Local Natives (live in The Village, Dublin) Review Snapshot: LA Hipsters Local Natives roll into town to play a work unfriendly Monday night at The Village in Dublin, the reviewer can't help but be reminded of sunnier times the previous July. The Cluas Verdict? 8 out of 10 Full Review: Ado decided to drive in so I sat in the house watching Australian Masterchef waiting for the lad to pull up outside the door in his ridiculous PlayStation-like BMW. The phone rings. It's himself, too lazy to get out of the car and knock on the door and, to be honest, when it is this cold I don't blame the buck one bit. Local Natives all the way from California playing The Village on a Monday night. I got into them during the summer in my uncle's vacant house on the Aran Islands, my girlfriend from Montreal was playing albums on her iPod for myself and two friends while we drank wine in the long grass and watched the sun set out over the west coast of Mayo. H... [Read on]

Cluster (live in The Village, Dublin) Review Snapshot: So-called “pioneers of ambient music” fail to light fires at Dublin venue, The Village, but perform a convincing showcase for the latest “relaxing bathing tunes” CD collection. The Cluas Verdict? 4/10 Full Review: Cluster are a German electronic/experimental group which are often referred to as the “pioneers of ambient music”. When preparing to see them perform live, this tag is likely to raise your expectations. Which will be significantly lowered once the duo (Hans-Joachim Roedelius and Dieter Moebius) begin playing their less than exhilarating set list. It would be unfair to strip the group of their “pioneer” status, as they have clearly influenced bands that have helped to shape music in the last 15+ years such as Air and Röyksopp. However their live performance left a lot to be desired when they played Dublin's The Village on Saturday, 6th of Feb... [Read on]

Jens Lekman (live in The Village, Dublin) Review Snapshot: Jens Lekman returned to Ireland to play the last date on his tour. An excellent gig from one of indie pop’s greatest performers. The Cluas Verdict? 8 out of 10 Full Review: Last December, Jens Lekman played to an adoring crowd in Whelan’s. It was just him and his percussionist, with a cameo from Owen Pallett (better known as Final Fantasy). That gig stands out for me as the best live experience of 2007. It finished with Lekman and Pallett playing a final 5 songs in the alley way beside Whelan’s. On Sunday night, he returned. This time he played next door at The Village. The place was crowded and there was an air of expectancy. Obviously, word had spread even further due to both his last performance, and his spectacular latest album, ‘Night Falls Over Kortedala’. As promised, he brought a full band this time. He opened with “I’m Leaving You Because I Don&r... [Read on]

The Duke Spirit (live in The Village, Dublin) Review Snapshot: Undaunted by less than perfect sound, the headliners delivered up to their reputation and a set that left the crowd panting, even if the supports failed to make an impression. The Cluas Verdict?  7 out of 10 Full Review: Each time I go to the Village, I find another reason to dislike it as a venue. Sometimes it’s the crowd; sometimes the painfully cool and smooth veneer, its attempts at looking like an underground venue while having fake-marbled, mirror-lined bathrooms. On Sunday it was the sound. While the Village has one of the better sound systems in the Dublin area venue circuit, the effect of this is too often ruined by having the volume turned up to 11: four or five instruments become smushed into one mashed-up whole with occasional words, high registers become toneless squeals and low registers become painful thumps. So while the crowd was big and enthusiastic enough to absorb the volume &nda... [Read on]

Mos Def (live in the Village, Dublin) Review Snapshot: With technical difficulties and a delayed start, Mos Def needed to win over the impatient crowd in a big way. Unfortunately, due to the patchy nature of his set, this didn't happen and ultimately made for a disappointing gig. The Cluas Verdict? 4 out of 10 Full Review: 9pm: I've been standing here, waiting for Mos Def to arrive, for so long that I'm expecting three Mos Def's to come along at once. I am a sweaty member of an impatient crowd waiting for things to kick off. According to our tickets, the gig is from 8-11pm, so most of us arrived about an hour ago. Three hours seemed an unlikely duration for a hiphop gig, so I was expecting a support act or at least a DJ set before Mos Def's appearance. Instead, for the past hour they've been playing what sounds like a brass band/hip-hop mix-tape over the soundsystem. It was vaguely distracting for the first half an hour but now I'm tr... [Read on]