The newly opened Irish Rock’n’Roll Museum in Dublin’s Temple Bar, which opened this week, is not the first attempt to cash in on the musical history of this little island by sticking stuff on a wall. Back in the late 1990s, the Hot Press Hall of Fame attempted to do something similar on Dublin’s Middle Abbey Street in the building which now houses The Academy venue. That venture did not go too well and the museum closed down two years later, leading to court cases between the operators and losses estimated at €1.5 million.
The new arrival on the block will undoubtedly hope to do a bit better than that. Promoted by Paddy Dunning, the man behind the Wax Museum and a rake of music ventures in Temple Bar, the museum hopes to pull in 100,000 people in the first year to experience “a fascinating and unique journey through the world of Irish rock music”.
This “journey” will take in memorabilia, artefacts, photos and assorted bits and bobs from such well known Irish acts as U2, Phil Lynott, Rory Gallagher, The Script and others. A press release also mentions some Michael Jackson ephemera, which may be a head-scratcher at first until you realise the King of Pop’s links with Dunning through his Grouse Lodge studios in Co Westmeath.
Future exhibitions at the museum will look at such areas as Irish indie bands from the 1980s and 1990s, the dance music scene, the country's colourful boy band history and women in Irish music. See irishrocknrollmuseum.com for more information.
