It’s been three years since we’ve seen or heard from Wicklow native Fionn Regan, but the Mercury Prize nominee of 2007 is back once again – albeit not in the fashion some will best remember.

Debut effort The End of History highlighted the songwriter’s capability to create music that was both honest and subtle, and ultimately earned him a ticket to the music factory that is Nashville, Tennessee. A then 27-year-old Regan worked with such renowned producers as Ethan Johns, who had previously worked with Kings of Leon, Ray LaMontagne and Rufus Wainwright, and set about cutting a second album on the Lost Highway label.

Fionn recalls this chapter with a somewhat heavy heart. Like an artist who was commissioned to paint a picture, Regan was given “his colours and his canvas,” but later discovered that the record company “thought the trees would be tilting the other way and there would be a lot more water out the front.” In the end, Fionn decided to bail of his own accord. “I reversed out the drive and found myself on the deck of the ship; the captain was gone, and I had hold [sic] onto the steering wheel.”

It was not long, however, before the American Country and Western scene took note of the 5’4” Paddy with the eclectic finger-picking style, with admirers including none other than multi Grammy-winning performer Lucinda Williams. A baby-faced Regan was “taken in, so to speak” by the experienced Louisianan artist.

Since then, the troubador from Bray has returned to Ireland to record and release his long-awaited sophomore album, Shadow of an Empire. The opus might take some fans by surprise; a transition best illustrated in the words “Regan goes electric” sees the folkster release the rocker within. “There’s no rules with music,” declares Regan. “You move from thing to thing. This time around I’ve gone for an edgier sound. God knows where I’ll go next!”

Like all works of art, Regan’s album was not a simple or rushed affair, and tells various characters stories in a humorous and engaging manner. “It was like digging to another country with a teaspoon,” jests Regan, describing the album-making process. Regan also feels the album should be listened to in its entirety, saying, “I don’t think you’ll understand this record if you hear one or two tunes. You need to sit down with the record as a whole, otherwise you might get on the back of the wrong horse.”

Regan will tour the UK and Ireland for the next month, hoping he will travel far and wide on the back of this much anticipated colt.

Shadow of an Empire is released on 5^th February. Regan plays Vicar St on 15^th March.

With a population of 320,000, one might expect that Cordoba would become an anesthetised ghost town but this is certainly not the case. Rich in culture, with its religious structures and musical legacy, this hidden city thrives in the summer months.

The Spanish city’s architecture is famous throughout the world, safeguarded as an UNESCO world heritage site. Narrow alleys lead onto quiet plazas while colourful mosaic work and traditional patios enchant every strolling visitor. Even the rundown flats between the Mosque and the city walls seem to gleam with charm. At times it is as if you are walking around 1950s North Africa, and not the Spain we know today.

La Mezquita is unarguably Cordoba’s tour de force. First built around 600AD, the Great Mosque underwent several crises of identity, having first been constructed as a church before being changed to a mosque and back to a chapel before eventually resting as a place of Muslim worship. Today La Mezquita is exhibited to the public at a fee of €5 for adult. Its windowless interior provides a welcome cooling system while its fountains are ideal for bathing in the basking sun.

The city library is a convenient pit stop. With air conditioning and free internet access, it is the only place where an organised UCD student can register for the next academic year, provided an American is not hogging two computers so she can blog about how cheap all-you-can-eat buffets are in the Andalusian heartland.

Together with its architectural highlights, Cordoba is also famous for its music and in particular its flamenco guitar. In the new town you will find numerous luthier workshops where everything from traditional Spanish guitars and lutes to steel string electric guitars are built by request. Towards the end of July “the City of the Guitar” celebrates la Festival de la Guitarra. Musicians from all over the world, including artists such as Mark Knopfler, Paco de Lucia and BB King, come to play and pay homage to the birth place of the instrument.

Spain’s high speed railway system ensures that within two hours you can be in Barcelona or Madrid and in even less time to go further south to Seville or Malaga.

Cordoba seems to have emerged from hiding. It is certainly cheap, even compared to other Mediterranean destinations. Go now before the city becomes homogenised in 2016 when it is crowned European Capital of Culture.

Dramatically speaking, Dublin has a lot to offer – according to the Fishamble New Play Company’s artistic director, Jim Culleton. Culleton, who was educated at Belvedere College before pursuing a degree in drama and theatre studies at Trinity College, has for the last twenty years been a driving force behind modern Irish theatre on a national and international platform. In 1990, after graduating, the Dublin native coalesced with like-minded Trinity graduates and members of UCD Dramsoc to form Pigsback Theatre Company. In 1997 it would be renamed Fishamble: the New Play Company.

Since then the company has expanded quite substantially, its work regarded by many as the cutting edge in modern theatre. In 2008 over 16,000 people attended Fishamble productions. The work of Sebastian Barry and Joe O’Connor has travelled the world being staged everywhere, from “the nooks and crannies of Temple Bar,” as Culleton puts it, “to 59E59 in New York City.”

What people all over the world find so appealing about the Fishamble productions is the “ethos of honesty and invention.” Plays such as Noah and the Tower Flower based in the Ballymun Towers, and Forgotten, which tells the story of four elderly people in care homes around Ireland, have been extraordinarily well received outside Ireland. “Fishamble aims to show us ourselves and reflect on society. People engage with this uniquely Irish perspective,” admits Culleton humbly.

The success of Fishamble productions would not have been possible without the support of the Arts Council and Culture Ireland. The director encourages the government to continue supporting the arts as it has been doing, remarking with a giggle that “the arts are one of the only things to have not let us down in recent times, with the banks and the church and so on.” The Trinity graduate goes on to further justify the importance of the arts, informing otwo of its economic benefit in stating, “Cultural tourism alone is worth €5.1m, it has created 50,000 jobs in Ireland, and from every euro spent on the arts, three euro goes directly back to the Exchequer.”

As the arts in Ireland continue to thrive, Jim Culleton prepares for the world premiere of Strandline, a play by Abbie Spallen and directed by Culleton. Based in a small coastal town in Northern Ireland, the recent work from Spallen, the winner of the Stewart Patrick Trust Award, tells the story of a woman whose husband has recently died. As she wakes him in the company of three women she never liked, secrets are shared. It’s a dark, vibrant and funny piece of drama which comments on what is worth revealing and what is better left unsaid.

Strandline runs at the Project Arts Centre, Temple Bar from 11th Nov to 5th Dec.

Mikel Jollett never wanted to be a songwriter; he dreamed of being a novelist like his idols, Charles Bukowski and Philip Roth. “There was a time when I wanted to be a younger, fitter, better looking Bukowski. The fact that he had no problem aiming the arrow of blame on himself really appealed to me. The idea of ‘f*ck you and your good impression’; I like that.”

During his first years of adulthood and after graduating from Stanford, Jollett moved back to his hometown Los Angeles where he worked as a carpenter and contributed to magazines and newspapers such as Filter and The LA Times. But everything changed for the Californian native one week several years ago during a period when his father was terminally ill, he found out his mother had been diagnosed with cancer, his partner had left him, and he himself was diagnosed with a life-threatening autoimmune disease. It was then that Jollett started writing songs and formed the Airborne Toxic Event.

The troubled period which Jollett speaks of certainly reflects in the lyrics of the band’s self-titled debut album. It has led to some criticism. Pitchfork Media, which rated the album 1.6 out of 10, suggested TATE had created an embarrassingly crude and cliché album in an attempt to copy successful and acclaimed indie bands like of Arcade Fire and Bright Eyes. “TATE embodies the Hollywood ideal of paying lip service to the innovations of mavericks while trying to figure out how to reduce it to formula,” according to Pitchfork’s Ian Cohen. In reference to the album, Cohen joked that “it’s the musical equivalent of showing up to a bar with a bad fake ID and throwing a hissy-fit when you get carded.”

In response Jollett pleas, “I was a struggling writer living in my room, trying to write an album when I thought my parents were going to die. I don’t know how you get more indie rock than that.”

From a hotel room in Norfolk, Virginia, the front man from this major label indie band speaks with the cockiness you might expect from someone who is touring the world for the third time on his debut album and is still selling out shows in New York City and Philadelphia.

“I don’t understand the desire for social climbing; I hate the idea of trying to make a good impression. What’s magical about guys like Bukowski is the power of ‘f*ck it’. Never underestimate the power of ‘f*ck it’; the sense of freedom – I don’t care if I look bad. That’s what I find extremely compelling. That’s where you live in your head.” TATE commence the European leg of their world tour next month and hope to start recording the new album this winter.

The Airborne Toxic Event play the Olympia on 11th November.

WHAT DO YOU get when you have four malnourished UCD students and one extra large packet of Jacobs Cream Crackers? The answer is quite obvious really… it is of course a world record attempt to eat the most cream crackers in one minute.

It is the sort of thing that everyone presumes is ludicrously easy. Having said that, this task is far from simple. I set out, like a typical naive food fanatic, in the hope of smashing this record and getting my name printed in the Guinness Book of Records.

The record which stands is held by English sports agent, Ambrose Mendy. Having spent a good part of the Nineties in jail for fraud, Mendy had plenty of time to practice eating three crackers in less than a minute. In 2002 the fraudster easily beat the previous record by gobbling three Jacobs Cream Crackers in an impressive 49 seconds.

They say it is all about self-belief when it comes to breaking records, so I eagerly turned up the day before the contest was due to take place, ensuring that I meant business and believing that I would effortlessly fi t at least fi ve crackers into my ever-ready belly in less than one minute.

Like all promising record holders I had a plan of action as to how I should go about eating my cream crackers, only to be accused of cheating when I went to break my crackers in four.

After aborting my initial plan I was at a loss as to how best to ingest the bundle of crackers which sat stationary in front of me.

I looked to my right and I looked to my left. Either side of me fellow cracker crunchers were shovelling large chunks of the famous dry biscuit into their mouths. As seconds passed I decided that I couldn’t afford to waste any more time and like a true country savage I began stuffi ng my mouth with the dry and familiar snack that is the Jacobs Cream Cracker.

As I neared the end of my fi rst cracker, I realised this was not such an achievable goal after all. My mouth drained of saliva and oesophagus stopped functioning. By the time I had picked up cracker number two, thirtyfi ve seconds had already passed. My dreams of becoming a world record holder were beginning to fade.

Desperately I forced number three in my mouth but that is where this tale ends. My malnourished digestive system was unable to break down the crackers any further. Instead I was left chewing and chewing, minutes after time had lapsed.

Things could be worse though: as I went to write this article I came across a piece in New Zealand newspaper which claims that Singaporean native, Jeffery Koh, broke the record mentioned above by eating three crackers in an amazing 14.9 seconds.

ONCE MORE Dramsoc has failed to disappoint and ticks all the boxes with their performance of Penguins Go For Free, a play by UCD student, Ciaran Ó Murchú. From the opening scene it is evident that this is not a play for the faint hearted. With its strong language and offensive stereotypes not everyone will have left the theatre feeling quite so refreshed as myself. Nonetheless, those of us with even the most minuscule funny bone found this comedy truly enjoyable and applaudable.

This is one of those types of humour that cannot really be explained until you see it for yourself. Perhaps if Pat Shortt were to write a play about a certain type of Northsider in this recessional time he would come up with something similar to the characters Anto (Marcus O’Learaoire) and Tomo (Stuart Pollock). Just like a D’Unbelievables classic, the cast play off each other to great effect, whilst interacting with the crowd and ensuring that attention does not drift from the stage for even a moment.

Laura Lenihen must be noted for her interpretation of Jacinta the penguin. She effortlessly transformed herself into the friendly animal, using very few words but much telling facial expression. Equally Sadbh Feeney must be applauded for, in the blink of an eye, transforming herself from a Northside mother to a light-headed D4 zoo keeper. Conor Barry should also be noted for his role as local mobster, John McDonald. He added a quirky element to the performance with his occasional spaghetti-legged foot movement.

One cannot go without mentioning the comedic references to current affairs such as the Anglo Irish Bank scandal and the Wibbly Wobbly Wonder (or lack thereof). Ó Murchú’s wit was not only present in his references to issues such as those mentioned, but also in the brief but beefy dialogue. Every sentence and every action rolled fl uidly into one another. Director Jon Honzier-Byrne must also be appraised for the job he did in exercising his cast, while the simplistic set allowed the audience to appreciate the acting capabilities of the actors onstage.

Ultimately, this is as good a tonic as any in a time when all we seem to hear about are job cuts, drug problems and gangland killings. It is not that Dramsoc has undermined the importance of these issues; it is that they have allowed us to take a break from the harsh realities of the situation at present and see the funnier side of things. Perhaps Dramsoc hold the answer, maybe they have the power to relight the fi re and get the economy moving in the right direction!

“I THINK you can over plan things, but life happens when you are making your plans.” Perhaps it is this John Lennon-like ethos which has led Padraig Rushe to success and prompted collaborations with artists such as Damien Rice and Paddy Casey.

First finding fame as a soloist in the Dublin Gospel Choir, the Dublin native could not have envisaged a career which would involve performing with the godfather of soul, James Brown. “I thought I’d join it for a few weeks but I ended up staying for six years.”

Artists who are used to performing in such a tightly tuned ensemble often fail to adapt to the pressure of solo performance, but this is not some- thing that worries the former MTV Contenders nominee. “It was defi nitely a bit weird at the start,” says Rushe, “but it has its own buzz.”

Padraig’s debut album, Greyworld, is by no means a rushed project. He first started writing it as a student of English and Irish at UCD. “It has been eight years in the writing. I’ve had all these songs and all these sounds which I’ve been dying to get out there”. The album title might indicate otherwise, but Rushe claims that his fusion of “soul and rock” could “lift you out of it and make you a bit better about your day.”

Padraig moved to the States at an early age, and change has played an important role in the development of his music. “When you’re always the new kid at school you get used to your own company. I would defi nitely have been an introverted child; music was a way to entertain myself.” College also played a founding role for his songwriting. “College opened my mind. Great writers gave a confi dence to me as far as treating my songs as art.”

It may be this respect for his art that has allowed the former chorister to avoid the bleaker sound which has granted contemporaries such as Rice and Glen Hansard popularity. “I used to write doom and gloom when I was a teenager”, he admits, “but most of the album is more hopeful. It’s great to express your angst every now and then but it’s a pitfall that singer-songwriters often fall into.”

Having sung as a backing singer for many chart-topping artists Rushe must have partaken in the occasional night of sheer artistic madness, but has failed to emulate the antics of artists like Jeff Buckley, who he has often been compared to. “I’m pretty tame really on that side… I was a backing-singer at Oxegen for Paddy Casey and I ended up staying at his house for two days. I became that house guest that wouldn’t go home. That’s my idea of being a nuisance.”

His after-show habits leave a lot to be desired, but Rushe’s talent is unquestionable. Maybe his upcoming tour will uncover a more rebellious side to this UCD alumnus.

Padraig Rushe plays Crawdaddy on Saturday, 4th April.