sense as there is a hell of a lot of Irish bands playing, but it’s not really what it’s all about. Obviously you want to be acknowledged in your home country but from day to day aspects of touring, and how you make your money, you really have to go abroad. You can only do so much in Ireland, you can do ten dates up and down the country, but for a band like us, we can’t really sustain ourselves on this, we need to think greater afield. We always had that kind of mentality that we really want to see

this thing grow and grow.”

The belief that to gain success as a band, you must first survive going abroad, taking the plunge into the European music scene, and trying to differentiate yourself, to prove your worth from the hundreds of thousands of bands that are playing in garages hoping and praying for a record deal, is one The Minutes too experienced. Cosgrave is quick to lend some words of wisdom to aspiring musicians under the same impression: “If you have your shit together, and I think that’s the main thing with a lot of bands that come out of the rehearsal rooms a little bit too early.

We’ve been around for years and have been playing together in bands for years; we catered to ourselves, and were on a good recording, and we had a good demo, and literally gigged everywhere. I’m sure with the industry itself there are things that are being done that I have seen, but really the emphasis should be on your band and if you have your shit together before you go anywhere.”

Plans for the second album are already in place; now that The Minutes have made some sort of splash they are not interested in getting out of the deep end, just yet. The pressure to succeed with this album has mainly

come from the band themselves: “I guess the only real pressure that we have is from ourselves, we don’t want to make the same album, nobody does, but it’s just trying to impress ourselves first and foremost, and then when that happens, like we did with our first album, well then we’re onto a winner. So it’s trusting your own judgement to keep yourself under pressure, that you don’t want to repeat yourself basically.”

It is a breath of fresh air speaking with a musician who is so open and honest about the difficulties of making the music industry sit up and pay attention, a battle that for so many is an on-going struggle.

It was a leap of faith that The Minutes took, touring around Europe, a leap that landed them in what seems to be a comfortable position in the Irish music scene. With Model Citizen Records as their label, the band have the opportunity to write and record their second album in their own time, and be provided with the publicity that is absolutely necessary for fame. Who knows what these three will come up with next.

The Minutes play Whelans in Dublin on Friday the December 7th. Tickets are priced €15.

MUSIC OTWO

mixtape

Songs to KICK EARLY ACADEMIC LETHaRGY

Aoife Loughnane names and shames the worst songs by the prettiest of people ‘Mmmm Bop’ - Hanson Let’s bring it back, right back to the ‘back in the day’ day, when Hanson’s long blonde hair dominated your dreams and indeed your wall space. No one recognised the brothers for what they were, a terribly beautiful crew of siblings, who were incapable of holding a guitar the right way up. So blind were our tweenycrushes that we could not see past their long golden hair and into the dark abyss of their souls.

‘The Cheeky Song’ - The Cheeky Girls What was the point of their teeny tiny hot pants again? Oh yeah, to distract from the fact that they were incapable of singing. Talk-singing the words: “We are the cheeky girls, you are the cheeky boys” over and over and over again, while they gyrated and looked at the camera in a ‘call 666 666 for conversation with sexy woman’ kind of manner proved to be effective. They reached number 2 on the charts.

‘Let’s Get Physical’ – Olivia Newton John It’s a well-known fact that every girl would kill to look like Olivia circa Grease, and every man would like to be with her.

Using this lust factor as a viable commodity, ‘Let’s Get Physical’, the song that launched sweatbands and latex as a fashion accessory, was released to the world. Beautiful people can kind of get away with being untalented, but if ugly untalented people try, it turns into a feature on Celebrity Juice.

‘Mysterious Girl’ - Peter Andre Who were we kidding? We look nothing like Katie Price. Well, unless you give it two stone of saline, a fake mane, and some black and decker. Anything could happen then. Though it turns out Pete was just lip-syncing under a waterfall with his top off just to sell some tapes.

That small revelation has left our illusions shattered, our dreams in pieces, and our wedding dress imaginations in disarray.

‘Call Me Maybe’ - Carly Rae Jepsen “Hey I just met you and this is crazy…”

Shut up. The only reason this bubblepop is appealing to anyone, is because the attractiveness of Miss Jepson, and the money poured into ensuring her beauty never fades, is regimentally upheld.

‘Fight for This Love’ – Cheryl Cole For those two weeks that the world loved Cheryl, she knocked out 21 singles. Astonishing how fast sound technicians can work at redubbing Madonna’s old B-sides isn’t it?

‘Macho Man’ - Sinitta Before striving her way to the top of fame as Simon Cowells’ hanger-on, Sinitta, did actually have a career and a hit single. Perhaps she was singing about Simon? At least we can credit her with the ability of using artistic licence.

‘Especially for You’ - Kylie and Jason Donovan Kylie and her beau showcase their love, or their dedication to publicity, through some less than authentic cuddles and an odd warbling chorus together.

‘Hollaback Girl’ – Gwen Stefani What happened to Gwen? She had the makings of being a credible artist: an actual voice, a stylist that was not on LSD, and what seemed like a personality. But no, we were treated to a burlesque show with your harajuku dancers and a lesson on how to spell BANANA.

Heathers Hello all, So we have just returned from the last few dates of our Irish tour. It was incredible! We played to some wonderful audiences and in some beautiful venues.

Our Dublin gig in the Academy was a real surprise. We arrived out on stage to a full house and were blown away. We’ve been looking forward to our Irish tour for a while now but especially the Dublin gig as we knew that our family and friends would be there. It was definitely something we won’t forget.

Next up was Cyprus Avenue in Cork followed by The Set theatre in Kilkenny where we nearly got lost in the extreme fog on the way home, but survived none the less!

Our last gig of the tour was in the Roisin Dubh in Galway. A venue we love and have played in numerous times. There was a great atmosphere and we had a really enjoyable last set of the tour.

It’s been so great playing with a full band every night. Lots of energy and lots of fun!

Our newest members, Tom and Boomer are extremely talented and so much fun to be around. We’re definitely looking forward to getting out on the road again as soon as possible.

In other news, we’ve been overwhelmed with the response we’ve had to our first single off our new album, Forget Me Knots. It was the most played song on 2fm a couple of weeks back and we’ve been receiving some really nice messages from people about how the song has helped them through tough times in their lives. The song is very important to us. We wrote it for a friend of ours who passed away about two years ago and it also draws from our own experiences. We really didn’t have any idea how it would affect people and it means a lot to us.

For now, we’ll be resting, for a day or two, catching up on sleep, and !

We’ve got a few exciting things coming up in the next few weeks which we will keep you up to date with. Stay tuned for our thoughts on Hallowe’en.

In the words of Cilla Black: Tarrah for now!

Ellie and Louise xxx

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OTWO MUSIC

album REVIEWS Prodigy - The Bumpy Johnson LP

Tori Amos - Gold Dust

Grade: C-

Grade: B

As if serving three years for gun possession wasn’t enough to solidify his street cred, Mobb Deep’s Prodigy has decided to name his post incarceration album after the infamous Harlem mob boss Ellsworth ‘Bumpy’ Johnson. Bumpy by name and bumpy by nature, P’s lyricism struggles to make an impact over the rudimentary, unimaginative beats of his long-term production associates Alchemist and Sid Roams.

The opening track ‘Changes’ offers up a reflection on the transience of the rap industry: “Hip-hop goes through eras my man, the only thing constant is change.” This seems an ironic reflection from a rapper whose lyrical content is blatantly dated, as he apes the gritty, hardcore rhymes that he spat during Mobb Deep’s glory days of the mid-nineties.

The Bumpy Johnson LP does rise above mediocrity on numbers such as ‘Black Devil’ and the atmospheric ‘Twilight’ where Prodigy muses over the treacherous nature of life within the music industry and the hopelessness of living a ghetto lifestyle.

P seems obsessed with asserting his realness throughout, most blatantly on ‘Hitman’ with lyrics such as: “I turn where you stand into a homicide scene, I’m a hit man.”

Although this posturing is an accepted part of rap music, the LP lacks any further depth or sense of purpose. The resultant listening experience rankles in its repetitiveness.

Tori Amos, never one to shy away from complex and unorthodox musical issues, has recorded a cover of her own material. The album Gold Dust spans the breadth of her two-decade career in pop music, re-interpreted with more orchestral arrangements. The song ‘Flavor’ is stripped of the mechanised beats and electronic adornments that featured on the original, instead instilled with flowing strings to accompany Amos’s piano work.

This is a record built on melody; indeed there are no drums at all, save some sparse eastern percussion on ‘Star of Wonder’. The listener glides on Amos’ melodies, feeling almost weightless, and the strings give the songs a cinematic sweep.

These real strings are a refreshing change from the mass-produced synthesised noises that our ears are so used to being subjected to.

The lack of percussion also has a downside however, in that without any changing drum-rhythms the songs do start to sound quite similar to each other. With no percussion to mark a division songs slip and fade, with such continuity that is hard to differentiate them. Piano, strings and vocals can only take you so far, though the album is still a thing of beauty some tracks lose more than they gain from the new format.

In a Nutshell: Dated, run of the mill rap.

By Edward Kearns

By Stephen Bance

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In a Nutshell: If you want a break from pulsing house beats, this is a lovely piano-pop album to spend an hour with.

Tame Impala Lonerism Grade: B+ What’s this, an album of revivalist psychedelic rock? Use-worn words like ‘trippy’, ‘trance-like’ and ‘swirling’ hover before our very eyes, taunting us, begging to be used in this review. But, like Jesus in the desert, we shake our head grimly and persist on our noble if doomed quest to write something original.

Tame Impala, a term we are informed means ‘medium-sized antelope’, and the project of Perth’s multi-instrumentalist and stoner, Kevin Parker, returns with a second album since the lauded Innerspeaker, of 2010. Through a syrupy broth of fuzz-effects, echo, phasers and primitive synthesisers, Parker eschews the experimentalism associated with the genre in favour of painstakingly reviving the sound of his musical idols, resulting in a record that’s resolutely classicist.

In fact, it is nigh on impossible to listen without participating in this bizarre musical word search, where you rise from your seat and alternately shriek “Pink Floyd sometime between 1967 and 1972!”,

“Magical Mystery Tour-era Beatles!” at numerous intervals. Parker’s voice even sounds like Lennon’s.

That said, the album is predominantly affectingly beautiful and shows real invention, reflected most notably on ‘Be Above It’, ‘Apocalypse Dreams’ and ‘Keep On Lying’; the intricate arrangements and thick harmonies are regularly entirely absorbing. Perhaps had this record been recorded in 1970 it would have been remembered as a classic.

In a Nutshell: Intensely attractive music that occasionally wearies in its duty to the past.

By Stephen Connolly

OTWO

Club Night: Residence With a growing demand for house music in Ireland, Muireann Dee chats to some of the key figures behind club night, Residence, and discovers what it is that the night has to offer

D

escribed by the manager of the night, Dan O’Brien, as “a concert in a nightclub,” Residence is a relatively new club night and house music project that has undergone admirable development since its conception in June.

Both O’Brien and Marcus O’Sullivan, one of the night’s resident DJs, talk about Residence as an ‘experience’, rather than a club night, complete with big name DJs and concertlike production, which is now set to get even bigger, following the night’s move to the Wright Venue, a setting which O’Sullivan describes as “mind blowing.”

Residence began in the Village last June, with their own resident DJs, and within a month, was playing host to big-name guest DJs such as Tim Mason, AN21 and Max Vangeli, Arty, Cedric Gervais and Sander Van Doorn.

The night has gone from strength to strength extremely quickly, resulting in the move to the Wright Venue.

Next month Residence will be playing host to two of the biggest names in the dance music scene at the moment: Nicky Romero and Hardwell.

Going forward, Residence plans a monthly takeover of the Wright Venue with their own DJs. O’Sullivan is keen to emphasise a continuing focus on Irish, national talent, saying: “If you can get to the stage where you’re having a big night at the Wright Venue, and an Irish act is playing, isn’t that such a good thing?”

Five months after beginning, Residence has been launched

nationwide, with monthly takeovers of clubs in Galway, Donegal, Belfast and Cork; it’s a clear sign of the rapid growth and progress of the night.

Along with this, the Residence founders have just launched a new weekly club night on Fridays in the Academy, called Mainroom. Like Residence, it will also showcase the best of national and international DJ talent.

The three founders of Residence, Dave DeValera, Jamie White, and Mark Jacobs along with O’Brien (who manages the night) started this project as a result of their shared interest in dance music: “Everybody

wanted to see these acts, but nobody was bringing them in in this type of club setting.”

For O’Sullivan the success of the night lies with the passion and interest everyone involved has for dance music. “The lads are insane about dance music. They know everything inside out.”

Yet Residence is not just about the music, it is also about interacting with the people who attend its nights.

O’Brien emphasises that the suggestions people give on Residence’s Facebook and Twitter pages are taken seriously and are used to plan artist bookings.

Listening to their fans is just one the night’s assets that will ensure that the future is bright for this fastgrowing, energetic, and innovative house music venture.

Nicky Romero plays the Wright Venue on the 2nd November, Hardwell plays on the 9th November and ‘Mainroom’ is in the Academy every Friday night.

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OTWO FASHION

Opulent Accessorising Photographer - Caoimhe Mc Donnell Model - Christine Mangan Make-up - Kate Kelly Stylist - Sophie Lioe Location - Ardmore House, UCD

Sequin Top - €15 PENNEYS Box Clutch - €25 Bracelets - €8 (each) Cream Ring - €3 A|wear

Fur Stole - €22 Bracelets - €8 (each) Cardigan - €25 Cream Ring - €3 A|wear Feather Bag - €9 PENNEYS

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FASHION OTWO

There’s nothing like accessories to complete a look. Sophie Lioe looks at the key pieces this season that are bound to make a statement

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Green Necklace - €5 PENNEYS Box Clutch - €25 A|wear

Glitter Clutch - €10 Clock Necklace - €8 PENNEYS

aroque and embellished, ornate and elaborate; these are the only words you need to remember when it comes to accessories this season. Led by the likes of Prada and Dolce and Gabbana at the Autumn/Winter 2012 shows, designers were fighting it out to see who could use the most luxurious fabrics, the richest colours and the most intricate details. Everything worth noting was jewel encrusted, in a palette of gold, black, rusty reds and royal blues.

This look is the perfect antidote to the pastel classics and screaming neon of the summer, and one of those trends that makes you appreciate the change in seasons. So despite the rain and the rapidly dropping temperature, let us embrace the warmth and opulence of this trend, which although screaming riches, can be easily done on a budget.

In order to get the look without the price tag, draw your focus to the accessories. Think bags, necklaces and stacks of bracelets, rather than wearing this look from head to toe. It’ll keep costs down and fashion credentials up.

Keeping part of your outfit clean and simple helps to emphasise your accessories. The more knuckledusters and bejewelled bracelets, the better. Contrasting textures are also a great way to add interest to your outfit. Check out these feathered and sequinned clutches from Penneys;

suddenly 10 looks a million dollars.

Some faux-fur is also a great coverup for winter, adding a certain luxurious feel to whatever you’re wearing, while also keeping you warm at the same time. If you want to invest in one key item of clothing in keeping with this trend, then why not try some patterned trousers or an elaborate top? Anything with lashings of embellishment and with a hint of gold, contrasted with some deep shades and varying textures, and you should be on the right track.

Keep eye make-up dark and smoky to complete the look, with a nude lip to keep it all in balance. Make sure you don’t forget about the dark, gothic nails which are the perfect accompaniment for all that jewellery people are going to be admiring.

However, don’t think this is just a night-time look; tone it down by balancing out the patterned pieces with a plain and simple t-shirt, and swap the clutch for a shoulder bag.

Don’t be scared off by the intricacies of this trend. Pick one or two pieces to start off with and slowly build it up. And if in doubt, think of that famous quote by Coco Chanel: “When accessorising, always take off the last thing you put on,” and you shouldn’t go far wrong.

A|wear offers students a 10% discount on all non-sale items when you present your student card.

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OTWO FASHION

BETWIXT AND BETWEEN Menswear in a Postmodern World

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model walks down a catwalk at a J. Press show at New York Fashion Week wearing a loud orange raincoat. A mannequin stands in a Topman window wearing a t-shirt with a borrowed image of some pop star’s face printed on it.

Joseph Gordon-Levitt arrives at a film premiere in the sharpest midnight blue three-piece you will ever see. A man walks down Grafton Street in a Hollister hoodie and Levi’s.

How do all of these things fit together? They all fall under the umbrella of men’s fashion, and yet there is a clear disconnection between the freshest collections of top designers and the garments sold to us by highstreet chains. The challenge is to find a happy medium of all these various influences.

Elite labels are alive with ideas but they are largely inaccessible to most men. Compared with women’s fashion, menswear receives very little mainstream press coverage. It takes a bit more effort to really absorb what’s going on and as a result we often fail to notice new collections.

In New York last month Gilded Age showed a hard-edged fixation with denim, while Mark McNairy got nutty with all-over floral patterns and N.Hoolywood put hoodies on the catwalk and yet very few Irish men knew about it.

This is not simply an issue of designer clothes being too expensive.

You don’t have to buy the latest gear from Burberry and Tom Ford to look your best, but they’re a useful springboard for ideas. Even at a distance, they can make you think about aesthetics and looks. It’s frustrating that this distance has to be there at all, however.

There’s also a kind of exclusivity at the other end of the spectrum though, when we look at the often one-dimensional output of high-street stores.

We can be deterred or even intimidated by places like Jack Wills and Hollister, as Arts student, Michael Sheridan remarks: “Everything is thrown at you like it’s the way things should be; if you wear this, you will look better.”

These shops do offer good clothes; it’s the attitude that goes with them that is nauseating. Abercrombie and Fitch CEO Mike Jeffries has stated that “a lot of people don’t belong” in their clothes. Obviously this is not a constructive outlook.

So where do we go between these two poles? We get creative. We look for influences beyond glossy magazines and ads on the sides of buses.

Science student Adam Bergin cites fellow students as an inspiration, saying it is “a bit creepy but it works.”

Street art, rap videos, books, films,

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N. Hoolywood Spring/Summer 2013

In the 1940s every man wore the same suit, coat and hat.

Now we have the option to mix high-tops, chino pants and cricket sweaters if we so choose

social media (Reddit has vast amounts of posts providing examples and advice about everything from Air Jordans to Oxford shirts), and even professional athletes can be great sources. NBA player Chris Paul is a big enthusiast of pocket squares and horn-rimmed glasses. The new-soul singer Frank Ocean seems determined to bring back headbands and Eric Koston wears pink shoes when he skates. That kind of audacity has to be applauded.

The television series Mad Men is an excellent example of the influence culture can have on fashion, and a rare instance where the menswear

With a growing vacuum in affordable fashionforward menswear, Edward Kearns explores the options available to men looking to make a sartorial statement is given as much attention as (if not more than) the women’s. Over the last five years the show has made men consider just how sharp the right suit can be, not to mention the attention it has brought to skinny ties.

The crossover became tangible last year when Banana Republic released a collection inspired by Mad Men, in collaboration with the show’s costume designer Janie Bryant. The collection’s success with the public was reflected by a follow-up last spring.

The fact that this kind of project even came into existence is evidence of a public appetite for cross-pollination between media and menswear. And what’s even more remarkable is that it bypassed the catwalk completely.

There is a perception that Irish men don’t think about their clothes very much, but the more we use our eyes, the more this will change.

Sheridan says: “most of my wardrobe is the same just in different colours,” but also states that the clothes he fills this wardrobe with do in fact draw on ‘skater/rocker’ styles, particularly Chris Cole’s signature stuff with DC Shoes.

The popular culture around us provides an incomprehensively large range of fashion stimuli for men. It’s our job to pick and choose, interpret and make our own personal gumbo. It is possible to transcend the designer/ high-street divide and find our own way.

In the 1940s every man wore the same suit, coat and hat. Now we have the option to mix high-tops, chino pants and cricket sweaters if we so choose. It doesn’t have to always work; it’s the experimentation that’s important, an expression of individuality reflecting the myriad cultural stimuli that we absorb every day.

One of the most fascinating things about menswear is it doesn’t even have to be very complicated; a simple shirt-sweater-jeans combination can still look sharp if some care is put into the selection. Or you can just go bananas with it. We can’t all wear a crazy polka-dot blue overcoat with a suit just because some designer says so, and yet it seems just as foolish for us to all march down the street wearing the exact same branded t-shirt.

Either way we are free to deviate from the dogma of both the catwalk and the high street. How far you take it is up to the individual.

OTWO

With budgets for the arts slashed, Anna Burzlaff talks to the director of the Project Arts Centre about how to keep culture in Ireland alive

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n economic downturn means a decline in the arts, or so logical financial deductions would have you conclude. If budget cuts and decreases in funding are thought to dampen cultural life in Ireland then they have failed in no small manner of speaking. Last month’s Culture Night perhaps that quashed the claims of a dying arts most obviously. With over 150 free events in Dublin alone, the night attracted hundreds of thousands across the country, a testament to the excitement around arts and culture in Ireland.

There are figures and institutions that will always stand as bulwarks of the arts. Curators, galleries, museums, and theatres in Dublin have proved particularly strong in their refusal to admonish cultural claim despite times of financial scarcity.

The Project Arts Centre in Temple Bar is one of these bulwarks.

For its director, Cian O’Brien, the arts are as alive now as they ever were: “I think the arts are very strong and I think that, or I certainly feel like, because our audience is so loyal, that that’s something that is there. There is a healthy future ahead, and I don’t mean in terms of finances, I think that’s separate from this conversation. That actually it’s the number of artists who are still living in Ireland, who are still continuing to make work, who still desire to make work.”

The Project Arts Centre is the national home for contemporary art.

Its array of exhibitions and theatre showcases would often lie on the side of experimental as opposed to traditional, but it is the centre’s ability and drive to display an art that pushes boundaries and exhibit pieces so wonderfully obscure you may not fully grasp their meaning, that has ensured it as a figurehead of Irish arts.

“I really feel that the value artists play and the role they have in society is incredible. I also believe that the government recognise that, and that they are absolutely committed to culture.” O’Brien speaks with a passion and excitement that makes you doubt the severity of the cuts. After all the National Arts Council’s budget has been slashed in a multifold of manners, leaving artistic directors, such as O’Brien, facing difficulty decisions in terms of their output.

While it undoubtedly plays on O’Brien’s mind, it does not consume it, after all, as he says: “I think what makes it such a unique organisation, is that the people who work in the arts world, they’re incredibly skilled

and incredibly experienced and they’re really good at making things happen. When there’s nothing they can still make things happen.”

Project Arts has indeed made things happen. In 2011 they employed 400 artists directly through dance, theatre and visual art. The building played host to 600 events over 48 weeks of the year, with 90,000 people passing through its doors.

Those who claim the arts are dying need only observe the mammoths of culture that are the Fringe and Dublin Theatre Festivals for which Project housed just over 140 performances. A quick chat with O’Brien will remove any belief that the arts are dying.

If Ireland in the age of censorship was a rejection of the art that formed much of the nation’s identity, it is now as a country perhaps now a little ashamed, showing it in the massive support it lends its artists. For O’Brien supporting national artists is paramount. “We invest a huge amount in the development of Irish artists, and that’s incredibly important to me, that we’re able to continue to do that. As a centre which began with Irish artists and which began as a place for independent Irish artists

to make work, we are still that and it’s important to me that we continue to do that.”

Some of the key works and performances which reflect national identity in all its facets were first showcased by the Project Arts Centre. It is as much a place for the dissemination of art as it is for the dissemination of Irish identity. Plays, such as The Blue Boy, a deeply personal look at Irish industrial schools, found their platform in Project Arts and have gone on to achieve international acclaim.

This ability of art to transform events into something powerful and inspirational is what makes it special, as O’Brien states: “What art can do is it can communicate the values of a nation, it can communicate the soul of a nation, and I also think that in a time when you switch on the news and you see this is cut and that is cut, and this report is coming out, and this number of children were abused, or whatever; that actually having art to respond to that or art that actually can take those issues and create a response that is eloquent and powerful, no other medium can do that.”

Ireland in the arts has reached an incredibly exciting stage in its development. Examining the response to events such as Culture Night and the Dublin Theatre Festival show that not only is Irish art exciting but that Irish people are excited about it. The interest shown, the time and money invested, as sparse as it may be, admonishes any notion that the arts are anything but a necessity.

The arts are a symbol of Ireland as it once again grows through difficult times. Spaces such as the Project Arts Centre are platforms for reflecting our progress as a nation and displaying the immensity of talent that this small country has to offer.

The Forgotten Works and Whitewashing the Moon are currently on display in the Project Arts Centre, while theatre performance, Talk of the Town, runs until the 20th of October.

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OTWO

RTE are seeking new ideas for children’s TV shows and Conor Luke Barry thinks he’s got just what they’re looking for

OTWO Attempts...

Writing a Children’s TV show

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f the saying ‘children are our future’ proves to be accurate then we can probably just give up on our chrome plated, hoverboard covered version of the future right now. Children are bizarre little creatures, waddling from one pointless activity to another. They’re incapable of handling the most meagre of tasks, such as driving a manual car or waiting in a bank queue without defecating. The idea that these are the people that will build our future is terrifying.

Of course, it’s not entirely children’s fault that they’re useless.

Grown humans get very excited at the prospect of creating infants but presumably the novelty of the childthing wears off quite swiftly, kind of like when everyone got Furbies for Christmas. All parents have grand notions that they’ll raise their child as an upstanding member of society who will eventually become emperor of the Universe, but teaching your child anything takes so much effort. It can be disheartening when it takes them 6 or 7 years to learn to tie their shoes.

Eventually parents give up on teaching them about the world because, you know, it’s boring.

It’s then up to the old television box to pick up the educational slack and inform these kids about how the world really works. Unfortunately, TV is the worst role model imaginable. Television has become so gross and abrasive, if TV were a human being it would be a short sweaty man wearing a winter coat in June shouting at strangers about how they’re not cooking their homemade meals like a five star restaurant. Also, modern shows have questionable morals,

I shoved in a bunch of things that I knew would probably appeal to RTE, such as a car that only speaks Irish as well as including a scene where all the characters stop and reflect for the Angelus. My world-changing epic was complete. categories. For instance, the form had one section saying there were looking for “five to ten episodes of a reality/ lifestyle show for 11-15 year olds. RTÉ is looking for ob-doc or string reality programming designed to appeal to tweens and teens”. Never have there been so many terms I’ve failed to understand in such a short piece of writing. An ob-doc sounded like some sort of embarrassing routine check up, perhaps the doctor making sure that your tween is in working order.

Eventually I opted for the 9-12 catego-

Kids today aren’t the same as from when I was a youth. Modern day little ones are so hi-tech that they pretty much have laptops sewn into their stomachs like grotesque Teletubbies. such as the hit series Fat people should eat less or we’ll continue to laugh at them. So when I was informed that RTE was accepting submission for an array of new children’s television series, I knew I had to give these kids a fighting chance by making a show that teaches them right from wrong.

Reading the submission form, I was presented with a bunch of different

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ry, mainly because they were looking for “strong and engaging characters which feature on-screen regularly”. It was a chance to provide the kids with more suitable role models.

Having decided on the category, I locked myself away from any distractions for a full weekend, lest I stifle the torrent of creative juices that would no doubt erupt from my

appropriate orifices. After 14 hours of staring at a page all I seemed to have written was ‘Children like animals, I think’. It was a strong starting point. All of my childhood television idols were either wise-crackin’ rabbits, jive-talkin’ hedgehogs or smacktalkin’ turtles, so my show definitely needed some sort of witty creature.

Unfortunately, all the good animals have been taken by other shows, forcing me to wade through the dregs of the animal kingdom, sorting through slugs and mole rats.

Then it occurred to me, kids today aren’t the same as from when I was a youth. Modern day little ones are so hi-tech that they pretty much have laptops sewn into their stomachs like grotesque Teletubbies. They won’t be able to relate to a real life animal, at least one that isn’t playing a keyboard.

I had to communicate on their level, which is how I came up the main character of a hip-hop wi-fi router named Jeremy, rapping advice he downloads from reliable sources on the internet. My show was finally taking shape.

I wrote long into the night, adding more hip technological words like firewall or malware almost at random. Most importantly, I had to get across a message. A lot of kids shows

focus on dull morals like ‘your parents love you’ or ‘not all humans are terrible’. I wasn’t going to pander, there were going to be some hard truths in my show. Such as when Jeremy has to attend a rap contest in 1989 at the Fall of the Berlin wall, Jeremy delivering a highly informative rap about the political and social conditions that led to this event. To finish it off I shoved in a bunch of things that I knew would probably appeal to RTE, such as a car that only speaks Irish as well as including a scene where all the characters stop and reflect for the Angelus. My world-changing epic was complete.

As I watched the printer slowly churn out the sheets of my masterpiece I instantly knew how Joyce must have felt when he finished Ulysses or the feeling that Van Gogh chap probably got when he painted a flower or whatever. Having sent the proposal off to RTE studios it’s only a matter of time before they call me to organise the production schedule, as well as set up my various interviews with Time magazine. But when I’m incredibly famous and rich remember that I never got into it for the money; it was for the children. And a bit for the money.

OTWO

Fatal Fourway

best joseph gordon-levitt film 10 Things I Hate About You

500 Days of Summer

Inception

Looper

Emer Sugrue

Aoife Valentine

Anna Burzlaff

Conor Luke Barry

While the explosive success of Joseph Gordon-Levitt may have come as a shock to those who remembered him solely from his longhaired, squeaky-voiced youth in 3rd Rock From the Sun, there was a film during this time that gave us a glimpse of what was to come. 10 Things I Hate About You is the 90s interpretation of Shakespeare’s The Taming of the Shrew, and therefore takes place in a high-school and mentions feminism while not being all that feminist.

JGL plays Cameron James, a typical nice guy who has recently transferred to the school and immediately sets his lusty sights on Bianca. Biana unfortunately is not allowed to date because her Obstetrician father is hyper-paranoid about teen pregnancy.

He makes a new rule: Bianca can only date if her older sister, the unfriendly outcast Kat, also does. Nice guy that he is, JGL pays the scariest guy in school, Heath Ledger, to seduce Kat so that he has a shot at bagging the younger one.

Though morally questionable, it is a great film and one of the first real showcases of Levitt’s acting talent.

Sure he had a slow motion zero-gravity fight in Inception, and was a time travelling Bruce Willis in Looper and banged Zooey Deschanel in 500 Days, but in any of those did he pimp out The Joker? No he did not. You have to go to this 90s teen movie for that sort of action.

I don’t know why we’re bothering to argue this one out this week. The winner is obvious: why would you choose any other of Joseph Gordon-Levitt’s films, when 500 Days of Summer is already the clear winner? It comes complete with Zooey Deschanel, and is the happiest break-up film of all time.

JGL falls very in love with Zooey, and while you’re still imagining how ridiculously beautiful their babies will be and how easily that family would take over the world by simply being a more hipster, yet easily more likeable version of Angelina Jolie and Brad Pitt’s brood, the dream family dies a quick death. She’s just not that into him, and he goes about being sad, because he too had been thinking he’d take over the world with his super cute hipster children.

No matter, JGL is at his best when he’s miserable, and boy is he miserable after that break up. In a nice way though. You won’t be sad watching it, like. It’s cute when he’s pathetic.

Why would you choose a film where JGL only features for like, 20 seconds because Leonardo DiCaprio has a crazy dream wife, or a JGL with Bruce Willis’ nose, or even, Shakesperian JGL? None of those make sense. What you need is the spontaneous rendition of ‘You Make My Dreams’ he leads with a bunch of strangers. What you need is to smile through an entire film. What you need is the very sweet and clever JGL in 500 Days.

It’s a great feeling beginning a battle you already know you’re going to win.

Joseph Gordon-Levitt, and the innovation of film that is Inception, is like a tiger amongst kittens in this futile fourway.

Inception is so mind-blowingly amazing you probably didn’t even understand what it was about; more than likely you left the cinema with a growing sense of perplexity and a strange desire to purchase a dream catcher.

From the moment Leonard DiCaprio starts talking about “a dream, within a dream, within a dream, within some other dream” your whole perception of reality and consciousness, as you know it is disintegrated before your eyes. I’m pretty certain were Freud still alive; he would be a fan of Inception. It doesn’t get much bigger than that.

Aside from that pregnant girl from Juno making Paris turn sideways, Inception is host to one of the best fight scenes in modern movie history, as Gordon-Levitt kicks ass zero gravity style in a hotel hallway. Inception is an example of special effects at their best, 10 Things I Hate About You is a Shakespeare adaptation with Julia Stiles in it. Need I say more?

If you’re looking to make yourself increasingly irate, then 500 Days of Summer and Zooey Deschanel’s obnoxious quirkiness is the movie for you. Should you find yourself seeking something slightly more stimulating, not to mention bad ass, then the choice is pretty clear.

It’s no surprise that Joseph GordonLevitt was recently voted ‘most instantly likeable man currently alive’ by some poll I just made up. He’s a man who practically vomits charm.

Whether he’s playing an innocent trickster in 10 Things I Hate about You or making hipsters not detestable in 500 Days of Summer, Levitt’s your go to guy.

But these roles are barely a stretch for captain charm. Imagine after the success of 500 Days of Summer, some mysterious individual came up to you and claimed that Levitt would one day star in a film where he played a younger Bruce Willis. You’d be all “Nuh uh, mystery chap. He’s gonna be wearing cardigans and having shallow hipster emotions for the rest of his cinema life”.

In Looper that’s precisely what he does, playing a young version of Bruce Willis’ assassin character. He wears a chunky prosthetic nose to make him look slightly like Willis but it’s Levitt’s dead on impression of the man’s mannerisms that make you forget you’re watching the weedy nerd boy from 10 Things I Hate About You. He swaggers in the same way and does that whole patented Willis halfway glare. Not to mention the film itself is about time travel and there are loads of guns and it’s totally rad and awesome. It’s the best Bruce Willis performance in well over a decade, it just happens to have been performed by Levitt.

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