Saturday night and the gate is low and it's raining.
Well, okay, I'm (badly) paraphrasing Half Man Half Biscuit here, and actually there's a stiff wind blowing around the narrow alleys of the beautiful mediaeval town of Kilkenny tonight, but there is nonetheless a distinct lack of stagefront presence as Dublin power trio THE LAUNDRY SHOP troop onstage to start their set.
Your reviewer caught TLS's unfeasibly tall singer/ guitarist Toni Ireton mutter ironically about the "glamour of rock'n'roll" before he joined his cohorts on stage, but regardless of the floorspace, The Laundry Shop are soon concentrating on working their way into the corners the way any band worth their salt should.
And, while TLS'S quiet-loud approach is broadly hitching a lift on the same hectic highway that brought Smashing Pumpkins/ Nirvana to prominence, it's undeniable they do their thing well enough. Man mountain Ireton has bags of presence, exudes aggression aplenty and wields a mean Telecaster; Swedish bassist Denise embodies foxy rock chick cool and makes the junior Melissa Auf Der Maur role her own, while drummer Col keeps the beat direct and driving while smoothing out Ireton's likeably gruff vocals with some surprisingly adept harmonies.
If you're resident in Ireland, you can't fail to have heard their first single 'Highs & Lows', which was snaffled by Bord Failte to advertise domestic holidays a short while back and continues to blast out from tellies nationwide. Its' feverishly catchy chorus certainly does the trick here and warm bodies begin to pile up stage front as they slice triumphantly through it tonight. It's by no means the only ace hiding up their sleeves either, as songs like 'Highway' also find room for angularity, crunching riffs and above-average choruses. Toni tells us they're working on their debut album for release later this year and on the basis of this cauterising 40 minutes, it may well be one to earmark.
Talking of albums to earmark, Cork's finest STANLEY SUPER 800's sophomore release, 'Louder & Clearer' remains one of the best - and most original - releases of the past 12 months. Its' word-of-mouth reputation finally spread to the committee of Ireland's prestigious Choice Music Prize early this year and the band hit Kilkenny on the back of memorable shows at Dublin's Vicar Street and a packed hometown house at Cork's Cyprus Avenue.
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And, while they don't quite hit the all-out highs they are capable of tonight, they are still as unassailably great as ever. Yes, the sound is a bit of a problem in places -the guy at the desk shows his inexperience in mixing banjos during the unusually mutant strains of a normally killer 'Voices In The Music' - but even this is ultimately turned to the band's advantage courtesy of a truly ethereal keyboard wash during the motorik 'Stars Come Out'.
Besides, highlights are soon coming thick and fast. 'Mountain Climbing' is as loopily poppy and frenetically exciting as ever; recent Irish radio hit 'Gatecrashing' is muscular and driving and the Maurice O'Keeffe/ Joy Division-influenced 'Southwind' threatens the blow the roof off. Elsewhere, Stan O'Sullivan may have written the new 'Beast Of The Bach Boys' primarily as a Led Zep pastiche, but it's fast becoming a live favourite in its' own right. But them's the vagaries of this here perplexing rock'n'roll game, you might say. Well, if you were misquoting Half Man Half Biscuit anyway. Which is pretty much where we came in, wasn't it?
Whatever. Despite a slow start, tonight proved to be a thrilling musical summit meeting and something of a celebration in its' own right. The crowd may not have been enormous, but all present were agreed that the coolest cats in Kilkenny were to be heard in Cleere's tonight.
(www.myspace.com/thelaundryshop)
(www.stanleysuper800.com / www.myspace.com/stanleysuper800 )
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