The morning sun touched lightly on the eyes of Terri Hooley.

Ah, groaned the great man, sitting at the bar, scrunching his eyelids.
Chance to show off my knowledge of the oeuvre of poets laureate: let there be no moaning at the bar, I murmured.
Of the bar, growled the God of Good Vibrations. Of.
Always the pedant when it comes to prepositions.
We were in the John Hewitt, fornensed the arcade that fire-bombers destroyed a while back, putting Terri temporarily out of business. He explained he’d been out the previous night until just a wee while ago, which is how come he needed a pint and a brandy as a steadier this time of morning. My 60th, he elaborated.
Hell, I told him, I just had my 65th. Árd Rí, Rea Curran, James King, Poetry Chicks, national treasures, international footballers, three different types of sausage rolls, the social event of the year.
Only in Derry, he disparaged.
I suppose you lost your glass eye in all the excitement. I believe it’s traditional.
Nah. Lost it in the loo.
A horde of snappers and hacks had shown up for Terri’s celebratory celebrity shoot with Snowmen, Patrolmen, Glenn Patterson, Therapists and three fifths of The Original Undertones. Must have been a relief. The number of journos who’d attended Terri’s launch of my Socialist Environmental Alliance European election campaign in 2004 was, approx., none.
At the Waterfront gig on the night before the morning after he’d properly been hailed as a hero by as great and good a gathering as Belfast has seen since the night The Clash didn’t play the Ulster Hall.
Not many people ever make a real difference, but Belfast is a different, better place for Terri Hooley having happened into and upon it, than which nothing more needs said. Until his 65th.

Slumping upstairs to Sandino’s Back Room I hear Cahir O’Doherty challenging the audience.
“How many people have our album?” A forest of hands.
“Now, how many only have it because I gave you one free?” the Fighting With Wire front-man presses on. A scattering of hands is tentatively raised.
Just as it should be. Music should be free. It sours your enjoyment if you’ve had to pay in. This is to explain that I am not mean. It’s a question of aesthetics.
Or privilege. Anyway. The word on the street is that the deal FWW has just signed with Atlantic would make your heart wince and your eyes water. A zillion pounds each, artistic control and all the sex they can handle for the rest of their lives. So I’m told.
The lads were flown to New York, put up in a hotel so swanky Americans aren’t allowed in and invited to play a set for a selection of the coolest execs ever, some of whom then threw themselves out the 25th storey window knowing they’d never hear anything this good again.
Not my preferred path to rock super-stardom, holding that no band which hasn’t played a free gig in the gutter and then made serious efforts to strangle the last member of the Royal Family with Michael O’Leary’s intestines should be allowed to step onto a stage.
Still, there you go. Young people today...
FWW’s just-launched Man Vs. Monster is a big brute of a record, showcasing stylistic versatility, slick musicality, punkish rough energy and a deft and even delicate way with a tune. With Jamie King on imperious bass and Craig McKean on dervish drums alongside him, O’Doherty spasms and shrieks and howls and jerks like he’s hot-wired to the Coolkeragh power-station and set to blow the fuse. A congenial soul between songs – introduces his mum from the stage and calls for a cheer – he’s pure scary savage letting rip
The band comes on hugely confident, a swagger and strut and a carefully-judged couldn’t-care-less.
There’s half a dozen seriously good songs here and one glorious, instantly unforgettable effort, ‘Everybody Needs a Nemesis’. How true that is, I thought, whatever it means.
FWW aren’t there yet. What they’ve got is their shot at it, which, as ever, is a lot.
There was a support band called No Sex, Just Violins, which I didn’t hear because I never go out before midnight when there’s a three-quarters moon on the shoulder of Orion but which I’ll make it my business to hear next time around because if the music is a match for the moniker we’re maybe talking mega once more.
And Faro finally made it across the Glenshane. More soon.

Somebody informed me, as I sharp-elbowed a path to the bar, that the reason the Kharma 45 album hasn’t appeared is that lead singer Glenn Rosborough jumped ship just days before its scheduled release. I’ll keep you posted on when we get a replacement, texts guitarist Pete Doherty.
I have no friends, I can’t get to sleep, laments Glenn.
Is this to be a repeat of Civilian and, for all I know, because they’ve disappeared, Red Organ Serpent Sound?
Every time I stumble across the Next Big Thing, they’re gone. Real gone. Kiss of death.
Watch out, then, Jane Bradfords, a six-piece from Belfast, Deci Gallen being three, whose ‘Hide From The Cold’ would warm the cockles of a Stalinist camp-guard. ‘Evening Angels Gather Here’ is beautiful, haunting, synth-rich and sad. Think punk Oppenheimer. Neatly-named album, The Jane Bradfords skimming its way to a shop near you right now. Could-be contenders.
I haven’t even mentioned Mantic, who, with blond vamp La Victoria up front, put on a show that’d remind you that all great gigs are celebrations of joy. Plus they have a bass player in ringlets and purple flares. From Draperstown. Imagine.