We found ourselves in Berlin over the weekend. Purely research, you'll understand.

We loved every minute and left with heavy hearts and sore heads. Maybe it's because we've been there a lot and feel comfortable in our skin there, or maybe it's because we hooked up with some great Irish people who call it home, but it feels like a city that young people go to retire. In the best possible way.

Clubs that seemingly never end, bars hewn out of basements and abandoned buildings, great value, nice people, good food and healthy amounts of decadence. Oh, and we were introduced, hilariously, to the concept of a Shildo.

And through it all, we wondered if Dublin could learn any lessons. The simple one is this: Despite being the epicentre of two lost World Wars and almost utterly destroyed during both, Berlin still offers a city experience that attracts young people from all over the world. Its self-governed ethos and opportunistic people make this underground city welcoming and positively glowing in cool. It's a lifestyle we could get used to.

Berlin, wir lieben dich!

Who is not going to leave just yet? Ciaran, Michael, Kate Frances or Conor?

Under the watchful eyes of Derek Cosgrave and Ian Finnerty (and others), MIDAS (Mapped, Interactive, Digitally Augmented Spaces) began in 2011 as a way of exploring the idea of interactive and generative designs, “augmenting traditional art/design/performance through technology to create a new sphere or dialogue for performance”. This ‘technology’ is Project Mapping, which involves projecting animation/video onto a 3-D object, adjusting the image to follow the shape of that object. This Thursday, at the launch of the JDIFF, those objects could be you, projected into films from over the decades. This talented team of programmers, designers and musicians are working with cutting edge technology and ideas, communicating the idea of a “digital playground”, by bringing it into our natural landscape. Win Passes / Siobhán Kane 

As hard as it is to believe, award winning singer-songwriter Cathy Davey hasn’t played on a Dublin stage for 18 months! This gig sees her rectify that in grand style. Over the next three weeks she will play a different themed show each week. This week Cathy and her band perform songs from her albums, including the most recent, the hugely acclaimed The Nameless, and allow the audience to have a say in what they play. Next week sees her reprise the popular Fringe show Songs That Scare Children, while the final week of the residency has a Heroes theme and will see her play a selection of songs from her own personal favourite artists. Always one of our most interesting and diverse performers, these gigs will offer a truly unique experience for new and old fans alike. / Frances Winston

The more mundane, functional archeological artefacts often illuminate more of our shared history than the bling. Which makes me suspect this multimedia exhibition Bulk by Niamh Heery stands a good chance of time-capsuling definitive issues such as globalization and carbon footprints, through her capture of industrial ritual. Niamh's clever manipulation via photographic and video footage bears witness to the Odyssey undertaken by our consumables & commodities through ports, via cargo ships, and across oceans. We are invited to unravel this secret life of things appropriately so, in a disused travel agents retail site. This geek also fancies it's other highlight- The sculptural feature Juggernaut, a cargo ship scaled model built from Lego. / Elish Bul-Godly

There's something really sexy about go-getters who don't wait for official permission, people who have ideas but go one step further and grab life by the proverbials. Especially the creative ones. Listening to them and how they overcome struggle and self-doubt and blaze ahead regardless can only be inspiring. The third edition of these sharing, intimate, candlelit and musical events will no doubt be as enjoyable as the first two. Catch these pop-up events while you can. I've come away with everything from financial to nifty gardening tips, and at the very least you'll leave with a bellyful of wine and buns from the yummy Cake Cafe. None of these people think that they are special in some way, only that they pushed through the boundaries facing them. / Emily O'Callaghan

I'm not quite as young as I used to be, so these days the prospect of a 4 hour clubbing session fills me with an odd mixture of excitement and anticipatory knee pain. Still, if there's an event worth hauling my old, protesting bones out on the town for, it could be this one. Since starting as a club night in 2008, Night Slugs have rapidly turned into one of the most reliable and forward-thinking brands In UK Bass, and 2012 could be their biggest year yet, with a string of choice releases on the way, including a much buzzed about album from house-prodigy Jam City. Label founders Bok Bok and L-Vis 1990 will be helping to celebrate the first anniversary of The Twisted Pepper's monthly Juice party with a marathon back to back set this Thursday. Keep an eye out, I'll be the grumpy dude loudly protesting about his bad back. Win Tickets / Conor McDevitt

Life-ring-esque metallic balloons are arranged like spectators at a football match atop a foil structure. Standing beneath, one feels insignificant, like you do standing under the wing of an aeroplane. It's the invention of a child who preferred K'Nex to Lego. I almost wish it was in a room alone and just swallowed the space. Luckily, the accompaniments in the room are even more bizarre than the collapsing solar intricacies of Panto Collapsar...for far away the effect is crafty - all clay and papier mache, but looking closer there are some surprises, such a tired packet of Marlboro peeking from behind a plinth, a plinth standing on four olive-oil bottles (risky!) and a hunk of clay transformed into a mercurial hedgehog by virtue of its copper spikes. It is sneaky art. Wilfully misleading. And I loved  it. / Kate Frances Coleman

What better way to pass an evening than to dress up for a night as a cheerful, singing, but consumptive prostitute, and pretend Ewan MacGregor loves you? The medley of completely unoriginal but sugary love songs would even bring a tear to the eyes of a cagefighting, Tennant's drinking, Darts watching hard-nut. The real piece de resistance has to be the classic Lady Marmalade; the reason why hundreds of schoolgirls have gone to their first French lesson already having perfected that staple 'Voulez vous couchez avec moi, ce soir'. Apart from robbing the innocence of children and making us cry and generating profits for those capitalist monsters at Kleenex, Moulin Rouge is a fantastical parade of sequins and feathers, almost gauche in its extravagance but hey, extravagance is what Baz Luhrmann does best! Win Tickets / Kate Frances Coleman

Being an up and coming Country and Western lassie isn't just about collecting a band whose combined age is your age squared, raiding your high school diaries for a mine of sufficiently tragic lyric material and knowing when to say yes to tassels as well as when to say no. Zoe Muth is everything Laura Marling wants to be; genuine, uncontrived...everything she writes isn't fictional and character-based, it resonates on a deeper and less abstract level. And these qualities aren't the result of some banjo-wielding Nashville upbringing, Muth was brought up in the capital of grunge, Seattle. Muth's cultural influences are raw - her interest in Americana and folk/country stems from her interest in history and the oppressed, as reflected to a degree in all her music. Prep with Starlight Hotel and Let's Just Be Friends For Tonight. Win Tickets /Cora Burke

We Are Electronic are hosting their first event of the year in the Twisted Pepper, with Edinburgh native Neil Landstrumm headlining. Having decided to move away from djing to focus on his own live shows a decade ago, he has cultivated a long-standing reputation for satisfying the needs of fans of techno, acid, dubstep and everyone in between. On Saturday night, support comes in the form of Sunil Sharpe and Barry Redsettaz. The sense of variety is not limited to the actions of one individual however, and appears to be a theme running throughout the entire venue with each room throwing forth a different musical offering, including the always-entertaining Discotekken if you fancy something a little less bass-heavy. It looks set to be a good year for dance music in Dublin if 2012 continues as it has started. / Lucy Watts

It has been a big week for one of pop's rising stars. In the space of a few short months, and with the assistance of a very pretty video, the release of her debut album this week was being anticipated with fervent curiosity. Yet, for every doting or fawning blogger, there was an equally derisory hack ready to pounce. Why such divisiveness? For one thing, she appears unable to perform live. And that is the crux of it. To contrast Factory Floor with this soon-to-be-crowned pop princess might seem ridiculous, but here is a rare breed of band who sound immeasurably better live, than they do on record. As intense as any band you’re likely to see, it comes as a bit of a surprise to find out this is their first headline show here. This is pulsating post-industrial, electronic-dance-drone of the highest order. Win Tickets / Simon Judge

I first came across Roller Derby on a night out where myself and a friend saw some Roller Derby Girls wearing their team t-shirts. As soon as I got home, I did the necessary googling. I had no idea what to expect on my first day, having not skated since I had Barbie skates. It's more athletic than I thought, but the great thing is you build up the fitness and learn the rules in steps. Derby is so fun and supportive that you're ripping up the track in no time! I love lining up on track waiting for the whistle to blow, everyone full of anticipation! The sport can look rough - girls hitting each other and falling everywhere, but it's actually very strategic, tactical and safe. Roller Derby is the fastest growing female sport in the world and tonight is our first home bout of 2012. Come and support! / Tina Gutt-Her

Chris Judge lives in the woods and high in the mountains. He loves nothing more than relaxing at home or tending to his beautiful garden. He likes drinking tea, walking in the snow, standing in the rain, baking cakes and...writing the best damn illustrated children's books since Oliver Jeffers. Following up on the brilliant, award-winning Lonely Beast, Judge launches his next book, The Great Explorer. A famous explorer is lost in the North Pole and only one person can save him. Expect ships, hot air ballons, ice, bears, dolphins, ice bergs, hiking boots, drama, wolly hats and the aurora borealis in an action-packed illustrated wonder. For the launch, expect signed copies of the new book and tea and coffee. Hopefully no ice. / Vernon Steel

My cowboy boots got ripped during a car crash. I kicked my first boyfriend with my Doc Martens after getting him into a headlock. I spent my school-years in a pair of Dubarry's. I mitched off school in a pair of Nike TNs. I went to my first underage disco in a pair of chinese slippers. I had my first kiss in a pair of brown winklepickers. I went to my first gig in lime and pink ballet pumps. Do you have lots of shoes and lots of stories? Donate/lend a pair to Robert Ladislas Derr and the Centre for Creative Practices for his video installation In Your Shoes and fill out a 'memory card' expressing the significance of those shoes. Then he'll take that popular phrase 'walk a mile in my shoes' and inhabit it. (Maybe not a mile, though) It's audacious for sure, and I'd not envy him trying to perch in my size three stilettos! / Cora Burke

Imagine if Vatican II had never happened, and we still had to sit through a Latin mass...a Latin mass that few of us would understand...especially if we were barely literate! You'd want something to look at, wouldn't you? To ease the boredom, you'd appreciate a physical representation of the parables if you didn't know what the person at the front of the church was going on about. This is where stained glass came in. Those venerated windows in the monstrously beautiful Chartres cathedral were basically a religious comic strip, simplifying bible stories into a vernacular that transcended language. Dr Eileen Kane, an art historian from UCD, will talk about stained glass in the context of cathedrals. It is sure to be illuminating (excuse the pun) and fingers crossed that there's a slideshow of stunning glassy art. / Cora Burke

Now try saying that three times fast. Tongue-twisting title aside, MMMM (I like to sing it to that tune by The Crash Test Dummies) is an extremely assured piece of film-making from debut director Sean Durkin, with a star-making performace from Elizabeth Olsen in its lead role. Little details, like the clatter of pinecones on a roof, take on an eerie siginificance as Durkin masterfully messes with our perceptions, artfully cutting between Olsen's time in a cult under the sway of a quietly chilling John Hawkes (who seems to be cornering the market in charismatic indie villain types. See also: Winter's Bone), and the uneasy sanctuary she finds with her sister after her escape. At its heart this is a horror movie, but one that eschews the gory excesses of many recent hits for a subtle and lasting sense of unease. / Conor McDevitt

This offering from the writer of Juno is a stark warning to anyone who has ever wished they could return to the heady simplicity of their schooldays. Mavis Gary (Charlize Theron) is a 30-something ghost writer of a soon to be cancelled range of teen books, living a totally directionless life until she receives an email from her high school sweetheart announcing the birth of his baby. Deciding this is a sign that everything would be perfect if they were together, she returns to her hometown in order to win him back, despite the fact that he’s happily married. What follows is a journey of self realization, home truths and healing with the underlying message being that you can never go back. Patton Oswalt needs a special mention; excellent as the bitter former high school nerd permanently crippled by a beating from jocks. / Frances Winston

Project Arts Centre's new tiny portal of pretty things - The Grotto, is currently a shrine to radical American politics. It's a gritty, dusty shrine, with faded paisley scarves curtaining the weeny space and framing that infamous king of psychadelia...George Washington? With evocative badges that have transcended their Summer of Love origins and become cliches - 'LSD NOT LBJ' and 'Free Power' among them - we are confronted with treating the material we are presented with in a manner that is not merely appreciation of a psychedelic aesthetic but also historical. It is basically a window into the past; the incense sticks are half burned, Allen Ginsberg is due to give a talk any day soon, and Hendrix and the Beatles in their Lonely Hearts Club band outfits are giving it sufficient hippy credentials on the poster. / Mai Byrne

This exhibition creeped me out a bit, so don't go alone unless you're a big burly man who can handle a Black and Decker. The space is creepy enough, with its fake walls, and a man behind a wall talking to you, although you can't fathom where this voice is coming from...There's a freakishly translucent projection; or maybe reflection of yourself in a corner. For a second you think it's a ghost, but then you check yourself, and all is well. There's a hint of a projection on the walls, is it the grey, stormy sea? Is it the cloudy abyss a pilot squints through? And the sounds...so hazy and indecipherable. It is all a bit un-nerving. Ego is also at the forefront of the exhibition: literally. Can you walk past several mirrors decorated with fragile, glinting bulbs without checking yourself out? Take the test. / Kate Frances Coleman

Roman Polanski’s adaptation of the critically-acclaimed satire God of Carnage sticks closely to the play, resulting in a claustrophobic movie, slightly overacted, filmed almost entirely in one room with just four players, none of whom is likeable. Sounds like a nightmare, but the sharp script, well-drawn characters and top-quality cast make for an entertaining 80 minutes with plenty of laughs to break up the tension. High-flying, arrogant New Yorkers Nancy and Alan (Kate Winslet and Christopher Waltz) visit the home of highly-strung liberal Penelope (Jodie Foster) and her bluff husband Michael (John C Reilly) after the son of the first couple knocks out the teeth of the others’ boy. What begins as a civilised attempt to find a resolution quickly unravels into barbaric clashes with whiskey drinking, name-calling and puking all thrown into the mix. / Anne Hayden