All that Enda can’t leave behind

AS U2 kicked off their The Joshua Tree world tour in North America this weekend, Taoiseach and avid air guitar aficionado Enda Kenny has announced that, inspired by the band, he has decided to go Stateside again this summer for one final revisiting of past glories. Enda’s All That You Can’t Leave Behind US Tour will kick off in early June and take in several cities, but the Taoiseach is remaining coy about any further dates, or whether the tour will continue into Europe. “Enda played a few small venues in Europe recently, but there is talk he might like to go back to Europe and do some outdoor gigs over the summer,” said an industry source. It is thought Enda will perform old favourites like I Move In Mysterious Ways, Stuck In A Moment You Can’t Get Out Of, Stay (Faraway So Close) and of course Until The End of The World.

There is a huge market for so-called heritage acts around the world, with big names like Bertie Ahern still pulling crowds and big money to see them playing their old hits. In his live gigs, Ahern focuses on his early period and his work around the peace process, doing numbers like Sunday Bloody Sunday while he avoids his later period’s critically panned work like the economy. Although in more far-flung places like Africa, he reinterprets some of that material. Tony Blair has been back on the circuit recently too and has even been trying out some new material, reinventing himself as a protest singer. There have been complaints that heritage acts like Enda are making it difficult for new bands, like the inoffensive duo Simon and Varfunkel, to break through.

Meanwhile there were warnings this weekend of a cyberattack on Mr Kenny. Cyber terrorists have apparently buried some malware deep into Kenny’s software and are threatening to release ‘Endaleaks’, everything that is going on in the Taoiseach’s head, unless he pays them a substantial ransom. It is thought that the Taoiseach, who doesn’t want anyone to know what is on his mind, has paid the ransom. There is a very real fear however that there is a malfunction in the Taoiseach’s operating system which has put him into a perpetual feedback loop. For example, the Taoiseach has promised to clarify his retirement plans next week. This will be approximately the sixth time Mr Kenny has clarified his plans for stepping down. And each time it seems like he has entirely forgotten all the previous times he said he would clarify the matter. Dealing with the issue normally means that he promises to deal with the issue at a vague later date. So the situation as it stands is that Mr Kenny has said that he will say next week that he will deal with the issue at another date and that in turn will involve saying that he will clarify matters at another date, which will mean naming another date when he will outline his plans, which will involve setting another date when he will set another date.