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Extra.ie
5 hours ago
- Entertainment
- Extra.ie
Lord Henry Mount Charles: The reluctant earl who made ancestral home a rock 'n' roll touchstone
He might have been known as the rock 'n' roll aristocrat, but Lord Henry Mount Charles never held any airs or graces. Despite being a marquess and the owner of Slane Castle, Henry was a familiar face around the village and well-loved by those who attended his many concerts. At gig time, as 80,000 people flocked to the stately home, it was not unusual to see Henry in his panama hat and trademark single red sock mingling with the crowds. Lord Henry Mount Charles. Pic: As his family announced his death on Wednesday night after a 'long and valiant battle' with lung cancer, tributes from huge names in rock 'n' roll who had graced the stage of Slane Castle came pouring in. And it is no wonder, as Henry Vivien Pierpont Conyngham changed the face of music in Ireland and made us a country who could compete on the world stage, bringing some of the biggest names in music to Ireland, a place that many outside it had previously associated with bombings and religion. Born on May 23, 1951, in Dublin's Rotunda Hospital, Henry was the oldest son of Fredrick Coyningham, the 7th Marquess Coyningham and Eileen Wren Newsam. Lord Henry Mount Charles. Pic: RTÉ The Coyninghams were Anglo-Irish aristocrats descended from Ulster Scots heritage and Frederick was a peer. As such, Henry and his two younger brothers Patrick and Simon lived what he described as an 'upstairs, downstairs' existence, similar to many aristocratic families – the first time he dined with his parents was at the age of 12. He was then sent to Harrow public school in London before heading to university in Harvard. But the breakup of his parents' marriage had a big impact on Henry and his younger brothers, and Henry had to step up to be the lord of the manor. 'As far as I was concerned, my father was deserting his responsibilities,' he said in an RTÉ documentary. 'My mother continued to live at the castle and things sort of went on like it was before, although everything was different. I was expected at a very early age to replace my father and it felt bizarre.' Lord Henry Mountcharles with his wife Iona and daughter Tamara at Oxegen music festival in punchestown, Kildare. Pic: Arthur Carron/Collins Harvard gave Henry a huge amount of freedom. He was a child of the Sixties, he loved music and the wilder side of life. 'I will put my hand up and say I misbehaved in my first year at Harvard,' he said. 'I smoked a lot of dope and did what liberated students did in those days and I enjoyed myself.' He met his first wife, American Juliet Ann Kitson, and the pair moved to London where they had their first child Alex. Henry was working in publishing for Faber and Faber when, at the age of just 25, his father forced him to make a tough decision. Lord Henry Mount Charles. Pic: Courtesy of Slane Castle A new wealth tax being brought in by the Irish State meant Frederick was being faced with a huge bill and though rich in assets, he didn't have a huge income. The castle could either be taken over by Henry or sold. 'I really felt I had no choice,' Henry said recently. 'Even though it was, as it were, my heritage what I was born to deal with it was quite daunting.' The farm that was on the castle site was no longer viable as the family couldn't pay the wages to sustain it. Lord Henry Mount Charles. Pic: Arthur Carron/Collins Photos But Henry had a few other ideas. His parents had previously leased the castle to Hollywood to film the Rock Hudson classic Captain Lightfoot, even making a cameo appearance themselves, and this was something Henry decided to reinvigorate to gain some cash for the castle coffers. He also opened the castle up to visitors, entertaining film stars who needed privacy behind the castle walls whilst filming for movies and the occasional TV series took place in the grounds. But it was Henry's love of music that created the castle's biggest earner. First of all he opened a nightclub but then had the idea to stage a concert at Slane, something that changed everything for the castle's fortunes and for the Irish music scene. 'I decided Slane was a natural for open air rock 'n' roll the key to it was finding someone I could work with,' he said of the castle's now-famed natural amphitheatre. That 'someone' came in the form of Belfast promoter Eamonn McCann and Dublin's Denis Desmond of MCD. Thin Lizzy became the first act to play Slane in 1981, supported by a lesser-known band called U2, but though 18,000 people turned up, the show was not without its risks. Across the border in the North, the Troubles were raging and tensions were high in Meath. Lord Henry, due to his title, became a focus for the ire of some sections of republicanism. 'It was very dark,' Henry said of the time. 'There were riots in Dublin, there was a situation in front of the British Embassy.' 'I come from a complex background – I got some very unpleasant mail and I got threatening phone calls in the middle of the night. 'But I'm a child of the Sixties, I grew up on The Kinks, The Beatles and The Rolling Stones and my anthem was things like We Gotta Get Out of This Place.' Former Spice Girls singer Mel C with Lord Henry Mount Charles at Slane Castle. Pic: EamonnFarrell/ It made Henry more determined to go ahead with his plan and by the time Thin Lizzy struck their first chord, 18,000 people witnessed Slane becoming Ireland's premier rock 'n' roll venue. This cemented Henry's friendship with U2 who also recorded their hit album The Unforgettable Fire at the castle. It was a terrible irony, then, that Slane would later fall victim to a terrible fire that gutted parts of the castle. It took ten years to restore the seat to its former glory and the concerts organised by Mountcharles and various promoters paid for the refurbishment. There were turbulent concerts too – after Bob Dylan's show in the 1980s, thugs vandalised the village, causing havoc. In 1995 two concert goers died trying to swim across the River Boyne to sneak into the gig by REM and Oasis. But for the most part, the concerts put Slane – and Henry – on the map, including the Bruce Springsteen gig in 1985 – the first date on his Born in the USA tour. While his first marriage to Juliet ended in divorce in 1982, the couple had three children Alex, Henrietta and Gerald. Lord Henry Mount Charles. Pic: RTÉ He met his second wife, Iona, daughter of the 6th Earl of Verluam, on a champagne-tasting trip and they were married in 1986 and their child Tamara was born in 1991. In person, Henry was erudite and entertaining, intelligent and fun with an unassuming air about him. As an Anglo-Irish peer he was styled Viscount Slane until 1974 and then Earl of Mountcharles from 1974 until 2009 when, on the death of his father, he became The Most Hon Henry Vivien Pierpont Conyngham, 8th Marquess Conyngham. The Marquesses Conyngham held the right to sit in the British House of Lords, until 1999. He was never really a 'lord' but didn't like being called an earl, so the rock 'n' roll Lord would do. But politics and justice were also very important to him throughout his life, particularly the politics of Ireland. He unsuccessfully contested the Louth constituency for Fine Gael at the 1992 general election. He was also unsuccessful in his bid for a Seanad seat in 1997. But his interest in the subjects never waned and for many years he wrote a popular column on the subject for the Irish Daily Mirror. Lord Henry Mountcharles with Oasis band members Noel Gallagher and Gem Archer at Slane Castle. Pic: Arthur Carron/Collins Photos After a diagnosis of lung cancer in 2014, his health suffered, but Henry's entrepreneurial spirit didn't wane. He decided to open a distillery at Slane Castle with his eldest son Alex. The Slane Irish whiskey brand was sold to Brown-Forman, the company behind Jack Daniel's, which invested €50million and established a new distillery and visitor centre at the seat. He handed over the running of the castle to his eldest son Alex while he and Iona spent most of their time in Beauparc House, a smaller stately home in Navan which had been left to him by a relative. Though dogged by health problems due to his cancer in his later years, Henry very much approved of the decision to host the first series of The Traitors Ireland in Slane. It was something his son Alex said he was very pleased about as it was a return to the castle's previous life as a TV set. But sadly, one of Ireland's last aristocrats won't be around to see it screened when it airs this summer. And the country has lost a colourful character who changed the face of the entertainment business and brought some of the biggest names in the world to a tiny village in Co. Meath. 'My life has been a mixture of great good fortune and adversity,' he once said. 'I just try to see my life as a journey.'
Sydney Morning Herald
8 hours ago
- Entertainment
- Sydney Morning Herald
Words keep coming and they don't stop coming
Baby bump and Swiftie are in the dictionary, right? Um, not quite. Soon, but not yet. English evolves at warp speed now, boosted by social media's endless prose, seeing an archive like Collins barely finding time to add half-sibling or double-space, blastproof and compostable, only for newbies like warp speed and newbie to come knocking. Content creator is now a career, yet only recently made the database. Ditto for terabit (1000 gigabits) and dishwashing. Mid-strength and safe word, beach read and survivor guilt. The siege is relentless, as timezone (one word) and evote (no hyphen) clamour for inclusion. Hence my habit of loitering vestibules, those annexes linked to lexicons listing which words float in limbo, language midway between user-usage and publisher patronage. Some seem obvious, like old soul and outsiderism, slushie or reclick. Others like crickets (for a joke's silent response) or a dog's cone of shame are slang awaiting sanction. While another set is straight-out odd, like helixophile (a corkscrew collector) or hatfishing (wearing a hat in your Tinder pic.) Fusions reign, as usual. My fave is binfluencer, that neighbour who puts out their bins early, swaying everyone else's colour-coded array. Then there's sporror, a subgenre of horror writing centred around fungi, which feels too close to home. Meanwhile, exervious (a blend of excited and nervous) and todorrow (today-tomorrow) won't happen. Headlines can often summon new phrases, such as planet parade, Gulf of America and TACO: Trump Always Chickens Out. Sport can likewise keep the annex busy, the webpage receiving pine-time (minutes on the bench), scorpion kick, spoon bowl (battle for last place) and breadstick. Different from a bagel, where a player loses 0-6, a breadstick sees you go down 1-6. And yes, it can be used as a verb. Loading Sport and politics also mingle, notably in two more nominees. Gordie Howe, a Canadian great of ice-hockey, popularised 'Elbows out!' , shorthand for play hard. Since Trump's tariff splurge, the phrase has been a Canadian catchcry. Just as flood the zone – to overwhelm one part of the field with players – is now a civic ploy, where media are deliberately engulfed in so many new policies that none gain proper scrutiny. One Collins visitor adores Australian birds, insisting firetail and bronzewing find a nest. AlloyMiner, another contributor, digs South African words, from skabenga (hooligan) to moggy (irrational), zol (marijuana) and seshweshwe (printed cotton). The latter batch has enjoyed success too, as all four words were later enshrined in Oxford 's March intake.
The Age
8 hours ago
- Entertainment
- The Age
Words keep coming and they don't stop coming
Baby bump and Swiftie are in the dictionary, right? Um, not quite. Soon, but not yet. English evolves at warp speed now, boosted by social media's endless prose, seeing an archive like Collins barely finding time to add half-sibling or double-space, blastproof and compostable, only for newbies like warp speed and newbie to come knocking. Content creator is now a career, yet only recently made the database. Ditto for terabit (1000 gigabits) and dishwashing. Mid-strength and safe word, beach read and survivor guilt. The siege is relentless, as timezone (one word) and evote (no hyphen) clamour for inclusion. Hence my habit of loitering vestibules, those annexes linked to lexicons listing which words float in limbo, language midway between user-usage and publisher patronage. Some seem obvious, like old soul and outsiderism, slushie or reclick. Others like crickets (for a joke's silent response) or a dog's cone of shame are slang awaiting sanction. While another set is straight-out odd, like helixophile (a corkscrew collector) or hatfishing (wearing a hat in your Tinder pic.) Fusions reign, as usual. My fave is binfluencer, that neighbour who puts out their bins early, swaying everyone else's colour-coded array. Then there's sporror, a subgenre of horror writing centred around fungi, which feels too close to home. Meanwhile, exervious (a blend of excited and nervous) and todorrow (today-tomorrow) won't happen. Headlines can often summon new phrases, such as planet parade, Gulf of America and TACO: Trump Always Chickens Out. Sport can likewise keep the annex busy, the webpage receiving pine-time (minutes on the bench), scorpion kick, spoon bowl (battle for last place) and breadstick. Different from a bagel, where a player loses 0-6, a breadstick sees you go down 1-6. And yes, it can be used as a verb. Loading Sport and politics also mingle, notably in two more nominees. Gordie Howe, a Canadian great of ice-hockey, popularised 'Elbows out!' , shorthand for play hard. Since Trump's tariff splurge, the phrase has been a Canadian catchcry. Just as flood the zone – to overwhelm one part of the field with players – is now a civic ploy, where media are deliberately engulfed in so many new policies that none gain proper scrutiny. One Collins visitor adores Australian birds, insisting firetail and bronzewing find a nest. AlloyMiner, another contributor, digs South African words, from skabenga (hooligan) to moggy (irrational), zol (marijuana) and seshweshwe (printed cotton). The latter batch has enjoyed success too, as all four words were later enshrined in Oxford 's March intake.
Daily Record
10 hours ago
- Daily Record
Ferne McCann's acid-attacker ex Arthur Collins in jail drugs plot probe using drones
The thug has been transferred to another prison amid fears he was plotting to smuggle drugs. The twisted acid attacker attacker ex of former TOWIE star Ferne McCann has been transferred to another jail over fears he was building a drugs empire behind bars. Arthur Collins, 32, was investigated over fears he was plotting to smuggle drugs into Cat C HMP The Mount using drones. The thug was handed a 20-year jail sentence in 2017 for hurling acid inside a nightclub - leaving 16 people with chemical burns and three people temporarily blinded, reports the Mirror. Prison chiefs launched the probe over suspicions dealers were flooding the jail with drugs using drones. Concerns were raised that Collins - who shares daughter Sunday, six, with ex-partner Ferne, 34 - was the mastermind behind the plot in the Herts prison. No police investigation was carried out, but it has been revealed that Collins has been moved to a tougher jail. A source said: "Collins has been at the centre of a major internal prison investigation. There were fears drug dealers had been using drones to flood HMP The Mount with drugs. It's a huge worry that tens of thousands of pounds worth of drugs were going to make their way into the jail. "Prison bosses identified Collins as being at the heart of the operation and was the suspect they identified. They launched an investigation into that and clearly have identified concerns. The police have not been called in as it has been dealt with internally. Collins has now been moved to another prison, which is a lot stricter." Evil Collins launched his acid attack on a packed dance floor at Mangle nightclub in Dalston, East London, during an Easter weekend night out in April 2017. He had claimed he threw the substance by mistake after hearing a group of men plotting to spike a woman's drink. The court heard that he picked up a container that he thought was a date rape drug and tossed it away. However, a jury found him guilty of carrying out the acid attack that left clubbers in agony and sparked a panicked evacuation and a massive emergency response. He was convicted in court of five counts of grievous bodily harm with intent and nine of actual bodily harm. In 2018 the Court of Appeal threw out a bid to cut his jail time. Lord Justice Simon said: 'These were exceptionally serious offences, and the severe sentence was fully justified.' As Collins was jailed Ferne released a statement in which she said: "Ferne's thoughts are of course with the innocent people caught up in the events at Mangle last April. No-one should ever be faced with violence on a night out." And speaking after the sentencing, Ferne told how she visited Collins in prison and told him: "This is the last time you will see either of us. You have ruined our lives. This is what you have done. And this is what you are missing out on. You will never see us again." Ferne said: "I went to see Arthur and I took Sunday with me. This was because I am very angry about what has happened and I needed to communicate that and wanted to hear what Arthur had to say. I thought it was important that Arthur see Sunday and see exactly what his actions have led to him missing out on. "I strongly feel for the innocent people hurt that night and I in no way condone violence as I have already made clear. It was a difficult decision to take Sunday into that environment but I felt I needed to confront him about a number of things, which I have now done." After being jailed Collins has been in trouble in jail and had extra time added in 2018 for smuggling a phone into prison which he used to call his Towie ex. Inspectors in 2024 found HMP The Mount had a major issue with drugs and drones. A report said: "The prison was not able to stop the entry of drugs and weapons into the prison by drones. "Traditional security measures were no longer proving effective. The biggest concern for both inspectors and leaders at The Mount was the ingress of contraband into the jail on drones, the scale of which could not be known for certain. As well as some large packages of drugs – two kilograms of cannabis in one case – weapons had also been recently found. "I was struck by conversations I had with two experienced prisoners who told me they were frightened by the risks posed by weapons coming into the prison. Without more support from the prison service there is a danger that many of the positives we found on this inspection could be undone. "As well as reducing the supply of drugs, it is also incumbent on the leaders at The Mount to make sure that a much higher proportion of prisoners are involved in genuinely purposeful activity."
Extra.ie
18 hours ago
- Climate
- Extra.ie
Met Eireann reveal hottest areas as temperatures to reach 29C this week
Is the famous 'Leaving Cert weather' back after a delay? It looks that way as some parts of Ireland are set to be as hot as 29C this week. Met Éireann said Thursday has been the hottest day of the year so far, with temperatures reaching a scorching 27C in Co Roscommon. However, the hot weather is set to continue this week as the national weather forecaster predicts parts of the country will see temperatures of nearly 30C. Delayed Leaving Cert weather? It looks that way as some parts of Ireland are set to be as hot as 29C this week. Pic: Stephen Collins/Collins Photos Thursday night is set to be 'mild and humid' according to Met Éireann. They said: 'While most areas will remain dry, localised heavy showers may occur with the chance of isolated thunderstorms. 'Temperatures will not fall below 13 to 16 degrees in light to moderate southeast breezes.' Most people, however, will be hoping to have an early start to their weekend, Met Éireann predicting a hot and humid Friday as temperatures are set to reach a sizzling 29C 'over the northern half of the country'. Met Éireann said Thursday has been the hottest day of the year so far, with temperatures reaching a scorching 27C in Co Roscommon. Pic: Stephen Collins/Collins Photos A spokesperson said: 'Friday will be very warm or hot. Largely dry with long spells of sunshine, however a few showers may break out, with isolated thunderstorms possible. 'Some patchy mist and fog may occur also, mainly in the southwest.' They added: 'Humid with top temperatures of 21 to 28 or 29 degrees, highest values over the northern half of the country, in light to moderate southeast breezes.' However, the hot weather is set to continue this week as the national weather forecaster predicts parts of the country will see temperatures of nearly 30C. Pic: Collins However, things are set to take a turn on Saturday, with the weather becoming 'more unsettled as an Atlantic regime takes hold'. Met Éireann warn that while warm sunshine is still expected, there will also be scattered showers in parts of Ireland, some of which will be heavy and possibly even thundery. Sunday is expected to see the biggest weather change, becoming fresher and breezier with temperatures between 15C and 20C.
