Rockin' all 
over the Web 

It's only HTML, but I like it. Unfortunately, a lot of Irish bands don't seem to have much interest in the Internet, and though many of our local heroes have lots of stage presence, they've got absolutely zilch profile on the Web. Looking for rock 'n' roll on the Web is easy - just go into www.yahoo.co.uk/ Entertainment/Music and you'll find an index of sites devoted to all your favourite bands from The Verve to U2. But looking for smaller, lesser-known acts is not so easy. 

 You can pull up lots of sites devoted to Bono and the boys (and learn about obscure albums like Achtung Baby and The Joshua Tree), and you can visit endless shrines to The Corrs (you just go there for the pictures, naturally), but if you want to get the lowdown on up-and-coming Irish acts, you might have to dig a little deeper. Many Irish rock bands are still suffering from technophobia, refusing to embrace dance culture, and scared to go beyond the safe boundaries of guitar, bass and drums. 

 It's the same with communication - ask them to send you an email, and they'll say, "we don't do E, man!" Ask them for their URL, and they think you're trying to borrow their flange pedal. 

 Irish bands may have moved on from the old U2 sounds, but many are still sticking to the old reliable publicity tools like press releases and xeroxed fanzines. In their minds, the Web may be a threat to good old rock 'n' roll values, like CDs were a threat to vinyl, but they're ignoring a valuable promotional tool which could help them build up their fanbase and get known outside their immediate neighbourhood. 

 With your own Website, you've got a fanzine, press pack, record store, box office, music video channel and merchandise stall, all packed into a few megabytes of Webspace, and you can reach out and sell your product to a potentially huge audience around the world. 

 Even if some Web-head in Arkansas has never heard of you, if they like your site they might just be tempted to buy your fab new single (by email order of course) or take note of your concert dates for their next Irish holiday. 

 Last week, Creation boss Alan McGhee (the guy who signed Oasis) predicted that bands would soon be bypassing the record companies and selling their music directly on the Web, offering downloads of their latest songs, plus artwork and graphics to boot. 

 This is still a long way off, but the Web is fast becoming a popular shopping market for new CDs, and punters are increasingly getting their pop news straight from their browser. 

 Of course, having cool graphics and hot HTML is no substitute for making great music, so don't waste valuable writing rehearsal time on your Website. Bands should never do their own promotion, and they should never run their own Websites either. 

 If you're thinking of embarking on that tour of cyberspace, then you need to get people with the techie know-how. Dojo maintain homepages for artists like Sinead Lohan, Eleanor McEvoy and Leslie Dowdall, and you can check out their complete client list on www.dojo.ie. Another company, Global Music Distribution, also offer Web services to rock bands, and they can be visited on indigo.ie/gmd. The best person to run your Website is a committed fan who likes your band enough to devote valuable Webtime to homepagekeeping. Bigger artists like Sinead O'Connor, The Corrs, U2 and Ash all have unofficial Websites created by enthusiastic fans, and these often provide more information than official sites. 

 The Van Morrison Website at www.harbour.sfu.ca/hayward/van/van.html contains up-to-date news on the Belfast Cowboy, plus complete discography, song lyrics, bibliographies, reviews and interviews. There's also a glossary of terms which explains some of the more oblique references in Van's lyrics, and a full roll-call of musicians who have played with Van The Man throughout the years. 

 Indulgence is the title of Australian Lawrence Campbell's excellent site devoted to The Divine Comedy (venus.va.com.au/indulgence/index.html). Designed like a Victorian visitor's book, the site suits Neil Hannon's old-fashioned, highbrow style perfectly and poses a serious challenge to the official Website at www.thedivinecomedy.com/liberator.html. 

 While fan-based Websites tend to be completist and comprehensive, they can sometimes also verge on hagiography. Jens Polster must be Sinead Lohan's biggest German fan, and his site (www.mz.rhein-main.de/people/polster/eire/music/lohan/ lohan.htm) sings the praises of this Cork singer-songwriter, and also offers some compelling reasons to visit our little country: "The Irish are very musical people... I have always enjoyed very much going to a pub and listening to the great music." 

 A Swedish site devoted to The Corrs (hem1.passagen.se/dallton) has a suitably Abba-esque message for the sibling singers from Dundalk: "Thank you for the music". But to love someone is to know someone, and once you get past the fawning praise, you'll invariably find enough hard info to neutralise the saccharine prose. 

 A good rock Website should be fun and entertaining as well as informative - after all, you're in the business to entertain, are you not? Irish girl band B*Witched, who recently topped the British charts with their debut single, C'Est La Vie, have a candycoated site designed to catch the eye of surfing pop kids. Visit www.b-witched.com/b-witched/main.htm and enter the world of Edele, Keavy, Lindsay and Sinead. It'll take you about five minutes to get around the site - perfect for those short attention spans. 

 Cork band Nine Wassies From Bainne are a pretty kooky lot, and their Website at www.dojo.ie/9wassies lives up to their image as acid-fried gaelgeoirí. It's designed as a fictional local newspaper, The Knock Bonya Express, whose features include a hot debate between Irish language revivalists and "Cromwell-loving sleveens", plus an adult-only "bovine line" where you can dial such hot numbers as "3 heifers in a bed" or "hear me moo". There's also news of The Wassies' gigs and record releases, but that's just a sidebar to the big story about late milk deliveries to Knock Bonya. 

 More serious fare can be found at The Plague Monkeys' site (www.dojo.ie/plague), but alas, there's only one short page of text, with a wallpaper-style background. The Little Sister Sage site at www.littlesistersage.com/index.html is more fan-friendly, containing possibly more than we'll ever need to know about this Dublin band. 

 Kilkenny band Kaydee's site (www.kaydee-music.com) has some nicely-designed backgrounds, but the planet/outer space theme on their index page looks a little out of place. 

 Northern Irish band Pitchshifter have taken this whole Web idea one step beyond, naming their album, www.pitchshifter.com, after their URL. The site has some pretty advanced graphics, and offers you free downloads for your desktop, but it comes across as a bit too smart for its own good. 

 For a complete database of Irish rock sites, go to the Irish Music Box at www.dojo.ie/ musicbox/imd, which contains analphabetical index of almost every Irish band on the Web. You can also find Irish and UK indie bands on The Wonderwall at www.beat.co.uk/beat/wonderwall.html and on The Knowledge at www.theknowledge.com/index.htm. If you've tried every directory and search engine and still can't find your local heroes, then maybe they're just not hip to HTML. You're never too old to play the guitar, but if you don't strut your stuff on the Web, then you might soon be rock 'n' roll history.