Episode Notes

This is a Bonus Episode of the podcast and it’s a long conversation with the broadcaster and journalist Danny Kelly.

Danny is a former editor of the NME and Q magazine. He joined the NME in the early 80s and by the end of the decade he was appointed editor. He left the NME in 1992 to become the editor of Q magazine. He left Q magazine in the mid-90s to launch the monthly sports magazine Total Sport. From the late 90s he has had a long and illustrious career in broadcasting.

Danny was born in Islington to Irish parents and like many children of 1950s economic migrants he spent every summer back home in Ireland.

In recent years Danny moved back to Ireland and though he enjoys his idyllic life in rural Kilkenny he continues his sports broadcasting with his weekly Trans Euro Express programme on talkSPORT and his Tottenham Hotspur podcast, The View From The Lane.

I started buying the NME in 1989 and continued to purchase it religiously every week for most of the 90s. I’ve only kept a few issues of the paper, issues related to some of my favourite bands. Photographed above are two such issues.

Bernard Sumner and Johnny Marr are photographed by Kevin Cummins in LA for the cover of the NME from 18 August 1990. It’s a great feature about Electronic supported Depeche Mode at Dodger Stadium on 4 August 1990. I’ve always loved Johnny’s “Ex-Smith ‘82-’87” drawn on tattoo. “Tattoo’s Company, Electronic light up LA” reads the headline.

In that issue there’s also a review of Jordan: The Comeback by Prefab Sprout; Vic Reeves and Bob Mortimer review the singles; Ice Cube and Teenage Fanclub are interviewed and 4AD took out a fullpage advert for the Pixies’ Bosanova.

On the cover of the NME from 30 November 1991 Tony Wilson is photographed by Kevin Cummins holding a framed photograph of Ian Curtis. Cummins also took the Curtis photograph which will be known to many. It was taken in Joy Division’s rehearsal space at T.J. Davidson’s in Manchester - the location for the band’s ‘Love Will Tear Us Apart’ music video - and shows the singer, his overcoat hanging behind him, one arm folded, holding a cigarette and starring into the mid-distance. The iconic photograph is now part of the National Portrait Gallery’s collection in London. The headline on this cover reads: “Still Flogging Joy Division? Tony Wilson on Smiths, smack and saving Factory.”

This issue also covers the news of Freddie Mercury’s passing, St Etienne review the singles and the release of the KLF’s ‘Justified & Ancient’ gets a a fullpage advert on the backpage.

Danny Kelly was the editor of the NME at the time of these two issues and he also wrote both of these cover stories.

It’s probably obvious that I felt really privileged to be invited into Danny’s home to spend a few hours in his company chatting about music, his time as a music journalist with the NME, and to talk about some of his favourite Irish albums.

This is a long episode of the podcast and over the course of our conversation we chat about: The Dubliners, Lankum, The Mary Wallopers, Kneecap, Fontaines DC, Sinéad O’Connor, Margaret Burke, Dele Fedele, Sounds, The Pogues, Shane MacGowan, President Mary Robinson’s “Light in the Window”, British Rail, The Transport Salaried Staffs’ Association, Union Newsletters, the Trades Union Congress, Neil Spencer, Public Enemy, Alan Lewis, Stuart Cosgrove, The Halliard, Nic Jones’ Penguin Eggs, economic emigration in the 1950s, the Irish diaspora, Stasi spies in East Germany, watching Live Aid in West Berlin, Melody Maker, Simon Reynolds, Danny Baker, Creation Records, Alan McGee, The Jesus and Mary Chain, Primal Scream, Oasis, Steve Lamacq, Loop, My Bloody Valentine, Bill Hicks, The Waterboys, Electronic, Billy Bragg, Billy Bragg’s mother, The Frank & Walters, The Sultans of Ping, Rory Gallagher, The Grehan Sisters, Thin Lizzy, and Bunny Wailer’s “Ska Quadrille”.

Below you’ll find photographs from Danny’s record collection of some of the albums we discussed as well as scans of NME articles that are referenced during our conversation. NME scans are by @nothingelseon and Danny’s records are photographed by myself.

“I am not just a President of those here today but of those who cannot be here; and there will always be a light on in Áras an Uachtaráin for our exiles and our emigrants.”
President Mary Robinson - Acceptance Speech in 1990

“This quartet may just be the most important band in these islands today and this amazing display of sent out a crystal message to all those floppy-fringed impersonators who thought they were getting close enough to touch the coat-tails of the masters. My Bloody Valentine haven’t just moved the goalposts, they’ve torn up the pitch and burnt the damned stadium down as well. Choke on their angelic dust.”
Danny Kelly - NME (14 December, 1991)

“The pub would rock when the Grehan Sisters - Francie, Marie and Bernie - let fly with ‘Leaning o'er the Half Door’ or ‘Tippin’ It Up to Nancy’. We often travelled up from Kildare to hear these women sing, for they melted our hearts with the wildness of their playing and the raw gusto of their three voices, and we fell in love with them. We met up with the Grehan Sisters again in London when we were all trying to break into the circuit. They gave me support slots and contacts and both the band and their manager Mike Thornley were generous with transport, floor space, mighty dinners and much appreciated friendship.”
Christy Moore - One Voice (Hachette, 2012)