HWCH #1 – The Bands

State and Analogue have already done pretty good write-ups of the various different bands they saw over the weekend so I’m going to try and keep this pretty brief.

I Don’t See What The Fuss Is All About

Over a week since the gig, but I’m only catching up on my blogging now, so I turn my attention to Crystal Castles. Obviously, Jim Carroll, Nialler and Una have written about the Dublin gig already and to be honest my experience was pretty similar. But I went to the gig with almost total ignorance. I had listened to their stuff on MySpace and remember thinking it wasn’t too bad but it didn’t stick in my head. I hadn’t even planned on going to the gig until a few hours before when Mechnoid rang me.

Like the Dublin gig, a huge part of the audience at Cyprus Avenue was made up of painfully young, painfully hip, painfully hair-styled teenagers, replete with aggressively asymmetrical fringes and sleeves of glowsticks. Having something of a distaste for large crowds of people (not in a phobic/hyper-ventalating/the-walls-are-closing-in sort of way; more of a you-people-are-annoying-the-fuck-out-of-me/stop-acting-like-idiots kind of way), the crowd of indie-chic teens didn’t bode well.

But I soldiered on.

Yay, gigs!

Y’know, considering the name of the blog is Stereotyping, I haven’t really been writing about music much lately.

There are a good couple of gigs coming up in the next few weeks and months that I really want to go to. Not sure if I’m going to make it to all of them but dammit! I’m gonna try!

- Ham Sandwich are supporting Sultans of Ping on Saturday in Cyprus Avenue. I haven’t managed to see the Meteor winners yet and to be honest I’ve heard very little of their music. Unfortunately, I don’t think I could be arsed paying 18.50 to see them seeing as I doubt I’ll stay around for the Sultans afterwards. LUCKILY, they’re playing a solo gig five days later on the 13th for 8euro in Cyprus! Sorted!

- The UCC Live Music Societies Battle of the Bands final is on the 12th, again in Cyprus Avenue (they’re doing well for themselves this month!). I was the head of the LMS last year and I know how stressful the Battle of the Bands can be but I always enjoyed the final – the atmosphere is great, the bands are usually very good and it always seems the bands that make it to the final go on to thrive in the music scene in the city so it’s good to see them starting off.

Song Of The Day

I cannot get this song out of my head today. So I’m spreading the happiness! Still, there are many many worse songs I could have stuck in there I suppose, so I guess I’m lucky!

Hooray For Humans in Cyprus Avenue tonight!

(This post is a bit late now, seeing as the gig kicks off in, like, 30 minutes, but whatevs!)

Hooray For Humans kicked off their national tour last night in Galway and tonight, they’re playing their first headlining gig in their hometown of Cork tonight. The gig is at Cyprus Avenue with Alps (of New South Wales) (or is that simply Alps Of New South Wales? StereoTyping has seen it written both ways in the last week.) and Cork trio, Elk. Tickets are €10 on the door. They play two more dates after that. Here are the details:

Dublin - Saturday, August 11 @ Eamonn Doran’s w/ Alps of New South Wales

Limerick – Sunday, August 12 @ Baker w/ Alps of New South Wales

 

In case you haven’t heard of them, Hooray For Humans are one of the catchiest and most exciting acts to come from Cork in a little while. Formed from the ashes of several other Cork bands (as so many good groups are) such as hardcore/technical-metal outfit My Remorse, as well as Waiting Room, ‘Humans have been getting a lot of attention in the 10 or so months they’ve been together. Even though they have yet to release an EP or album, they’ve been marked out by HotPress as one of the bands to watch out for in 2007, as well as winning the “Best New Act” in the Cork Independent Reader’s Poll. Hype like this doesn’t always bode well for a band, but the band’s material to date has but fueled people’s excitement. With a catchy, melodius electro-rock pop sound that was described in a text I received today, from who I assume was Alan (I didn’t recognise the number), as “love-metal/gaycore”, Hooray for Humans have brought a refreshing sound to a city that seems to overflow with metal and post-rock bands. The band have just finished up in the studio, recording their debut album with Ross O’Donovan (Cars In Walls, Waiting Room, Sideproject) and will be released by Out On A Limb later this year.

I’d love to write about Elk, becuase they’re really nice guys, but I’ve run out of time! Seperate entry on them another time. Check them out here though!

I don’t know diddly-squat about Alps (of New South Wales) but this is his myspace. Sounds good.

Afro

The River of Shadows

After failing to go to Mitchelstown, I decided to go down to Annascaul – a village outside Dingle, home of Tom Crean (the Arctic explorer) – with the girlfriend to see our friends in Sideproject play at the River of Shadows rock “festival.” The fact that ROS and Oxegen can both be called festivals hints that there might be something wrong with the English language. This wasn’t a festival, it was a gig. In a cow shed. Well…it used to be a cow shed, now it’s an “exhibition centre”, but big windows and white paint does not necessarily make an exhibition centre. The place still had the acoustics of a cow shed – sound bouncing off the hard walls, the hard ground and the hard ceiling making an ugly, echo-ey, muddy sound. So, while most of the bands were good, they didn’t always sound like it, unless you sat out on the grass. The only festival-like incident was the catering van getting stuck in the mud.

   The “Exhibition Centre”

   The inside of the cowshed

First band up were some run-of-the-mill teen metal band, with the clichéd chugging riffs and throaty growl of teen angst. Luckily, my compatriots and I were down in the pub, so I didn’t have to listen to them.
Next up – Eskemo Joe (Yes, that’s how it’s spelled!). A cover band, playing the songs exactly how they sound. Pleased the still-small crowd, but I was a bit bored. Good musicians and a very good frontman and their last song – an original – hinted at good possibilities. More writing, less covering is what this doctor orders.

    Eskemo Joe

After that, my friends, Sideproject. No point in denying I’m biased, I though they played their post-rock very well, but were let down by the poor sound and a sudden burst of sunshine which drew the crowd outside.

    Sideproject

    Mike from Sideproject

Following up were Vesta Varro. Mediocre, melodic indie. Not neccesarily bad, but nothing original or all that well written. Super Jiminez, who were up next, were far more enjoyable. Again, nothing massively original, but the tight, catchy and melodic songwriting was really enjoyable.

   Vesta Varro 

   Super Jiminez

Headlining, at the end of the night were Delorentos. Even though their soundcheck took ages, but their set was very tight and had the entire crowd (who were by now, well sauced) moving their feet. I couldn’t stop singing their songs for the rest of the night. (My photos of them came out shit, so here’s one from somewhere else!)

   Delorentos

Over all, it was a good day and the bands were all of a reasonably high-standard, but the organisation of the gig as a whole was a bit shit. They should have either used a different venue, or soundproofed the cowshed in some way – everything sounded better from outside. Also the fact that every band sound-checked in front of the crowd just screamed disorganisation. Of course, organising a sound-check before the start of the gig would have proved difficult seeing as the bigger bands didn’t arrive until later in the day, but these are problems that could have been overcome by some proper organisation. Even entertainment outside to divert the attention of the crowd would have worked. Hopefully, they’ll learn from this for next year.

   A van stuck in mud, does not a festival make.

Afro

Purgatory – Tonight

While they bill themselves as Cork’s “only” alternative club night (which isn’t strictly true, but we’ll get into that some other time), Purgatory certainly appeals to a certain clientèle and from what I’ve heard, do it very well indeed. While mostly seeming to cater for the goth/metal crowd, they have been known to mix it up a bit as well as hosting a few good gigs with a few good bands.

Tonight (Friday, Aug 3) they have Kojii and Lauren Guillery & The Claws (both from Dublin) as well as Cork’s own Ladydoll, resulting in something of a reasonably promising rock/indie gig. Never having seen the Dublin bands, I can’t comment too much on them, though their MySpace stuff sounds alright. Ladydoll however are I band a really enjoyed the few times that I’ve seen them. While not entirely original, their mix of Placebo/Jimmy Ear World (to my ears) rock is really easy to listen to. But not in a shitty Coldplay/Daniel O’Donnell easy-listening sort of way, more of a catchy, pleasant, seriously foot-tappingly good sort of way. Right…I just made them sound like a very boring and safe band. That’s not what I meant at all. Just check out the myspace and you’ll get the idea. Out.

Afro