A cage of live chickens which the Yard Dogs Road Show demanded on their rider for the show. Not so sure what they’re going to do with them, though.

There are already delays and bottlenecks on all roads to Stradbally so be patient. Traffic is moving, albeit slowly. There’s a two-lane one-way system in operation on the main approach road and Gardai are directing traffic into first available car-parks.

Main arena opens later this afternoon (4pm)

It has probably not escaped your attention that there’s a big music and arts bash on in Co Laois this weekend. Here’s On The Record’s YouTube guide to the 10 musical acts you really should see at the Electric Picnic.
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You can use this post to tip or plug any acts playing at the Picnic this weekend. As you all know by now, the full line-up with stage times and all that jazz can be found here.

There will be a special event in the Leviathan Marquee featuring readings by authors who have contributed to The Irish Times/Amnesty series of short stories. Each event will be followed by a panel discussion chaired by Irish Times Features Editor, Hugh Linehan

SATURDAY 4pm-5.30pm Hugo Hamilton, Ann Marie Hourihane, Kevin Barry and Roddy Doyle

SUNDAY 4.30pm-6pm Claire Keegan, Anne Enright, Mark O’Halloran and Glenn Patterson

The Yard Dogs Road Show will be recreating the vaudeville saloons of the American Wild West on the main stage today, Lost Vagueness tomorrow and on the Little Big Tent on Sunday

Anyone for a good news story from the music retail sector?

While the Tower Records brand may have disappeared from American streets and malls in the last few years, the Dublin store trading under that name celebrates 15 years of business in the city in September.

The Wicklow Street shop will be marking its landmark birthday with a host of local talent performing in-stores during the month.

The birthday series kicks off on September 13 with The Blizzards, Jenny Evans, Carly Sings and Lisa Hannigan.

Others appearing during the month are Someone Still Loves You Boris Yeltsin (16), Pugwash (17), Chequerboard and Rollers/Sparkers (23), The Coronas (24), Cowboy X and Ham Sandwich (25) and We Should Be Dead (26) (video for “Forget Romance, Lets Dance” follows)

With promoters finding it difficult to shift tickets for more and more shows, expect the “unforseen circumstances” excuse to make a lot of appearances in the coming months to explain away why shows are cancelled.

Maybe the answer to punter apathy is more recession-busting gigs?

Dublin indie promoters Foggy Notions think so and they’ve put together a fine new music four-pack for next month.

The bash features Baltimore’s Ponytail (who have just released their new album “Ice Cream Spiritual”), rising Kilkenny electronica act R.S.A.G., Dublin’s Vinny Club and London’s Gentle Friendly.

Tickets for the show, at Whelan’s in Dublin on September 10, are 14 euro.

Look on all ye who have sold your tickets and despair! Here’s the real story from within the Electric Picnic world.

(1) The sun in shining in Stradbally. It’s lovely and hot. Bring sun-cream. I’m serious. You’ll thank me for it on Saturday.

(2) Ground conditions? The overall going is excellent right now. The main arena space is solid and the car-park is grand.

(3) Mud? Non-existent at the moment. Production roads which were supposed to be muddy are now dusty instead which is a problem everyone is very happy to have to deal with.

(4) Vibes? Excellent, to be honest. Everything seems on track and all set for kick-off tomorrow.

(5) The Daily Ticket office? Plush, expansive, en-suite spa room, gourmet chef working up a storm in the corner, two dozen spell-checkers speed-reading dictionaries. Who am I kidding? We’re back in the shed in the middle of a field. But hey, we have tables and chairs and electricity.

(I did say that the sun is shining, right?)

(1) Check out our Electric Picnic special which features videos from Lisa Hannigan and will be where you will find the Daily Ticket on Saturday and Sunday plus a host of other news and updates over the weekend.

(2) How about an Electric Picnic mix-tape? With Muxtape out of commission while they have a chat with the RIAA about stuff, On The Record has decided to go with 8tracks to house the latest mix. It’s available for you to listen to right now right here. Press play and enjoy.

(3) The Picnic site promises that the running orders for the music stages are “coming soon” (the times are up for the other stages). but Quint is already ahead of them. Ideal for those who want to get a head-start on planning stuff while they’re supposed to be working for the man today.

(4) First reports and photos from the festival site this afternoon. Stay tuned.

(1) We’re trying to put Public Image Limited back together again for the weekend, OK? Body & Soul area, first thing Sunday morning. Just don’t tell anyone

(2) One of the POD bookers has discovered that they’ve booked all the Saturday acts for Sunday and the Sunday acts for Friday.

(3) The promoters are worried that MCD will pull off a spoiler festival at the very last minute in Co Leitrim called the Electric BBQ.

(4) Look, we haven’t quite booked enough authors and comedians yet, alright?

(5) The Electric Picnic is on THIS weekend?

(6) We’re waiting to confirm that the Rose of Tralee will recite a poem on the main stage to get the weekend off to a flying start

(7) Kraftwerk now want to play and we have to squeeze them in somewhere. Maybe after Christy Moore?

(8) It’s really hard to spell the names of some of the bands who are playing on the World Music stage.

(9) Bodytonic have discovered that they actually have 8 stages.

(10) We’ve ran out of coloured markers.

First couple of proper line-ups are now beginning to appear on the Electric Picnic site

Here are line-ups for the three stages located in the Body & Soul area:

Chill stage (main stage)
Merka Bar stage
POD stage

Want to see some films? Here is the line-up for the Cinema Stage.

And here is the line-up for the Pop tent, as brought to you (I think) from the people behind the wonderful Powderbubble from years gone by.

As more stage line-ups, dates and times are announced, I’ll post them here or link to them from this post.

Here are the Balanescu Quartet (playing the Chill stage at Body & Soul on Friday night) rocking out with David Byrne. Yes, Dorothy, there will be Kraftwerk at the Picnic this year…

Yep, we’re producing a daily supplement from a shed in the middle of a field in Co Laois for the second year in a row

The Daily Ticket will be published on Saturday and Sunday at the Electric Picnic in Stradbally. Each edition will contain all the words and photos we can fit onto the page, including reviews of the previous day’s music, previews of what’s ahead, line-up updates, features, food reviews and much, much more.

The supplement will be distributed each day from noon from the Ticket kiosks - one will be in the Oscar Wilde campsite and one will be in the spoken word area in the main arena - and also from distribution staff who will be covering the campsites and main arena.

The Daily Ticket - outstanding in our own field since 2007.

(Oh and for those of you who won’t be in Stradbally next weekend, the Daily Ticket will be published online each day and there will also be regular updates on this blog)

(PS Here’s Modeselektor, playing Bodytonic’s main stage on Sunday night)

(1) Who killed Sam Sparro? Well, it was certainly not the Lovebox people who had him on the bill for Marlay Park last weeked on their website from the get-go. So, lets try to get this straight. Sparro was announced for Lovebox in Dublin. Cometh the hour, though, not cometh the man. There was no sign of him on the running order for the show, there was no word from the promoters about the cancellation and the gig was not even mentioned on his MySpace. Like, what the hell happened there? Will the hundreds (nah, thousands) of Sparro fans who bought a ticket for the show be able to get a refund because he didn’t show? Is Sparro the new Prince? And, while we’re at it, any other stories from the Box Of Love people would like to share with the group?

(2) More hell. Does anyone know what the hell is going on at State magazine? In terms of weird posts, this one takes the gold, silver and bronze medals (though some may be calling for a dope test). Is this the curse of Abbagate?

(3) Hot as hell? We’re on a roll here, people, stick with us. Belem was hot. Proper tropical humidity all day long except for the two crazy monsoon showers. Only mad dogs and Irishmen would go for a stroll in this kind of Amazonian heat. Actually, hang on, the dogs gave it a miss too. Belem was where I got a taste of tecnobrega, the completely insane favela pop music which ducks and dives, cuts and pastes, robs and steals from all over the place. Culchie baile funk - if only Diplo had come here instead of Sao Paulo and he had taken a ride with the taxi-driver we had on Sunday morning (I reckon he was one of the Senna family). By the by, the tecnobrega scene is a part of the music industry that is using piracy in a very interesting way.

(4) What does hell look like? Hey, I like the way this is going. Want a sneak preview of The 02? Thrillpier Ian has had a quick look around inside.

(5) Hell, no. The Liquid Liquid show has been pulled. Not enough people prepared to pay for tickets, methinks.

(6) The Brazilian adventure is now at an end, with our last seminar taking place on Saturday in Belem. It really did feel like a band on tour, complete with moaning, whinges, in-jokes, superb catering, tantrums and some fantastic star performances. What we need now is an agent to book us some shows in Argentina, Mexico and Chile. Any takers? Muito obrigada to my travelling companions for sharing the trip.

(7) Hell, no (parte dois). Seems like Lenny is also not coming to town. A mooted gig at Dublin’s 02 had been listed on his website for December 1, but it has now been yanked from the list. Maybe Lenny has made enough cash from his Irish dates this year to pay for a new hat and some nice Christmas presents for the folks.

(8) Hey, any reports from the gig by the other Lenny last week? How many people showed up for it? Did it rain? Was it ironic? Any of those MCD folks who usually hang out here care to give us a copy of the Ticketmaster manifest for the show? C’mon guys, I keep showing you mine so you should show me yours.

(9) Fiddy, can you spare a dime? Here’s why 50 Cent is the richest cash cow in hip-hop, even if he never spits into a mic again. Many of us hope his people at Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley are telling him to give up the rapping and stick with the mining.

(10) Did you know that girls are not supposed to go to gigs? You didn’t? Well, you’re missing all the fun over at Chez Rocks.

(11) If there’s a hell below, we’re all going to go. Have a read of this fine piece by Hugh Linehan on Paul Durcan’s strop with the Catholic Church (or as Hugh puts it “the unattractive spectacle of ageing irreconcilables hurling juvenile insults at Catholic bishops for doing what Catholic bishops are supposed to do. And worse, in verse”).

Much to quote from it, including this:

“But there does appear to be a generation which, despite having raged against the church since puberty, seems unwilling just to let it go its own way. Perhaps due to unpleasant formative experiences at the hands of the Catholic education system of the 1950s and 1960s, it seems to regress to the most tedious and banal adolescent abuse whenever the subject comes up.”

(12) And finally, keeping with the religious theme, we hear that POD Concerts have brought in a large consignment of Child of Prague statues ahead of next weekend. The word according to the weatherman, for those who still have faith in that particular testament, is as follows:

“Thursday will be largely dry and bright with sunny spells. Feeling very mild, even warm with highest temperatures ranging 18 to 23 degrees, again warmest across the southern half of the country, with mainly moderate southwesterly breezes persisting.”

Here’s a video from the Stradbally-bound Wilco to get folks in the mood. Hey, anyone know any good songs about wellingtons and mud?

Think of Brazil and music comes to mind almost as quickly as football. Samba and bossa-nova may be the marquee sounds that dominate the landscape, but Brazil’s musical smarts are as wide and deep as the country itself.
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You can use the weekly Etc post to plug and recommend gigs, new releases, TV shows, headache remedies and ways to get from A to B. Please be polite and declare an interest where relevant (or I’ll do it for you)

Hugely popular online mixtape site Muxtape has temporarily shut up shop pending discussions with trade group, the Recording Industry Association of America. Those in need of some muxes during this outage can always get their fix at Mixwit or 8tracks.

Herbie Hancock, Clinic, These New Puritans and Jay Reatard are the first set of acts announced for the Green Synergy fest in Dublin from November 12 to 16.

Minotaur Shock will be showing off his awesome new album “Amateur Dramatics” at a date at Dublin’s Crawdaddy on October 25.

Ace Norn Iron duo Oppenheimer (video below) get their live freak on with October shows at Dublin’s Whelan’s (2) and Belfast’s Stiff Kitten (3)

The latest JNLR report is out and I am sure the spinning has begun. As always happens every few months when a fresh batch of listenership figures are released, radio executives head to their boardrooms and start working out how best to present the figures for their station.

To be honest, there seems to be very few “headline” changes in the latest book. Since the JNLR survey went quarterly, mass movements no longer occur in the same way as before. All of which which makes the fact that there are less and less people hanging on the Ryanline even more startling. Gerry Ryan lost 17,000 listeners in the period under review. That’s like everyone in Clonmel turning off their radios at once and saying “see ya later, dude”. It seems the downward trend is back in full effect for 2FM’s big kahoona which is bad news bad news for him especially with Tom Dunne about the enter the equation.

On the more positive side, Marian Finucane keeps on keeping on. Her Saturday morning show saw its audience grow by 14,000 to 323,000. Her Sunday show too has increased its reach.

Nevertheless, expect to read plenty of spin and to see (and hear) chest-beating adverts in the next day or two as stations attempt to big up miniscule changes in an effort to plamas advertisers and diss their opposition.

Tom Dunne is leaving the Today FM fold to take up the 9am-noon slot with Newstalk (who just happen to be moving in downstairs in the same building as Today FM).

Just as it will be interesting to see who Today FM select to take over that early evening spot, which was once held by John Kelly, it will also be interesting to see how the Dunne vs D’Arcy vs Ryan battle works out in 2009’s JNLR books (the latest JNLR book covering radio audiences is released later on Thursday).

On the former point, Dave “A House” Couse has been the main sub these past few months when it comes for standing in for Dunne when he’s away (and he has been away a lot) and Couse has done a fine job of it too. However, the show’s focus on new music has become quite narrow in recent times - too much emphasis on no-mark NME and indie landfill bands with a very selective and spotty coverage of Irish bands - and it would be great to see the station using the change of driver to address that issue.

When it comes to the battle for listeners, all bets are off. As all radio analysts know, it will take at least 12 months for Dunne to really assert himself in that mid-morning spot, provide competition for the incumbents on 2FM, Today FM and RTE Rado One and make listeners remember his new time slot. However, it’s a challenge that Dunne will relish. In the last few years, he has been really firing on all cylinders when he covered daytime slots for Today FM so the move away from an evening show was obviously something he has been hankering after for a while.

Er, and speaking of radio… I am now podcasting with a bunch of girls (someone will probably accuse me of sexism for that). Anyway, the Three Girls and a Guy podcast is now live here. It’s where Alison Curtis, Sinead Gleeson, Tanya Sweeney (Tanya’s blog is coming soon) and myself talk shite on Alison’s show for 15 minutes or so every few weeks. It’s a whole lot of fun. This time out, we talk about first musical loves and how they stick around forever. End of blatant plug, declaration of interest and all that jazz.

Quick question - did a survey appear in the last year/few years claiming that Irish audiences went to more live shows (or spent more money on live music) than anywhere else in Europe?

I’ve definitely seen this statistic turn up a few times in features and reports, but I’ve never read the survey in question. Does anyone know if it actually exists, who produced it and if the survey is online?

Big thanks On The Record readers!

Taking off from Sao Paulo’s Congonhas airport is one hell of an adrenalin rush as you wonder if you’ll actually scrape the buildings which surround the runway. Of course, it doesn’t help when one of your travelling companions points out the site of that plane crash from last year.

There is a Brazilian take on those Irish PRs with their penchant for lovely girls pics. Around Sao Paulo, you’ll notice people standing around near traffic lights holding banners advertising cars and mobile phones. When the lights go red, they step in front of the cars and give the banners a twirl, while others hand out leaflets to motorists. I reckon you’ll be seeing them at the Red Cow by this time next year.

The canvasing has begun in earnest for October’s local elections here. In Porto Alegre, the panel was chaired by a local Partido Trabalhista Brasileiro councillor who is a dab hand at the aul’ glad-handing - he made sure he had his grand-daughter in his arms when he was giving the farewell speech and he was probably in more photos than Willie O’Dea can muster on an average weekend out and about in Limerick - while there are souped-up boy racers vroom-vrooming around the streets of Belo Horizonte with speaker stacks on the roofs of their car plugging their candidates over booming hip-hop.

Yes, there has been music too and a couple of acts deserve a mention in the despatches. Like Gilberto Monteiro, the swashbuckling Jimi Hendrix of the squeezebox who wowed us all in a restaurant in Porto Alegre. This giant of a man with hams for hands (you wouldn’t mess with him - he kept glaring at the sound engineer who looked fairly worried by it all) made the accordian sound like the accordian has never sounded before.

Then, there was Expresso 25, a 46-strong choir singing classics by Caetano Veloso, Milton Nascimento, Tom Jobim and many more. They’re the kind of act you could imagine going down a storm at a festival like, oh, the Festival of World Cultures or the Farmleigh Affair.

In BH, it was the awesome Pleiades who led the way. Four kids (the guitarist is 12, the singer and bassist are 15 and the drummer is an aul’ fella of 18) doing the metal thing with dash and colour and bravado and gung-ho. They’ve already got loads of props for making the Top 10 of a BBC Next Big Thing competition and they’re the kind of band who, if they’re still together in three years time, will probably be world-beaters.

My favourite act of the 50 or so I’ve seen so far are Músicas Intermináveis para Viagem (”endless music for tripping”). A girl called Laura and a boy called Dudu, guitar and drums, instrumental sorcery and euphoric sonic bliss bringing acts like Pivot, Battles, Our Brother The Native and Explosions In The Sky to mind. They’re touring Europe in the next couple of months with dates already booked in Lisbon, Bologna, Barcelona and Berlin. Note to Foggy, Umack, Skinny Wolves and Forever Presents: they have your contacts, dudes. Here’s the video for “Caixa Preta”