THE SONG IS NEARLY OVER
Music Stories 1985-2025
Stuart Bailie is an NME veteran, a music journalist and author from Belfast. He has rolled with Tom Waits and Shane MacGowan. He has encountered Nina Simone, Björk, Sinéad O’Connor and Dave Grohl. This is his collection of stories and original articles – 40 years of insights and shenanigans, a record of fast times in popular culture.
He charts the rise of Radiohead and messy times with Oasis. There is road fever with Primal Scream and U2. The Manic Street Preachers suffer pain and achieve transcendence. Stuart documents a passing era of access and friction, critique and acclaim. The Song is Nearly Over is a requiem and an action replay.
“Bailie writes with tremendous skill and authority” - The Quietus.
‘You need a f**king slapping’ - Paul Weller
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Stuart Bailie is a music writer and author, based in Belfast. He has been a music industry professional for 40 years, writing for NME, Mojo, Uncut, Q, Vox, The Irish Times, Hot Press and Classic Rock. His books include Trouble Songs: Music and Conflict in Northern Ireland (2018), Terri Hooley: Seventy-Five Revolutions (2023), 75 Van Songs (2020) and The Ballad of the Thin Man: The Authorised Biography of Phil Lynott and Thin Lizzy (1997). He wrote and narrated a BBC TV history of music from Northern Ireland, So Hard to Beat (2007). He is a co-founder the Oh Yeah Music Centre in Belfast and was its CEO from 2008-16. He edits Dig With It, a forum for music, arts and counterculture in the north.
