Sometimes you can't help whom you fall in temporary love with, writes Róisín Ingle
My current celebrity crush - I use "celebrity" loosely - has been simmering for some time. On paper he's not exactly a catch. He has a penchant for tracksuits, hoists his thumbs permanently aloft in photographs and refers to a certain part of his anatomy as his "ding-dong". I know it's wrong, but I can't help it: I Spiral.
When the rapper - again, I use the word loosely - from Finglas, in Dublin, ambled into the Big Brother house during the summer I could never have imagined how he would grow on me, like an indestructible weed. "What's your name?" asked the unsuspecting housemates, only to be greeted with "Spiral, yeah?". In his Finglas accent it sounded like "Spiurralyeah", so they were a bit confused for a while about what to call him.
DJ Spiral wasted no time telling housemates that he was practically Ireland's answer to Fifty Cent, "yeah?" He started "laying" down the "rhymes", including a catchy ode to fellow housemate Aisleyne, which enigmatically began: "You got de 12 10s, oh yeah." His other big hit in the house was a song called So Sexy, featuring the immortal line "I'd do anyting to youuuuu", which has been given the seal of approval by the hip TV presenter Russell Brand.
More than anyone else in that house Spiral kept it really real, if you know what I mean, eh yeah? I first realised I was developing feelings for him the day he tried to persuade Aisleyne to join him in an "oul snog". She is a couple of years older than him, so, to assuage her fears of coming across on TV as some kind of sugar mammy, Spiral cited Cameron Diaz and Justin Timberlake as one couple for whom romance had blossomed despite the age gap. "The ting is, Aisleyne, you've got an arse like a loaf of bread, and Spiral just wants a slice, yeah?" he said with a smile. He had me at ting. Sigh.
Since his eviction from the house the 22-year-old has appeared at nightclubs, record stores and bus shelters promoting his new single, called, inevitably, Finglas. ("F-I-N-G-L-A-S," he whispers. "It's where I'm from, and I'm proud of it.") I downloaded the "track" from iTunes, and I have to say it was the best €3.96 I've spent this century. The song is a social commentary on urban Dublin life. A tale of joyriding in the Finglas fields, going to the offy, being chased by gardaí - surely this is the first rap hit in history to feature gardaí - and stuff about his "ding-dong". For sensitive types there's a clean version of the song, but you don't get really get the full Spiral effect that way.
I don't mean to be disloyal, but Spiral is probably the worst rapper I've heard, which only makes the song more compulsive. "I'm Spiral, I mean what I say/I'm Spiral, writing raps every day, I'm Spiral, this is who I am/If you don't like me, I couldn't give a damn." Last week the single made the top 10 in the Irish charts; he celebrated with a bottle of Lucozade in the back of a limo. That he neither drinks nor smokes just adds to the Spiral enigma.
Inevitably, he has been compared to Rats from Paths to Freedom, but he has more in common with Shane Lynch, his fellow Dubliner, who was the other surprise hit of the reality-TV summer. Time was when to score a hit on British reality TV the Irish contestants had to be gay and chirpy, like Brian Dowling. These days it's the down-to-earth, authentic, straight-talking Dubliners who are inadvertently charming audiences.
Still, this crush on Spiral isn't healthy. I find myself being lured into sports shops, where I finger the shiny tracksuit material and wonder if I could carry off the backwards-baseball-cap look. Suddenly Finglas has all the allure of New York or Hollywood. The Music Box record shop in de village, where Spiral has been spotted signing his single, now has all the edgy cachet of LA's Viper Room.
When I received a text from a friend saying Spiral was in my favourite haunt, the Karaoke Box in Dublin's Ukiyo restaurant. When I nearly cried because I wasn't there to meet him, I knew it was time to do something about my obsession. I was just weaning myself off Spiral by listening to Finglas five times a day instead of 10 when another old crush, Colin Farrell, arrived home. Wouldn't you know it, he only ends up out on the teetotal tear with our Spi at Renards, both of them looking what I believe is known in hip-hop parlance as "fine".
In one photograph I saw, Spiral has abandoned the thumbs-aloft pose to point his finger at post-rehab Colin in sheer delight. "Look, Ma, it's me and Colin Farrell!" the photo seems to say. Colin and Spiral. Coiral, if you will. My celebrity-crush cup runneth over. I'd do anyting to youuuuse, eh, yeah?