As Cork gears up for a feast of music over the next few days, Ed Power spent the weekend in Lismore with some of the stars to get a taste of what’s in store for Leeside

ALEC Ounsworth likes not being famous. For a few scary months in 2005 he was on the cusp of something akin to celebrity (the indie rock equivalent at least). The experience did not agree with him very much.

It’s not every gig you almost get flattened by the lead singer, but this wasn’t every gig, and The National’s Matt Berninger is not every singer.

Now that Cincinnati’s finest have taken their lovely, gloomy love stories and hitched them to even catchier tunes like last night’s Marquee set opener, ‘Don’t Swallow the Cap’, the buzz is even better than ever.

AARON Dessner chuckles ruefully as conversation turns to ‘Beyoncé-gate’.

Ed Power looks at the highs and lows of a mixed year in music

MUSIC NEWS: It’s become as regular as Christmas, so start your Facebook campaign to keep the X Factor winner off the seasonal number one slot.

“Sorrow found me when I was young, Sorrow waited, sorrow won.”