
Brian Boyd: Enough of the flight shaming and train bragging
- Opinion
- August 23, 2019, 01:08
Focusing on the impact of aviation is to miss the point about global warming

Brian Boyd: Can anyone conceivably view the word potato as an ‘ethnic slur’?
- Opinion
- August 15, 2019, 13:14
Our understanding of what constitutes actual racist language and behaviour has become devalued

Love Island: Better than Oxbridge and harder to get into
- Opinion
- July 25, 2019, 18:00
Erotic capital may be all the reality television show’s contestants have or need

Brendan Grace: The best bits from a life in comedy
- Stage
- July 11, 2019, 13:09
These eight YouTube clips show Brendan Grace’s pioneering, inimitable comedy style

Brendan Grace: His big break came when he gave the gig of his life for Frank Sinatra
- Stage
- July 11, 2019, 11:31
Grace was a pioneer in Ireland, writing and performing his own comedy as a headline act

Freddie Starr: Chicken-thrower, Hitler impersonator and ‘idiot’
- Stage
- May 10, 2019, 11:23
Anything could happen at a Starr show. That was the appeal of his now dated comedy

Scott Walker’s work is woven into the musical fabric of the age
- Music
- March 25, 2019, 11:13
His beautiful voice and avant garde compositions influenced David Bowie and Radiohead

Michael Jackson music bans show double standards of cultural elitists
- Opinion
- March 11, 2019, 01:44
Brian Boyd: It is one rule for popular figures and another for revered idols of high art

Choice Music Prize: Irish album of the year revealed
- Music
- March 7, 2019, 23:34
Picture This win Song of the Year for One Drink

Why Centrist Dads will stop Brexit
- Opinion
- February 27, 2019, 17:37
The Independent Group have within days of formation made a dramatic impact on the debate

Should Liam Neeson be cancelled?
- Opinion
- February 5, 2019, 13:08
Were the actor’s remarks so disgustingly and violently racist that he brought this on himself?

Michael Jackson: The boys, the king, the shouting match
- Film
- February 2, 2019, 06:00
A public row has erupted after two men alleged the ‘king of pop’ molested them as boys

Beware the perils of Veganuary
- Opinion
- January 14, 2019, 12:10
Renowned chef Anthony Bourdain once referred to vegans as 'the Hezbollah-like splinter faction of vegetarians'

Jokes are being weaponised in culture wars
- Opinion
- January 4, 2019, 00:44
Despite risk of bad taste, comedians must honour progress and defy group-think

Should we censor ‘homophobic’ Fairytale of New York and ‘rape anthem’ Baby It's Cold Outside?
- Music
- December 5, 2018, 12:23
Some hear a song about sexual coercion and say it’s inappropriate in the #MeToo era

Nike’s Kaepernick ad is corporate “woke washing”
- Opinion
- September 5, 2018, 14:02
Big companies are keen to to appropriate social justice concerns as part of their marketing strategy

Another word for drunk? Try ramsquaddled
- Books
- August 16, 2018, 00:08
A rediscovered dictionary of historical slang highlights some bawdy delights of the past

Can you be racist against white people?
- TV, Radio, Web
- August 11, 2018, 06:00
A row at the New York Times has sparked a heated debate over the nature of racism

Winner-takes-all urbanism brought Dublin a housing crisis
- Opinion
- August 3, 2018, 01:00
Dublin needs affordable housing and an increase in the minimum wage – not another poetry pop-up space

World Cup shows ideas of race and nationality are no longer fixed
- Opinion
- July 6, 2018, 13:06
Success of Irish athletes explaining to us is that monolithic notions are not fit for purpose anymore

Video gaming is about as dangerous as Beatlemania
- Opinion
- June 19, 2018, 13:20
WHO officials appear to have ignored the views of Psychiatric and Psychological bodies urging them not to stigmatise video gaming (...)

The dead spy, the drowned MP, the lost canoeist: the people who fake death and why they do it
- People
- May 31, 2018, 18:15
Russian journalist Arkady Babchenko did it to expose a killer. But most people who fake their deaths are running from something

Brian Boyd: Mo Salah the “good Muslim”
- Opinion
- May 26, 2018, 00:56
Crass and facile as some of it may be the adulation of the Liverpool player shows once again the power of sport to challenge preju(...)

Eurovision in Dublin, 1971: hotpants, ‘women’s lib’ and boycotts
- TV, Radio, Web
- May 12, 2018, 06:00
When Ireland hosted its first Eurovision it was beset by Troubles with a capital ‘T’

Kanye West’s White House bid - the Irish connection
- Opinion
- May 3, 2018, 11:51
The rapper's presidential ambitions may have been born over breakfast in a Dublin hotel

What the ‘Abba reunion’ news really boils down to: not much
- Music
- April 30, 2018, 13:40
They’ve recorded two new songs. One will be performed on TV in December. Not by Abba

Ed Sheeran: We’re about to become a nation of Edheads
- Music
- April 28, 2018, 06:00
Sold-out tour begins in Cork on May 4th followed by shows in Belfast, Galway and Dublin

Brian Boyd: Pathological Incel misogyny and myth of male oppression
- Opinion
- April 27, 2018, 01:06
Manosphere must sit down and shut up – men’s problems are caused by men

Ken Dodd’s best lines: ‘When my kleptomania gets bad I take something for it’
- Stage
- March 12, 2018, 14:00
He was the Springsteen of seaside comedy, with no hatred or bullying to his humour

Brian Boyd: Current bout of Russophobia rings hollow
- Opinion
- March 9, 2018, 11:05
The suspected poisioning of Sergei Skripal exposes the hypocritical moral grandstanding of the West when it comes to Russian malfe(...)

Boris Johnson is a joke that isn’t funny anymore
- Opinion
- February 28, 2018, 12:20
When the reality of political life intrudes - a hard border in Ireland - he reverts to type and tries to quip his way around it

Throwing George Clooney at the issue of gun control will not work
- Opinion
- February 22, 2018, 10:29
The NRA are old-school: they show up at town hall meetings, they stuff letters and lick envelopes, they put through phone calls to(...)

Is ‘cancer-free bacon’ a cause for celebration or just more 'nutribollocks?'
- Food & Drink
- January 30, 2018, 06:01
The WHO report that scared people off rashers and a bacon that's “safer than any other bacon on the market”.

What goes on WhatsApp doesn’t always stay on WhatsApp
- TV, Radio, Web
- January 29, 2018, 14:50
Chat carefully. A UK minister’s description of colleagues as ‘swivel-eyed’ has gone public

Remembering Dolores O'Riordan: ‘Can you lend me 20 quid and buy me a drink?’
- Music
- January 16, 2018, 09:37
Before they made it big, the late Cranberries singer felt she was drinking in the music industry’s last-chance saloon

Adam Boulton is right – We do need to get over ourselves
- Opinion
- December 11, 2017, 14:59
Tayto and Saoirse Ronan are not actual emblems on our flag

Bono’s brush with death: ‘I was clinging to my own life’
- Music
- December 1, 2017, 10:00
On the liner notes of U2’s new album ‘Songs of Experience’, the singer references 'a shock to the system'

U2's new album Songs of Experience: the most tortuous journey
- Music
- December 1, 2017, 08:00
Trump, Brexit, personal crises scuppered the release of U2’s album out today

Brian Boyd: Trump is going to make Christmas great again
- Opinion
- December 1, 2017, 00:17
Analysis shows every time Trump mentiones “we can say ‘Merry Christmas’ again” or a variant thereof he receives his biggest applau(...)

Spirits make you angry, wine makes you ‘sexy’ and beer doesn’t
- Drink
- November 25, 2017, 06:00
A new study explores how spirits, wine and beer affect drinkers’ moods

Sean Hughes: coruscating comic talent who never compromised
- Stage
- October 16, 2017, 16:30
Youngest ever winner of the Perrier Prize, he became the UK’s biggest stand-up attraction

Now Showing: My Journey To Self-Improvement, a Harvey Weinstein Production
- Opinion
- October 12, 2017, 15:53
Film producers response to harassment allegations follows a well trodden path

Roger Waters: Trump voters are not liking his latest Wall
- Music
- October 11, 2017, 05:00
Fans are angered by provocative images of the US president in the Pink Floyd man’s Us + Them tour

Hillary Clinton and the €1,000-ticket book tour
- Books
- September 19, 2017, 13:00
With low overheads and sky-high ticket prices, Hillary Live is a book tour like no other

Abba-tars: Super Troupers return, and somewhere in the crowd there’s you
- Music
- September 16, 2017, 06:00
Björn, Agnetha, Benny and Anni-Frid are back – as you haven’t seen them since 1977

Picasso house built on a Guinness fortune for €23m
- Homes & Property
- September 14, 2017, 05:00
The artist bought Mas de Notre Dame de Vie, a luxurious villa near Cannes in the South of France, from the Guinness family, and li(...)

Brian Boyd: If we raise awareness of everything, we raise awareness of nothing
- Opinion
- September 8, 2017, 01:09
National Recovery Month reduces addiction to selfies, thumbs-ups and confessionals

How Barack Obama became top of the Twitter charts
- Culture
- August 19, 2017, 06:00
Obama tweets less than Trump, but seven of the 10 all-time most popular tweets are his

Brian Boyd: Sunlight of tech disinfects Charlottesville
- Opinion
- August 16, 2017, 01:00
Unhidden by hoods and robes, white nationalists have been caught on camera

Brian Boyd: Tourists seen as terrorists by some in Barcelona
- Opinion
- August 11, 2017, 01:00
The youth wing of the CUP party is on a mission to drive out visitors

The Dublin father whose photos place his baby in life-threatening scenarios
- Visual Art
- August 7, 2017, 11:30
Baby Hannah cllimbs ladders, plays with knives, drives a car. It's for a good reason

Brian Boyd: Spare me Mick and Jez’s Brexit hypocrisy
- Opinion
- August 4, 2017, 06:00
Like fellow Glastonbury headliner Corbyn, Jagger is jumping on the bandwagon

Brian Boyd: Trump is Commander in Chief of the cuckoo’s nest
- Opinion
- July 27, 2017, 11:57
American Psychoanalytic Association has lifted ban on members commenting on president’s mental state

Brian Boyd: Federer happy to talk about drugs so why does nobody want to ask?
- Opinion
- July 17, 2017, 16:21
Wimbledon winner’s remarkable revival raises questions that only he seems to be asking

Get Active: Tennis
- Fitness
- July 15, 2017, 06:00
It’s better for you than swimming, running or cycling

Opening our digital door to welcome in tech-Stasi police
- Opinion
- July 15, 2017, 05:55
Many of the ‘problems’ being sold to us by digital technologies aren’t problems at all

John McEnroe: ‘I saw myself as part of punk’
- Books
- July 8, 2017, 06:00
The former champion on women’s tennis, his recurring nightmare and who will win Wimbledon 2017

Brian Boyd: Towelgate shows the failings of social media
- Opinion
- July 7, 2017, 06:00
Furore over the Wimbledon tussle highlights a digital desperation for popularity

Ireland’s gin craze: From mother’s ruin to hipster’s tipple
- Drink
- June 11, 2017, 22:50
It’s the biggest growth sector in drink sales, and even the tonic has had a makeover

Moderate drinking is good for you. Except when it’s bad for you
- Opinion
- June 8, 2017, 15:49
The governmental obsession with litres and units does nothing to address alcohol abuse

Ignore lunatic lifestyle gurus. Sugar’s not the new heroin
- Opinion
- May 25, 2017, 02:01
Sugar-shaming is not just about sugar. It’s about our wider relationship with food

Manchester Arena attack will change the concert experience
- Culture
- May 23, 2017, 11:00
Analysis: Going to a concert will become more time-consuming and more expensive

Bono: ‘I don’t want to meet Donald Trump’
- Music
- May 20, 2017, 05:58
The U2 singer fears the US president will undo years of work on Aids and development

Bono says U2’s next single inspired by Eamon Dunphy
- Music
- May 15, 2017, 06:40
‘Eamon said this beautiful thing once - he said ‘Bono, Ali is the best thing about you’’

Amid backlash and rising prices, the avocado craze continues
- Food & Drink
- May 6, 2017, 06:00
Ireland can’t get enough of the avocado, but there’s a sinister side to the food trend

Brian Boyd: Jeremy Corbyn, Islington Labour and me
- Opinion
- April 25, 2017, 12:41
The Islington Labour Party of the 1980’s was achingly “right on” and as relevant today as Duran Duran

What’s behind those Ed Sheeran Croke Park rumours?
- Music
- April 21, 2017, 09:45
Speculation mounting that Ed Sheeran will play three concerts in 2018

Brian Boyd: We have reached Peak Synthetic Outrage
- Opinion
- April 13, 2017, 12:23
Stories about Pepsi, United Airlines and Sean Spicer ticked the “social media storm/online backlash” boxes but none of them stand (...)

Film industry has only itself to blame for illegal streaming
- Opinion
- April 6, 2017, 05:30
Studios create massive global hype around movies but stagger releases across markets

Next in line for the anti-vaccination brigade? Autism
- Opinion
- March 22, 2017, 12:55
Controversial ‘anti-vaxx’ film linking autism to childhood vaccinations to tour Ireland

Brian Boyd: Cheltenham is backing the wrong addiction
- Opinion
- March 17, 2017, 01:00
Excessive gambling rather than alcohol consumption is the real danger

A very American coup: Is a ‘deep state’ targeting The Donald?
- Opinion
- March 7, 2017, 13:09
Swivel-eyed loons among US right claim a shadowy movement is out to ‘remove’ Trump

What’s left? Brian Boyd on a regressive political agenda
- Opinion
- February 14, 2017, 01:00
Throwing around insults and labelling voters will not prevail against the muscular right

Why the religious right is now the biggest threat to Trump
- Opinion
- February 6, 2017, 13:00
Backlash over decision not to roll back LGBT rights will be more damaging than travel ban

Feng shui: nonsense fad or good design?
- Interiors
- January 31, 2017, 06:00
Practitioner says it is not about decluttering, it is an Earth science

Golden oldies leading tennis into brave new world
- Other Sports
- January 26, 2017, 15:17
Williams sisters and Federer proving that veteran doesn’t have to mean past it

With Ruth Negga, we have disgraced ourselves again
- Opinion
- January 25, 2017, 10:49
It is the sole authority of Ruth Negga to describe her nationality and sense of place in whatever way she sees fit

Why Trump’s age, obesity and diet matter
- Opinion
- January 23, 2017, 13:00
His lack of interest in his own health informs his support for anti-vaccination campaigners

Brian Boyd: Today’s luxuries need to have soul
- Interiors
- January 21, 2017, 06:00
Brew your cappuccino in a built-in machine, before drinking it in a free-standing soaker tub, set under a showcase chandelier

Give Me a Crash Course In . . . Ticket reselling
- Irish News
- January 21, 2017, 00:00
U2’s Croke Park show sold out in minutes this week. Then tickets showed up online at vastly inflated prices. Is this touting, and (...)

Music industry hypocrisy exposed by boycott of Trump inauguration
- Opinion
- January 17, 2017, 11:38
It is ok to play for money in front of Gadafy but not the president-elect of the USA

U2 confirm Joshua Tree tour date in Croke Park on July 22nd
- Music
- January 9, 2017, 09:12
‘More desperate times’ motivated U2 to revisit songs from three decades ago, says Clayton

U2 to outline tour dates for The Joshua Tree on Monday
- Music
- January 8, 2017, 12:07
Croke Park likely venue in unexpected move for band who have never toured a catalogue album

The only meaningful exercise to be got from Fitbits is throwing them into the bin
- Opinion
- January 1, 2017, 12:59
They’re the equivalent of paying for a weather app on your phone - when you could just look out the window instead

Ten songs in the key of George Michael’s life
- Music
- December 26, 2016, 12:35
Brian Boyd selects 10 songs that tell part of the story of the British pop superstar’s life

George Michael (1963-2016): effortless and free – the best way to remember him
- Music
- December 26, 2016, 01:46
2016 continues to be year of living dangerously for giants of music world

Man who got MacGowan to write ‘Fairytale of New York’ has died
- Music
- December 23, 2016, 13:00
Frank Murray managed The Pogues, Thin Lizzy, The Frames, Elton John and The Specials

Brian Boyd: Have I got fake news for you
- Opinion
- December 22, 2016, 13:20
Just like previous efforts to police the internet, the clampdown on fake stories will fail

Hitler’s house seized by Austrian parliament
- Homes & Property
- December 15, 2016, 12:50
The former dictator’s home has become a macabre Neo-Nazi attraction – a phenomenon known in the trade as “real estate disaster por(...)

The way we were: 1960s Ireland in a moral vice
- Books
- December 10, 2016, 06:00
When TV soaps were seen as a social threat and kitchen skills were part of the Inter Cert
![“It is shameful to think that the actions of figures such as Rosa Parks [above] and Harvey Milk have now been replaced with the lazy, crude, stupid and infantile justice warriors, be they on the left or right.” “It is shameful to think that the actions of figures such as Rosa Parks [above] and Harvey Milk have now been replaced with the lazy, crude, stupid and infantile justice warriors, be they on the left or right.”](/polopoly_fs/1.2894974.1481029693!/image/image.jpg_gen/derivatives/landscape_140/image.jpg)
Online idiots of the far right and hard left turn on their own
- Opinion
- December 6, 2016, 13:08
Today’s alt-righters and SJWs have far more in common than they care to know

How to buy a television without being bamboozled
- Interiors
- December 2, 2016, 06:00
‘Home entertainment’ offers a dizzying array of choice, depending on budget and, er, taste

Gold Circle members brassed off by Aer Lingus changes
- Transport & Tourism
- November 28, 2016, 05:20
New AerClub frequent flyer programme is based on money spent and not airmiles flown

Brian Boyd: Goodbye and good riddance to the nonsense of homeopathy
- Opinion
- November 23, 2016, 12:27
US law will hopefully also spell the end of aromatherapy, reiki and mindfulness

Skyr’s the limit for traditional Icelandic yoghurt
- Business
- November 17, 2016, 04:29
UN report ranks Iceland at the top of the list of healthiest countries due to its diet

Brian Boyd: Liberal Snowflakes resort to ‘voter shaming’ over Trump victory
- Opinion
- November 11, 2016, 11:24
The people who punched the ballot for Obama in 2008 and 2012 (a good vote) but this time punched for Trump (a bad vote) are now be(...)

Leonard Cohen: the key songs and what they mean
- Music
- November 11, 2016, 10:41
From his 1967 debut album to the final recordings, here are 10 of Leonard Cohen’s best songs and lyrics

Brian Boyd: Why do US politicians seek celebrity endorsements?
- Opinion
- November 8, 2016, 01:00
Research shows the rich and famous alienate more voters than they recruit

I Read the News Today, Oh Boy review: Like an Irish ‘Great Gatsby’ by way of ‘Ripping Yarns’
- Books
- October 22, 2016, 05:00
Paul Howard’s biography of the Guinness heir Tara Browne – fan of fast cars, modern jazz and recreational drugs – is a masterpiece

I’m with the T-shirt: how a punk band invented a design classic
- Art & Design
- October 13, 2016, 06:00
Ramones top is still a fashion staple, 40 years on, underlining the power of good design