If anyone asked me what the year 2000 was like for music, the word mediocre would have immediately come to mind. Yet when I set about compiling my lists of the albums and singles of the year, I agonised and deliberated more than ever before over who to leave out and who to include.
Most of the albums that got under my skin in 2000 are from smaller, indie labels, with PJ Harvey and Bowie At The Beeb the only real heavyweight contenders in my top 20. Album of the year was a toss-up between two debut LPs, the equally beguiling wordsmithery of Tom McRae and Michael J. Sheehy, with the McRae opus taking the gong by the shadow of a leprechaun s mickey.
Tom McRae s is a masterful piece of work,
and yet it was only after living with his
magnificent voice and beautiful arrangements
for a month or so that these songs took up a semi-permanent residency in my cranium. As
for Sheehy, the uneasy listening of Sweet
Blue Gene is a raw, uncompromising and
extraordinary look at the darker shades of
life s canvas.
On the homefront, things are very healthy, with a plethora of great albums released during 2000, the best of which is probably Turn s corking debut Antisocial. Honorable mentions must also go to Wilt, Bell X1, The Walls, JJ72, The National Prayer Breakfast, Sack, Luka Bloom, David Kitt, Damien Dempsey and Dara. I don t know whether Irish bands are finally crawling out of U2 s shadow or whether the current crop are a reaction to the pop pap oozing from these shores. Whatever the reason, music is the ultimate winner.
On the gig scene, big shouts out to Wilt, who made Glastonbury a ball, and Dara, who turned Slane into party central for a day and a night. Bowie at Glastonbury was the live highlight of the year, although The Go-Betweens in The Olympia came darn close. Elsewhere, Turn were awesome in the Music Centre, The Frames and Snow Patrol rocked Whelan s and Skindive almost took the roof off Vicar St watch their star rise in 2001.
Through hotpress, I got to meet two of my heroes: Counting Crows Adam Duritz was a really nice guy, a remarkably interviewee and gave great quote, while the ever-polite Keith Wood was more reserved than I expected the photo of me and the Irish rugby captain takes pride of place on the Walshe mantelpiece.
Moviewise, Wonderland and Wonder Boys were, ahem, wonderful, and O Brother, Where Art Thou? was so refreshingly funny it hurt, while on the literary front, Homer H. Hickham s October Sky and Bernhard Schlink s The Reader rocked my world.
As for 2001, all I ask is for Liverpool to win
a trophy, Ireland to qualify for the World Cup,
and someone to present me with a portable
mini-disc recorder and Katie Holmes phone
number.