Douglas Stuff

  I was in Interference for a while when they were based in Cork and played on several demos before they moved to Dublin. It was a nice formation, yours truly, with Fergus O'Farrell, Kevin Murphy and Cal McCarthy. As already iterated, I was in a moderately successful band with Kevin called Midway, based in Monkstown Co Cork, we played a lot of gigs, some massive crowds, even had a manager, Brian Ormond, who went on to manage Radiohead. We recorded a demo, Fergus went to Clongowes with Kevin's brother Bernard, Fergus engineered and produced Midway's demo, he brought his recording gear down to Scotsman's Road in Monkstown and Bernard was a guest member on Violin. Kevin, yours truly, Tom and Seam, all hunky dory until Kevin was offered the bass position in an early transitional line up of Interference and basically, left his own band to join them, he was persona non grata, although, I still personally had great time for Kev, then Interference had no guitarist (at this con...

  I had two students that were picked to star with Marlon Brando and Johnny Depp (always forget Depp...as well). I coached them a little bit besides the music, confidence building, tactics, and in that supplementary moment, 'do you have anything you wish to add', grabbing a guitar and a rendition with maximum impact, whereby after the first verse, "sorry kid, exactly when would you like to start work with Marlon Brando".. On a rainy, drab, innocuous saturday afternoon I was auditing new students in the Wright Music Centre on Castle Street and two new students arrived in to be assessed; Cillian and his friend Eoin. I'll never forget, Cillian was kind of, pardon the french, "who the fuck are you." "Well, I've got two students that are going to be starring with Marlon Brando"... "Yeah boy, yeah." "Oh Yeah boy, oh yeah" I retorted. An older lad in the class intervened and said he does, I'm in school with one of them. Su...

  Paul Bley and Mark O'Leary Live at the Half Moon Theatre. This was the last concert of our little tour over here. Paul and I kind of worked well together, musically and personably. The concert at Half Moon was full to maximum capacity, even though EST were playing just across the street, with people travelling from far and wide for us and them. Paul would usually play solo, you would play solo and then for the last fifteen minutes play together, but he liked the idea of us playing together from the beginning. We played all improvised material, Paul working inside the piano ala John Tilbury, I was in ambient guitar mode, we then diverged into more disparate type improvisations, angular, rhythmic, Monkesque and a digression to material that was more second vienesse school, next to the terra firma of ECM genre material, a short solo from Paul, a short solo from me, he stood up and tipped his hat, the audience gave a thunderous applause.... We played blues tinged material and that wa...

  Paul Bley Mark O'Leary Live at Kilworth Arts Centre. First concert with Paul Bley. Declan Jones obliged by driving us to West Cork, back to Rochestown for a cup of tea and then to Kilworth for the concert. No rehearsal, just a thirty second soundcheck, payment up front for the gig, Paul's stipulation to much chagrin and show time. No set list, no discussion, just straight into the musical discourse, when people engage in dialectic with regard ECM, this concert in Kilworth was the epitome of this aesthetic, both tonal and more open ended material. Primarily rubato, albeit, with interjections of rhythmic based material, the Kilworth concert was more; cerebral, subtle, oblique melodies, countermelodies, working the interstices, lots of space, short motifs and leitmotifs, the merging of the two musical minds, but also what Paul sensed was a degree of compatible musicality, our mores where congruent, no grandiose grandstanding, more minimal lyricism, the audience, were appreciativ...

  Mark O'Leary Oasis Anecdotes A couple of claims to fame, I did teach a chap who was in Inspiral Carpets, was he; before, during or after Noel's tenure as roadie. Never asked, but he was in the band as a transitional member. I also worked in a band with a guy who played with Paul Stacey and knew him well, Stacey is an exceptional guy; brilliant guitarist, multi instrumentalist, producer and much more, Oasis are lucky to have such a sagacious band member. Ipso facto, connections. Another minor claim, I did meet, albeit serendipitously, Paul Gallagher outside comet on Washington Street in the early nineties, a decent enough sort. One thing that stands out about Cillian Murphy, to an extent he was pre Oasis, but it is a credit to him and his contemporaries, they were not really influenced by Oasis, nor Blur, nor Radiohead, it makes them sui generis and confers a degree of authenticity upon them. When Oasis were nascent, Cillian, his contemporaries and myself were cultivating our ...

  Mark O'Leary, The Sarahdaze and the band that got away. The Sarahdaze were a band with unsurpassed potential, with relative ease, they could have inhabited that mezzanine space between Fontaines DC and U2. I know, I was teaching three of them; Cillian, Eoin and John. In a way I connected John and Cillian. Cillian needed a bassist, John was keen to join a band. With a superlative touch on fender bass, using finger work, slap and pop, excellent organic timing, he was the perfect match. Cillian decided to do the vocals and be the front man, I initially hypothesized that it could be a twin guitar band, but Cillian just astounded everyone with his vocal range and stage prowess. Cillian and Eoin met up with John, John was superb, he got into the band, no small feat! Eoin was a brilliant guitarist, influenced by the Edge, David Gilmour et al. With a little nurturing they most definitely could have also ended up on Top of the Pops like some of my other students and made a breakthrough. ...

 

 

 

 

  Here is an extract from the Douglas Community Magazine regarding our South Munster and Munster victory. This was of David vs Goliath magnitude and I was honoured to be on the team as goalkeeper. Thanks to Cian O'Mahony of DCS for kindly forwarding this to me. We were heralded as the pride of Douglas. --------------------------------------------------------------- In keeping with our strong tradition, three teams were entered for competition - Juveniles, Juniors and Seniors. The U-14's defeated Ashton 2-0 in Round I. They then met Stiofáin Naofa, last year's All-Ireland Semi-Finalists and scored a fine 1-3 victory. They then advanced to meet old rivals Spiorad Naomh, Bishopstown in the South Munster Area Final, where they were most unfortunate to lose by the only goal of the game. The Senior team had initial success with a 2-0 victory over Millstreet Community School but then made their exit to a strong De La Salle team, 4-1, in Waterford. De la Salle were exacting revenge...