Spot on with Snow Patrol there Eric. A great band and a great writer. Some more for the list. In the Irish corner: TenSpeedRacer - These guys are pretty damn good. Colm Quearney - Well know for playing in other peoples bands, he deserves more recognition for his solo material Mexican pets - Where are they Now!! a great band Internationally: Pete Yorn - If you like Ryan Adams then you will love this guy Interpol - Still havent quite reached the levels of high that they deserve

well ya know what I'm gonna toot my own horn and say Obediah. They're f**king great, and deserve more attention. Incidentally they're gigging in Dorans tomorrow. website in progress www.obediah.cjb.net

Its really hard to say if a band is actually underrated. How do you define under-rated? Some bands are just underexposed, if they got a bit of media attention, were on a bigger record label or had better management the might be "above the radar" for more people. Other bands, though great have limited appeal. Bands like the Pixies were referred to as "hardcore" for a good reason. For example, electro/punk/techno/pop/whatever band Adult. is one of my favourite bands at the moment. To my ears, its pure fun ear candy, other people just get a headache.

I'd agree with the Snow Patrol mention. I saw them in Scotland this year and they were great. This is a little bit embarrassing, but I really like Embrace. I know they've lived in the shadow of Blur & Oasis, but for a pop-rock band, they're a lot more satisfying to listen to than Oasis or U2. Their ballads are almost always great too(The "If You've Never Been" album is full of them). Apparently there's a new record on the way too and I for one, will be looking forward to it. Q2

A touch on the morbid side sometimes, but THE THE have produced some of the most musically ambitious, tuneful, and touching records ever. They are quite well known I guess...but your man the writer, has I think alot of integrity and has stuck to his guns - this hasnt rubbed up well with cool journos? Check out "Soul Mining" it is a classic...maybe blokes can relate to it more than girls?

Yeah Skyarcher, The The are a great band. "This is the day" is possibly one of the greatest songs ever written. I have the remastered CD version of "Soul Mining" with the carboard outer sleeve and that has quotes from reviews of the album at the time. All of them seem extremely positive. Theres even a quote from Smash Hits who made it their record of the week which shows how much the music press has been dumbed down since. Could you imagine Smash Hits reviewing a Radiohead or Nick Cave album today? OK I know the record company is only going to put positive reviews on the sleeve but there were quotes from almost all the major music publications so I don't think critics had a problem with The The, I think it was the record buying public. To me, The The were kind of the middle ground between the dance/electronic sound of New Order and the indie pop of The Smiths. The The could sound modern yet pastoral simultaneously. The The didn't fit into either camp so this is probably part of the reason the were not as successful as those bands. The fact that The The was arguably more morbid than even The Smiths probably didn't help either.

Can't say enough good things about Matt Johnson and The The. Infected was the album that convinced me there was more music in the world than U2. Another classic is the 1995 album "Hanky Panky", all Hank Williams covers - one of the most ambitious albums I have ever come across. I have always thought of them as more of a bloke band, probably related to some of the tortured subject matter. For instance, "Out of the Blue (Into the Fire)" will have resonance for most (all?) blokes, but I'm not sure how the ladies view it?

The The were one of my favourite bands as a young 'un, along with the likes of the Stranglers, Depeche Mode and Front 242. I never really found them to be too morbid though, The Beat(en) Generation off 'Mindbomb' and 'Infected' are too f**kin great tunes. But by far my favourite is 'Love is Stronger Then Death' off Dusk, it's such a simple melody but really beautiful. His voice sounds really good on it and he sings it with conviction. He's a great songwriter and they were a well underrated band and should have been huge. I think Johnny Marr played on one of his albums but can't remember which one - Vent My Spleen or Q2...were we not talking about this before??? Anyway, certainly not just a 'lads' band!

Yep - The The has certainly come up in the past. Marr played on both Dusk and Mind Bomb, if memory serves. He has said in the past that his best work since The Smiths was on those albums (although, that was before The Healers which is pretty poor, imho). Heartland was one of my favs, funky pianos and dark subject matter. Now that I look, I have Dusk and Burning Blue Soul in work. An afternoon of reminiscence for me!

There is a mini Watergate going on over at the THETHE website - www.thethe.com

welcome to underrated city, ireland. population: scheer, tamalin, kerbdog, passengers.

jmmcd, I assume by Passengers you mean that little U2/Brain Eno side project? Great album, but I'd hardly call it underated, more just a case of limited mainstream appeal. For a side project based on the concept of soundtracks to imaginary movies, full of ambient soundscapes and containing very few "songs" in the traditional sense fo the word, I'd say it was very successful. I'm sure Mr. Eno is pretty happy with the royalties.

well it sold a lot of copies, considering what it was (largely because u2 completists wanted to own it). but the vast majority of listeners didn't really rate it (ie like it); hence underrated.

Not really suprising though really is it? U2 up until Achtung Baby had mainly been prducing fairly straightforward stadium rock (no bad thing). A lot of people probably bought Passengers on the strength of "Miss Sarajevo" only to find that they have got a fairly leftfield, largely instrumental album on their hands. Initial reaction is bound to be negative. For something so ambitously outside the mainstream, I think enough people bought and liked it to justify it as being a success. On the other had I suppose compared to the fact that Radiohead had far more success with the equally leftfield Kid A and Amnesiac you could say its underrated.

Snowpatrol, Kid Blunt, Wevie stonder, El Guapo and The postal Sevice.

Ahhhhh. The The. I too had forgotten how fantastic they were until I stuck Mind Bomb on back about 6 months ago. First time I'd put it in eons and it immediately conjured up a whole load of fab memories from 10 or so years ago of when I was living in smoggy Turin, listening to the album incessantly as I tried to get to grips with how ye say things in the local lingo 'a pint of milk please, and none of that dodgy UHT stuff you sold me yesterday'. Dusk, Infected, Soul Mining - the whole damn lot are remarkable. Although I never got my grubby paws on Hanky Panky which Mr. Vento Spleeno so highly praises. A mental note to rectify that absence from the CD collection has been duly made. Anyway, staying with The The I also remember the BBC ridiculously banning "Sweet Bird of Truth" from Infected (sung from the viewpoint of an American fighter pilot bombing a Middle Eastern country) which - by marvellous coincidence - was released a few days or so before the British allowed the yanks to bomb Libya from UK airbases. Very effective ban it was as well, the album going on to sell over a million copies… And good on ye Binokular for mentioning Smash Hits. I have to admit I used to devour it (and “No 1” magazine as well – remember that anyone?) for a period back in 1980s. It remains one of my great regrets that a few years ago I threw out my entire mid-1980s Smash Hits collection. Curiously I find that the editorial policy of Q magazine today is not too far off Smash Hits’ editorial policy of the mid-1980s (although Q magazine has never printed the lyrics of the latest single releases which Smash Hits and No. 1 did back then. Used to be great for sorting out those school yard arguments (yeah, 'twas a sad ould childhood I had, eh?). eoghan

I would think that Kid A and Amnesiac were under-rated. You talk to many Radiohead fans and their response is 'I like Radiohead up until OK computer, then they started producing all the weird stuff.' The two albums in question were so different to their previous stuff, alot of people got scared and didn't give it a chance. The composition and chord sequences in Kid A send shivers down my spine. A fine album. Binocular - true point made earlier, what is under-rated? Personally I hate the fact that in some cases it takes the death of a great artist before they get attention on the airwaves eg Jeff Buckley and more recent Mic christopher. The songs didn't change up to the point of their passing. I know the likes of Today FM play good music but why do you have to wait until after 7pm to hear it. Go to the States/Australia and the big stations are playing great music morning, noon and night.

James Yorkston and his Athletes. His one LP release, 'Moving Up Country', laid fair claim to 2002s album of the year...however, he seems to have slipped beneath the radar - all the more surprising considering the (rightful) veneration of Nick Drake et al... No-one I've met who's heard him has emerged unchanged though...and the records on sale in Tower right now! (As an aside, the talk of The The got me thinking about a great underrated record from one of their contemporaries - does anyone hold a torch for the jesus and mary chain's stoned and dethroned? pure sepia summner memory bliss...)

I'll probably get lamped for this but...I think Roxy Music are so underrated. They've influenced so many bands...in particular British indie-type acts like Suede, Placebo, Ladytron (obvious one) etc. A lot of people dis Ferry and say they only ever liked Roxy Music while Brian Eno was a member, but I think that's really unfair. Eno was certainly a driving creative force and had that kind of mad-inventor air about him but Brian Ferry had so much charisma and personality that he was just as important. I never realised how involved he was in the band and always thought he was a front man to Eno's material, but read an article a while back about their writing/recording process and was really surprised to hear that Ferry would dictate much of the music to the band, never giving a clue as to what the song (i.e meoldy/lyrics) was going to be, they'd go on to the studio and record the music and Ferry would then go into the studio on his own and record the song. Only after that would the rest of the band hear it in it's final form - I guess that's maybe egocentric, but I was glad to hear he wasn't just Eno's puppet. They've a fantastic back catalogue of work, and some of the best album covers ever. i was lucky enough to see them (well 3 of them) play the Point Depot a couple of years ago..and was blown away, it was a stunning gig.