Event Guide: Tyler, the Creator; The Cat Laughs; and the other best things to do in Ireland this week
Event of the week
Tyler, the Creator
Saturday and Sunday, May 24th & May 25th, 3Arena, Dublin, 6.30pm, €130.80/€105.50 (sold out),
ticketmaster.ie
One of the most influential figures in alternative hip-hop of the past 15 years, Tyler, the Creator – the name is derived from a long-since deleted MySpace page – was seen, in his provocative early years, as a threat to public order and the public interest: in 2015, Theresa May, as UK home secretary, banned him from entering Britain for up to five years; lyrics on his album Bastard, from 2009, were cited as the cause. By then he had already been nominated for a Grammy; now he's a double winner, for his albums Igor and Call Me If You Get Lost. These two sold-out shows will feature up to 40 songs from his extensive back catalogue, including a chunk of tracks from his latest album, Chromakopia. Special guests include the US hip-hop acts Lil Yachty and Paris Texas.
Gigs
Scissor Sisters
Tuesday, May 27th, SSE Arena, Belfast, 6.30pm, £98/£56.50; Wednesday, May 28th, 3Arena, Dublin, 6.30pm, €96.25/€70.70/€54.85,
ticketmaster.ie
Scissor Sisters. Photograph: Kevin Tachman
They were the good-time band of the 2000s, flexing their pecs as they belted out an anarchic mix of disco, glam rock and electroclash. Returning after an extended hiatus (and without two of their original members, their singer Ana Matronic and their drummer Paddy Boom), the group now features Jake Shears, Scott Hoffman and Del Marquis Gruen. This concert marks 20th (ish) birthdays of their self-titled debut album and its follow-up, Ta-Dah, from 2004 and 2006.
Remembering Christy Dignam
Thursday, May 29th, Vicar Street, Dublin, 7.30pm, €44, ticketmaster.ie
Last year's inaugural concert to celebrate the memory and the music of
Christy Dignam
,
Aslan
's original frontman, who died on June 13th, 2023, was so successful that a sequel was inevitable. Guests for the second outing add up to a who's who of Irish performers, including Mundy, Steve Wall, Tom Dunne, The 4 of Us, Shobsy, Brian McFadden, George Murphy and Kiera Dignam. The cohosts are the comedians Eric Lalor and Enya Martin.
Villagers
Thursday, May 29th, Helix, Dublin, 7pm, €46, ticketmaster.ie
Villagers, from Tony Clayton-Lea for The Guide, Saturday, May 24, 2025.
In April 2015 Conor O'Brien and his musical project
Villagers
released their third album,
Darling Arithmetic
. It was actually one of his solo endeavours, O'Brien playing every instrument on songs that pointedly addressed topics of the heart and mind. It was no surprise when the album went on to win the best-album gong at the Ivor Novello Awards in 2016. O'Brien will play Darling Arithmetic in its entirety, then complete the evening with a selection of songs from his other five (equally acclaimed) studio albums.
READ MORE
Spoken word
Every Blooming Thing: A Spoken Word Roadshow
Thursday, May 29th, Droichead Arts Centre, Drogheda, Co Louth, 8pm, €18,
droichead.com
; Friday, May 30th, Riverbank Arts Centre, Kildare, 8pm, €18,
riverbank.ie
Erin Fornoff
The poets Colm Keegan and Erin Fornoff are touring Ireland to celebrate life's ordinary pleasures. With a title inspired by three words from Patrick Kavanagh's Inniskeen Road: July Evening – 'A road, a mile of kingdom, I am king of banks and stones and every blooming thing' – each show will feature a local writer or poet (selected from a preshow workshop) and a guest musician. Also Thursday, June 5th, Ramor Arts Centre, Virginia, Co Cavan,
ramorartscentre.com
; Friday, June 6th, Backstage Theatre, Longford,
backstage.ie
; Saturday, June 7th, Roscommon Arts Centre,
roscommonartscentre.ie
.
Manuscript art
Words on the Wave: Ireland and St Gallen in Early Medieval Europe
From Friday, May 30th, until Friday, October 24th, National Museum of Ireland, Kildare Street, Dublin, free,
museum.ie
Metal, stone and manuscript art from Ireland's golden age form the basis of a unique exhibition of early medieval artefacts from the Abbey of St Gallen, in Switzerland. Alongside them are more than 100 objects from the National Museum's collection. The exhibition includes fragments of the earliest surviving copy of Isidore's Etymologiae, which was written by an Irish scribe in the seventh century and later transported to St Gallen.
Opera
Blackwater Valley Opera Festival
From Monday, May 26th, until Monday, June 2nd, Lismore, Co Waterford, various venues, times and prices,
blackwatervalleyopera.ie
For the first time in its 15-year history, Blackwater Valley Opera Festival presents two full opera productions: Henry Purcell's Dido and Aeneas (Tuesday, May 27th, and Thursday, May 29th, St Carthage's Cathedral, Lismore) and Benjamin Britten's A Midsummer Night's Dream (Wednesday, May 28th; Friday, May 30th; and Sunday, June 1st, Lismore Castle). The festival also features live performances in neighbouring towns and countries, including Castlemartyr, Cappoquin, Dungarvan, Stradbally and Youghal.
Comedy
The Cat Laughs
Monday, May 26th, Derry, various venues, times and prices; Tuesday and Wednesday, May 27th and 28th, Castlebar, Co Mayo, various venues, times and prices; Friday-Monday, May 30th-June 2nd, Kilkenny, various venues, times and prices, ticketmaster.ie
A multitude of mostly Irish comedians perform around the island this week and into next weekend's bank holiday with a series of solo and collaborative shows in Derry, Castlebar and Kilkenny, the original home of the long-running comedy festival. High-profile names, including Deirdre O'Kane, Rich Hall, Jason Byrne, Barry Murphy, Kyla Cobbler, Alison Spittle, Colm O'Regan and Colin Murphy, will mix it up with emerging comics, including Amy Gledhill, Shane Todd and Ali Woods.
Still running
Open Ear Festival
Thursday-Sunday, May 29th-June 1st, Sherkin Island, Co Cork, various prices and times,
openear.ie
Little O
Sherkin Island's camping-only Open Ear Festival returns for three days and nights of music, connection and small-event intimacy. A broad range of music acts and DJs feature across the weekend, including I Dreamed a Dream, Elaine Malone, Róis, Brìghde Chaimbeul, Little O, No Place Like Drone and Sunil Sharpe.
Book it this week
Masters of Tradition Festival, Bantry, Co Cork, August 20th-24th,
westcorkmusic.ie
Michael Rother, Button Factory, Dublin, September 19th, ticketmaster.ie
Baxter Dury, Vicar Street, Dublin, November 12th, ticketmaster.ie
Lorde, RDS Simmonscourt, Dublin, November 22nd, ticketmaster.ie
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How Henry Mount Charles brought Dylan, Springsteen and The Rolling Stones to a former rock'n'roll backwater
When Henry Mount Charles , who died on June 18th at the age of 74, first reframed his ancestral home of Slane Castle as a signature rock venue in 1981, it must have been more in hope than expectation. Ireland was then a rock'n'roll backwater rarely included on the touring schedule of the big international acts of the day, as it had a severe shortage of decent-sized venues. The backdrop of violence and the hunger strikes in the North did not help, but the Republic had succeeded in making itself a dispiriting place on its own. Fintan O'Toole, in his book We Don't Know Ourselves , outlined the grim picture. 'The number of unemployed people had doubled over the course of the 1970s. Mass emigration was back. There was a balance of payments crisis and government debt was out of control ... The whole project of making Ireland a normal Western European country was in deep trouble.' Yet there must have been some optimism in the music business, as in 1981 Slane had to compete with music festivals in Macroom, Co Cork, Ballisodare, Co Sligo, Castlebar, Co Mayo, and Lisdoonvarna, Co Clare. Most of those events were headlined by Irish acts, however – as indeed was Slane. Thin Lizzy were nearing the end of their career at the top, but supporting them that day in August was a four-piece on the rise from Dublin: U2 . READ MORE Although only about 25,000 people attended the first Slane concert, its success paved the way for future events and for Henry Mount Charles' emergence as a public figure of note. Slane's natural amphitheatre could safely accommodate numbers much greater than the modest first event. In addition, it was near Dublin and could be reached by bus or car in a relatively short time. [ Henry Mount Charles: A Lord in Slane – The strange blend of fact and fiction around one of the last Anglo-Irish eccentrics Opens in new window ] Rock music is a business. The bigger the audience, the easier it is to attract leading acts. Pay them the money and they will come. And so it proved, with the likes of The Rolling Stones , Bob Dylan and Bruce Springsteen happy to park their caravans down by the Boyne. Springsteen's concert in front of an estimated 65,000 fans marked an important shift in his career: it was the first time he and the E Street Band played in front of a stadium-sized outdoor audience. It would be the first of many lucrative concerts. As the profile of Slane grew, Mount Charles lapped it up. Although concerts were generally partnerships with the likes of MCD Productions and Aiken Promotions , Henry was the public face of the event. He was no less a performer than those artists he welcomed to Slane. Concert days were celebrated in high style with the great and the good in the castle. [ Foo Fighters, Oasis, U2, the Rolling Stones and more: Slane's 15 greatest acts – in reverse order Opens in new window ] He was keenly aware of the value of good publicity and no slouch when in search of it. The money generated by the concerts was a windfall of sorts, but, crucially, it allowed him to underpin the finances of the castle and its grounds, developing other projects, such as the Slane whiskey brand , and helping to provide the resources to overcome setbacks such as the fire of 1991. Although a very public personality, the young Henry Mount Charles – he was in his early 30s in 1981 – was good and genial company, interested in the world beyond his castle walls and indeed beyond his elite social milieu. Embracing the rock'n'roll world afforded him the opportunity to experience the thrill of meeting great artists and celebrities while banking enough to retain and maintain his beloved Slane Castle for future generations. That concert idea was good fortune indeed. Joe Breen wrote about rock music for The Irish Times from the mid-1970s to the mid-1980s
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