INTERVIEWS, ETC.
Since Sept.3rd '98  people have been here!
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CORK was ROCKIN'!!!!
Yes, indeed. Sunday August 30th saw the final Beat On The Street hit the Carrigrohane Straight in Cork...and MY , was it busy!!! On arrival, we were presented with our cool little backstage passes---the fact that I was in possession of a card with " Access All Areas" written on it was enough to put me on a high for the entire evening!!! People had traveled from all over the country to be there--hordes of Dublin people, of course us Galway girls, and MANY more!! Bryan from IOU
(now known as WESTLIFE ) was talking to girls at the side wall, 2fm people were walking around the spacious back stage area. The crowd was beginning to build up, and everyone was in a really happy mood, helped by the sunny evening we had! The long awaited final concert of the Summer was about to take place.
As 8 o'clock drew nearer, buses, cars and vans carrying Dj's, 50 + dancers, and of course, the bands pulled into the backstage area. So before the concert even began, we had talked with (and thanked) Shane O Donoghue for prizes that I had won 6 weeks back. We had met IOU's Tour manager, as Cilla Black would say,the "lovely Graham", and he agreed to let us have IOU to ourselves for a few minutes for the interview. So, before the music even bagan, we had our first interview of the night under our belts!
CLick to the left to read it!!
At 8 we rushed to front stage to watch the magical beginning, which was followed very quickly by
Men 2 B
performance of two songs, including "Love Sensation", their current single. Farrad had a broken leg, and a good friend of theirs, Ian Colgan (he used to be in the group FRENDZ) took Farrads dancing parts, and it worked well.
This was quickly followed by a number of dances, and then 2fm dj's took to the stage. Meanwhile,we had the pleasure of interviewing Mark, Lee, and Farrad (collectively known as
Men 2 B )
Before long, we were treated to 2 songs from
Inutopia
on stage, their previous singles " Like Only Lovers Do" and " Like A Prayer". They are the only male act to do a cover of a Madonna song. Ian was on the keyboards, and Mark did the singing. They were followed by dancers, and more Dj's, and backstage we were all having a water fight!!! It was
IOU
who started it--once they got their hands on the huge water guns that were backstage, and the drinking water tap, they were spraying everyone!! There was no stopping them!! Especially Bryan and Nicky!! I managed to persuede Bryan to give me his water gun for a minute, and reluctantly he did!! Well, after that I chased him with it, and managed to get him a bit wet, even though all the water was almost gone. Then, the scaredy cat, went and hid in the IOU tour bus!! I wasn't going to wait around for ever, so I ended up giving the water gun to one of the young dancers!! Unfortunatly this meant when Bryan finally came back out of hiding, I had no weapon, and he had no toy anymore, so he went off in search of another water gun!!!
We interivewed
Inutopia
,
(once we were a bit dryer!), and we happened to be outside IOU's tour bus. I hadn't noticed it until afterwards when I was told, but the lads were changing inside!(No wonder Marie was a bit distracted!) (Sorry Maz!) Once again we got chatting with IOU, (Nicky this time), and I asked him if he made a consious effort to look like Ronan Keating! He said no, but admitted that Ronan was his idol. The he did a brilliant impression of Ronan for us!!!(it went on about being credible, how they've matured, and of course, finished with " God bless"!) Then Nicky called Bryan over to do his impression of Nick Carter from the Backstreet Boys for us (another fantastic effort!!) Then it was time to watch
N.V.
on stage. They sang their 2 hits, " Scream" and " Young, Free, and Single". Not to long after they had left the stage was it filled by the 3 Sligo Guys, and 2 Dubliners (That would be IOU) who sang 2 songs, one fast, one slow, bridged with an accapella of Garth Brook's " If Tommorow Never Comes". They were great and proved that yes indeed they are worth all the hype they've been getting!!! Afterwards, we got into conversation with some D.j.'s: Damien Mc Caul(now he has a new job-on Kids t.v. show Den 2 and is doing fantastically brilliantly!) We were chatting to Shane O Donoghue again, and to "Ken Wood" (in the mix with Ben Dix)(He does the mixing of records on Tony Fentons 3-5 live show, and he was trying to get Marie to go up on stage and mix with him!). We got our photos with Michael Cahill (who incidentally wouldn't believe when I toldhim I loved his show--he woldn't believe I'm ever up at 6 am!). We met Dusty Rhodes, who complimented this very website (Thanks!)(as did Shane O Donoghue, thanks there too!).
This is a group photo of the Dj's and me in the middle!!!!(actually from the 1997 Beat on the Street!!
It was then time for the
Carter Twins
to go on stage, and they sang 2 songs, finishing off with their latest hit " Ooh, laa laa laa, Lets Go Dancing". The crowd went wild! Finally then we got the chance to interview
N.V.
Sadly the night was almost over, and much to the relief of the organisers,
T-Spoon
had finally arrived, just before they had to go on stage. This was what everyone had been waiting for--the people in the crowd, and all those backstage as well!!Everyone was asking for autographs--we even saw Nicky Beaming when he came back cherishing a piece of paper one of the T-Spoon girls had signed! The lads from all the bands were drooling over the 2 girls in T-Spoon, and their Sparkly Outfits. T-Spoon sang 2 songs beofre Tony Fenton came on stage and presented them with a platinum disc to represent sales of their Huge single, " Sex On The Beach" in Ireland. They called him back on stage (Or at least they called someone called " Tony BENNETT" back on the stage, to give him a big hug. Sniggers from around me soon turned into words of praise from all the bands who were mesmerised by this band( or was it just the skimpy sparkling belly tops lads?) Before T-Spoon were finished, all the dancers, bands, and D.j's had to gather at the back of the stage, ready to go on for the finale, in which they danced to 3 songs, finishing with the Friends Theme " I'll Be There For You", during which certain members of IOU , MEN 2B, and N.v. stripped themselves of their T-shirts and threw them into the crowd! The final song of the night, like last year, was " Time To Say Goodbye" and as the bands and dancers came off the stage they all disapeared into their buses, vans or cars, and sped off to the Silver Springs Hotel for the After Show party!! So that was it for another year. By 11.30, all that was left was a field full of rubbish and sweet papers, a traffic jam 3 miles long , and over 40,000 smiling faces with ringing in their ears! The Beat said goodbye for the final time this year, but watch out for the 1999 Beats--
which have promised to be even better!!
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