Former inmate slams ‘outrageous’ Nathan Carter prison gig as lags kept locked up

COUNTRY music crooner Nathan Carter belted out his version of Jailhouse Rock at Castlerea Prison.

But the charity event was no cell out as the prisoners were actually excluded from the gig.

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The ‘Nathan Carter: Locked Up’ jailhouse concert on Thursday night was billed as similar to Johnny Cash’s legendary show at Folsom Prison, which was turned into one of the icon’s most famous albums.

And as the wagon wheel comes off the vibe of the concert, a former inmate slammed it as “outrageous”.

One-time lag Mannix Flynn is angry that prisoners were kept in their cells and did not attend as Nathan played to 300 invited guests.

Mannix told The Irish Sun: “Johnny Cash would be appalled by this. This is outrageous.”

Fuming that the invitees were not at a typical prison gig, he said: “You were not, you were at a Nathan Carter show.”

The Dublin councillor, who spent over 20 years banged up in different institutions, including months in Mountjoy jail, said his heart went out to the prisoners who were barred from Nathan’s show.

Mannix said: “They would have been in their cells listening to the distant sound of a concert going on which was denied to them.

“This is an absolute breach of prisoners’ rights. The publicity around this looked like Nathan was going in to play to the prisoners. No such thing happened.

“These prisoners had their liberty taken from them for a crime they have committed. But now they have to suffer the torture of a concert being performed within earshot which you cannot attend.”

Despite the snub, Castlerea lags dug deep into their pockets and raised €600 for the event.

And Carter himself revealed he believed that inmates would be attending the show when he accepted the offer to play there.

The Wagon Wheel hitmaker said: “That’s what I thought it was going to be, but of course it’s invite-only.”

Cllr Flynn was first incarcerated at the age of 11 when he was sent to St Joseph’s industrial school in Letterfrack, Connemara.

He said his life was turned around by actors who performed in the prisons and institutions where he was an inmate.

Flynn later penned three celebrated works, The Liberty Suite (1977) Nothing to Say (1983) James X (2004) and ended up a member of Aosdána.

Mannix said: “The experience of jail is appalling and artists coming in to stage works can change the whole dynamic of your life. It did mine.”

“Rather than a small number of prisoners seeing the concert due to operational reasons, all the prisoners are seeing the concert tonight piped onto their TV’s, specially recorded for them.”

Irish Prison Service

The Carter concert in the prison church – a fundraiser for three local charities – was attended by Irish Prison Service staff and members of the community in Roscommon.

It was due to be screened on the Prisoner TV channel last night.

Singer Rory Gallagher described the prisoner ban as “bizarre”.

He recalled how his former indie band The Revs performed a concert exclusively to inmates at Mountjoy Prison in 2004 and how lags even took to the stage.

Rory told The Irish Sun: “I remember one prisoner got up on stage and sang Champagne Supernova by Oasis with us. It must have been a great night for him.

“The whole point of a prison gig is to play to inmates. And to win them over. That’s the challenge. There’s no jeopardy in playing to 300 invited guests.

“The attitude Johnny Cash had by deciding to perform in Folsom Prison was the inmates hadn’t been so lucky in life but he felt at one with them by performing to them.

“I know Nathan Carter and he’s an ‘of the people sort of guy’, and this must have been something which he was surprised with.”

Saoirse Brady, of the Irish Penal Reform Trust, was also surprised that prisoners had not been allowed to attend Nathan’s gig.

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She told The Irish Sun: “We believe this was a missed opportunity to allow some of the men in Castlerea prison to forget about the harsh reality of their everyday lives for a couple of hours.”

She added: “We can’t understand the decision to allocate staff resources to bring 300 people into a high security setting at a time when prison staff are already overstretched to the point where the prison school has had to close multiple times over the last year.”

Brady said “the hard work of prison staff” was acknowledged but added: “I’m at a loss as to why the concert couldn’t have been held at another location that would have been easier to manage from a practical point of view and still raised money for charity.”

DECISION TO PLAY

Carter told The Irish Sun during a tour of the jail this week why he agreed to play.

Nathan said: “I got chatting to a guy and he told me that he’d been in prison for five years and that my music kind of inspired him and got him through the dark times.

“Whenever I was asked to do this, I was like, yes it could be a good idea.”

The Irish Prison Service said it would have been impossible to cater for all the prisoners in the jail and at no stage did they say the lags would be attending.

A spokesperson told us: “This event was targeted at the staff of the prison. It was primarily a fundraising event which raised €6,780 for three local charities.

“That would not have been possible if we had filled it with 300 prisoners who are of limited means.

“At no point in pre-publicity did we state this was solely for the benefit of prisoners.

“We couldn’t have put 400 prisoners into the church and we wouldn’t have had Nathan Carter for a small crowd or been able to raise money.

“Rather than a small number of prisoners seeing the concert due to operational reasons, all the prisoners are seeing the concert tonight piped onto their TV’s, specially recorded for them.

“Each charity got €2,000 and the staff got a pat on the back.

“I’d stress that the skill and the talent that made the event possible was that of the prisoners. It’s not correct to say the event was of no benefit to the prisoners.”

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