So Cow, New Amusement and more at HWCH (night 3) Review Snapshot: A rained soaked Dublin played host to the final night of this year’s HWCH. The night’s lineup was, to look at, the weakest of the 3 but as it turned out two of the weekend’s best sets took place on the final night. The Cluas Verdict? 7 out of 10 Full Review: Day 3 of 2008’s HWCH took place on a miserable wet Sunday evening which could have seriously put a damper on proceedings but things were rescued a little when it was decided to pull most of the bands from Meeting House Square and move them to indoors venues. This call wasn’t made in time for New Amusement who from their vantage point must have thought they were playing to a sparse but enthusiastic crowd of umbrellas. Their debut EP from a few months back was a fine collection of indie tunes and their set was based around that. But also dropped into the mix was some fresh material earmarked for their debut album due... [Read on]

Frightened Rabbit, The Vinny Club and Bats at HWCH (night 2) Review Snapshot: Night 2 of 2008's HWCH saw the cream of the festival's lineup all crowbarred into a single night. A nice complaint to have I guess as there was pretty much always something worth seeing. The Cluas Verdict? 8 out of 10 Full Review: Night 2 of 2008’s HWCH festival threw up its own set of problems that were far more pleasing to deal with than those on Friday night. That being that most of the best bands on the festival had been given Saturday slots so there were all sorts of unfortunate clashes between bands that were worth seeing. What makes it worse is that tonight’s lineup is a little thin on the ground when it comes to quality and could have done with some bolstering. The lineup in particular in Andrew’s Lane was so good you could have stayed there for the whole evening and had top night’s entertainment. And that’s where the night began for me with... [Read on]

Super Extra Bonus Party, Groom and The Dublin Duck Dispensery live at HWCH Review Snapshot: The opening night of 2008’s HWCH festival saw bands faced with joke shop organistional problems and disgraceful sound in the festival’s main venue. Despite that there was plenty to enjoy. The Cluas Verdict? 7 out of 10 Full Review: After a brief flirtation with the POD complex last year The Hard Working Class Heroes Festival returned to its traditional home of Temple Bar and its environs last night to, at least on an organisational level, mixed results at best.  The first bands I saw were over the river in the Academy. Having spoken to a few people in the run up to the festival it seems that a lot of people are somewhat unenthusiastic about the prospect of making the trek over to Abbey Street. In all seriousness, it takes less than 5 minutes to walk there from The Button Factory/Meeting House Square. Upon my arrival I discovered that due to a miscommunicat... [Read on]

Os Mutantes live in Vicar Street, Dublin Review Snapshot: If one were to go and watch a football match featuring a returning from retirement Pele, Jairzihno and Tostao, you would probably expect, in spite of the brilliance that they demonstrated in their youth, for them to not be very good. Why should we expect better from recently unretired band of their countrymen? The CLUAS Verdict? 5 out of 10 Full review: Aside from in one of the episodes of David O’Doherty’s recent TV series where the comedian played a lunchtime show with no advertising to a crowd of about 7 I don’t think I’ve ever seen Vicar St. so empty as it is tonight.  Did you know that if a disastrously low number of people buy tickets for a gig they can draw the curtains across the balcony so the room doesn’t look as pathetically empty? I didn’t.  My skills at estimating crowds are really rather poor so it’s hard to gauge precisely how many people... [Read on]