NEWPORT'S Riverfront arts venue continues its run of fine acoustic music with an appearance by this band - Clayhill - on Wednesday, February 16. Sounding like a mix of folk and croaky Rod Stewart, Clayhill are rustic, soulful, bittersweet and can also
AM AYRES was a household name in the late 1970s and early 1980s and 2005 marks 30 years since she first appeared on TV's Opportunity Knocks. To celebrate this anniversary, she is embarking on a grand tour of Great Britain and Ireland. The tour includes
WEIRD - that is the way Ian Gough describes his call-up to the Wales 22 for tomorrow's Six Nations Championship clash against Italy. He doesn't mean his actual selection back on the bench after a gap of three years, more the circumstances surrounding
NEWPORT County are set to finally get their hands on Chester City striker Cortez Belle after months of speculation. The former Merthyr target man, who was at County as a youngster but spent most of his early years playing for the YMCA, has been linked
STARRING Nicholas Lyndhurst, written by Oscar-winning playwright Ronald Harwood and directed by Royal Shakespeare Company founder Peter Hall, The Dresser has an impeccable pedigree. It plays at Cardiff's New Theatre from this Monday until Saturday. In
WEIRD - that is the way Ian Gough describes his call-up to the Wales 22 for tomorrow's Six Nations Championship clash against Italy. He doesn't mean his actual selection back on the bench after a gap of three years, more the circumstances surrounding
BEWARE the Italian pack, Tony Ward, the Ireland legend and prominent media man, warns Wales going into tomorrow's Six Nations clash against Italy in Rome. Ward witnessed the battling Italian performance at first hand last week when title favourites Ireland
MARTINI Henry Rifles have been thrown out of strip joints for touching up the ladies and hailed as the saviours of Welsh rock. They are everything a bad-ass rock'n'roll band should be: fearsome, dangerous to know, and wildly talented. It's been a long
BACK in the sixties a young Oxford graduate hit on the bright idea of filling a picturesque country town full of bookshops. Today, Hay-on-Wye, a beautiful little market town nestled between hills on the Welsh/English border, is internationally famous,
THE award-winning Warsaw Village Band is set to raise funds for the Maindee festival next week. Their music is a mix of Polish folk and contemporary dance rhythms, and is truly infectious. "Warsaw Village Band is a result of response against narrow-mindedness
WALES youth supremo Brian Flynn believes this week was an excellent one for Welsh football, despite his Under-21 side suffering a heavy defeat. Flynn's side were beaten 4-0 by Germany in a World Cup qualifier in Wrexham, but the senior side enjoyed better
GWENT student Megan York has dreamed of playing rugby for her country since she was five. Next week the 17-year-old from Pontypool gets her second cap when she flies out to Canada with the under-19s squad. "I'm thrilled to bits, and I feel really confident
SPIRITS were high as a sea of red shirts descended on Car-diff International Airport yesterday for the Six Nations Italian rugby airlift. And amid the rugby shirts, scarves, weird and wonderful hats and plastic daffodils making the trip to Rome were hundreds
THE father of a Newport teenager who died after a hit and run crash last night slammed the six-year jail sentence imposed on the driver who caused his son's death. Paul Snelgrove, 41, a printer of Brynglas Road, Newport, whose son Carl, 19, died after
A CHARITY boss from Newport has just returned from India after handing out much-needed supplies to victims of the Asian tsunami, paid for by local donations. Retired businessman Ron Prosser, who is the chairman of the christian charity Health Help International
John Griffiths, AM for Newport East, a long-standing republican, said: "It shouldn't be a public holiday and recent events show that Charles has enough landlord and business interests to fund the wedding himself. "The event will leave me cold but he should
THE number of drivers using Newport's historic Transporter Bridge has nosedived since the Southern Distributor Road was opened. Before the new road bridge started taking traffic across the Usk, the Transporter Bridge was used by an average of 2,670 vehicles
BEWARE the Italian pack, Tony Ward, the Ireland legend and prominent media man, warns Wales going into tomorrow's Six Nations clash against Italy in Rome. Ward witnessed the battling Italian performance at first hand last week when title favourites Ireland
WALES youth supremo Brian Flynn believes this week was an excellent one for Welsh football, despite his Under-21 side suffering a heavy defeat. Flynn's side were beaten 4-0 by Germany in a World Cup qualifier in Wrexham, but the senior side enjoyed better
THE number of drivers using Newport's historic Transporter Bridge has nosedived since the Southern Distributor Road was opened. Before the new road bridge started taking traffic across the Usk, the Transporter Bridge was used by an average of 2,670 vehicles
CHOOSE life? Forget the big TV, travel insurance and ungrateful kids. Life is lying in a bed for 28 years, unable to move, whistling for your nephew to come and prop you up so you can poke at a page with a pen in your mouth. At least, that's the true-life
A RAINY day in Blaenavon may not be ideal for Sunday lunch. But with an advertised price tag of £8.75 for five courses, my aged but spritely parent -- always a man with an eye for a bargain -- and I decided to investigate The Arundel. We got off to a
AFRICAN Soul Rebels are a melting-pot of crunching heavy metal power chords, throat-shredding vocals and mind-melting electronic beats. Their new single is a cover of The Clash's Rock El Casbah, which, dare one say it, sounds better than the original.
SPRING is almost upon us and at the National Museum & Gallery, Cardiff, you can learn all about the wildlife that you might find living in and around a riverbank near your home. From 12-21 February, find out which creatures you are most likely to
RENOWNED Irish choral group Anna -- the original voices of Riverdance -- bring their haunting sound to The Riverfront in Newport next month on the only Welsh date of their 2005 World Tour. Dublin-born composer Michael McGlynn founded the group in 1987
I TOLD you last week, my next world title defence might be in Belfast and now we know the opponent, Belfast's own Brian Magee. Magee may not be one of the best known fighters in the world, but he is a good fighter, a former IBO world super-featherweight
MEN and women rarely agree on what makes a romantic date. While heart-shaped chocolates and Valentine's kitsch often send both sexes running, spending the most romantic weekend of the year at Rodney Parade isn't always ideal either. But with a little
A NEWPORT cancer sufferer whose operation was cancelled three times has finally had the vital surgery. Sandra Lowe underwent the major operation to remove her oesophagus yesterday - more than three weeks after it was first due to take place. As we revealed
PARENTS and pupils are on song in their bid to save a small community school from closure. Campaigners fighting to save Ponthir Primary School have recorded a CD of songs which they plan to sell to raise money for their closure-threatened school. The
THE Prince of Wales announced yesterday that he will marry Camilla Parker Bowles on April 8 at Windsor Castle. We asked people across Gwent what they thought and there was a mixed reaction. Dorothy LOWE, 74, of Newport, said: "I don't think it will make
DELIGHTED Gwent villagers can breathe a sigh of relief now that a new road has transformed their community. The people of Cwm fought for decades for a bypass for their village now their prayers have finally been answered. The £21 million Cwm Relief Road
