A little story 'bout my trip to Dublin

I'm back from my holidays and a trip to Dublin, and what a trip it was! Music aside I think I may have fallen in love with Dublin a little bit, though still terrified of the zombie junkies, expensive drinks and lack of dancing amoung the cool kids I've shed many a prejudice against the capital. We acted like tourists, going to the Guinness Storehouse (learning what Hops were), taking the DART (Dublin train) and considering going to Dollymount Strand (a famous Dublin beach):



...and then deciding as places to go for a swim or lie in the sun go it's a pretty crap beach.

So I arrived on Thursday and went to Whelan's to see The Tallest Man On Earth play his last show on his current tour. He arrived out, and despite a few initial technical problems he grabbed and held the audience in the palm of his hand dipping between songs from his first and second albums and playing a beautiful version of Paul Simon's Graceland.



We stuck around Whelan's for the night dancing to the most bored DJ playing the most bored selection of predictable indie hits for the night, helped only by the shots of Jagermeister purchased after Michelle found €20 in the ladies toilet. I guess as a DJ who'd only love to play to an audience with, I assume, relatively decent taste in music, to see some guy sitting at a desk, doing what an itunes crossfader could do, to a selection of Strokes, Arctic Monkeys, Interpol on repeat bugs the be-jaysus out of me. It's a fun job, stand up, dance, celebrate (it's not 9-5). Also, I'm not demanding an eclectic mix of B-Sides from bands you've never heard of, just something a little more interesting, chosen with a bit of care. I just felt a little cheapened by the assumption that I'd dance to anything NME approved. But to my detriment I did. And fuck it, we had fun. We kinda had to, we were on holiday!

Back to Whelan's the next night again, this time to Enemies album launch, supported by the wonderful Super Extra Bonus Party. It was uplifting to see a heaving room of avid fans for the launch of a band's debut album. So fair play to Enemies and Richter Collective.



But our night wasn't over, oh no! Though the DJ might have been wonderful we weren't to take that risk and off we went to Twisted Pepper for a bitta DJ YODA!!!

We got in for a good chunk of DJ Kormac's support slot and my god, that guy is absolutely flawless! I also found myself wondering what one particular song was as it was being mixed it, to quickly realise it was one of Kormac's own from his excellent debut album Word Play out now on Scribble Records.



To try and rethink what Yoda dropped would be foolish ...suffice to say it was awesome. Maybe a little too much dubstep for my liking but Max Romeo's Chase the Devil into Prodigy's Out Of Space? Wonderful stuff!

Then on to Saturday. Lot's of chilling out, and pestering our friend Sarah to come from Galway after work, which worked, followed by drinks at a salsa dancing bar and then onwards to see Not Squares in Twisted Pepper. And I finally got to hear Release The Bees live. Great show, good fun, then silly dancing and neon halo wearing upstairs to a DJ who stopped Groove Armada's Superstylin' during the intro to roar "yis better fucking dance or I'm not playin' it!" ...good stuff.

So Dublin, I like you now. I still have some reservations but I think someday I may live in you for a while. Not for the moment but hey, you're alright.

I'll be back later with some mp3's from tunes I'm digging at the moment ...