1 THE Mary Byrne award for best female performance this year, happily, has been marked by our girls representing on the world stage.

Cheryl Cole duets with Dizzee Rascal on her new album.

Chart veteran Paul Weller will tonight take on past winner Dizzee Rascal and hotly-tipped acts such as The xx to claim the Barclaycard Mercury Prize.

DUBLIN band Villagers have been included on the shortlist for this year’s Mercury Prize.

Chart veteran Paul Weller was today shortlisted for the Mercury Music Prize for the first time in 16 years – and will battle it out with past winner Dizzee Rascal.

Gangsta rapper Snoop Dogg put Glastonbury Festival's hippie reputation behind it once and for all today with an aggressive, foul-mouthed performance which delighted revellers on the opening day of the festival.

The music begins at the 40th Glastonbury Festival today with revellers arriving in their thousands - hopeful that the forecast of a sunny and warm weekend will be spot-on.

FORMER Spice Girl Geri Halliwell is stepping in as a guest judge on The X Factor.

Dizzee Rascal wants to do a heavy metal album.

Dizzee Rascal wants to play James Bond.

Acts such as Dizzee Rascal, Scissor Sisters and The Flaming Lips are among the main acts playing this year’s Glastonbury Festival, it was announced today.

IT’S a long way from Mrs Flannery’s Folk Club in Tullamore to the Highway to Hell for Taoiseach Brian Cowen, who had teenagers around the country cringing yesterday when he tried to get down with the youth, talking music and his preference for Guns ‘N’ Roses over AC/DC.

I nurse a clandestine habit that has driven me to the coldest and darkest corners of society.

WELL, we might as well get the big question out of the way early doors.

Dizzee Rascal will shower the BRITs audience with “money” tomorrow.

The Rolling Stones will not perform at Glastonbury, it has been confirmed.

An award ceremony which celebrates black music will take place away from London tonight for the first time.

Dizzee Rascal is "amazed" by the success of 'Bonkers'.

Superstars Estelle and Leona Lewis won two gongs each at tonight’s Mobo (Music of Black Origin) Awards.

Travis lead singer Fran Healy is to visit the devastated Darfur region with his fiancee, photographer Nora Kryst, in a trip organised by Save The Children to highlight the importance of the Band Aid 20 campaign, he revealed today.

Bono has won out in the rock rivalry over who should sing the most famous line of Do They Know It’s Christmas?, it was confirmed today.

Teenager Dizzee Rascal has become the first rapper to win the prestigious Panasonic Mercury Music Prize.