National Prayer Breakfast

Temple Bar Music Centre, Dublin, May 2000

I'll admit it took me a while to get my ears around National Prayer Breakfast. It was at some stage during their gig in Vicar Street when they blew headliner Hally offstage that it hit me just how damn good these guys are. I have seen them a fair few times before this gig, a couple of times in the Funnel (oh how we miss it) and somewhere else that I can't quite remember. But it took me a long while to adapt to NPB, through no fault of their own I must add.

These days NPB have a very strong fanbase, as was evident by tonight's gig. A lot of the songs that they played when I saw them first are still played today but the wear and tear of gigs has grown them up a lot. Tonight's support came from Bambi (who unfortunately I missed) and the majestic Redneck Manifesto.

National Prayer Breakfast took to the stage tonight to a very packed Music Centre. Since the last Funnel gig I saw them at, they gained an extra member in Paul, who plays guitar, sings, shouts and plays a bit of keyboards. As a live band NPB have always fed from the energy provided by the audience and that fact that tonight a good 60% of the crowd are bopping and swinging and have formed their own dance-pit makes for an even better gig. Phantom anthem 'Feeding Frenzy' sends the dance pit in to a frenzy *eek* while songs like 'Pop-Song' and 'Six O'Clock Swing' just give us more excuses to dance or sorry little asses off.

You see, in a world where money, politics and pure shiteness seems to be taking over, National Prayer Breakfast are a breath of fresh air and one of the only bands you can go and see that will make you smile the entire bus journey home. "It don't mean a thing / if it ain't got the swing". I couldn't have said it better myself.

Paul O'Reilly