Cluas Gigs of the Fortnight

Where and When?

Well there's the fact that James Blunt is on the bill but with any luck a bunch of hippies will show up, confuse Laois with Glastonbury and sacrifice Blunt to their dark lord. Or maybe I'm confusing hippies with Norwegian death-metal fans. It's not really all that important.

But there is one band playing whose performance will unquestionably be the most eagerly awaited of weekend. After two previous European tours The Arcade Fire will finally make their Irish debut and it promises to be a treat. Having seen them play in London back in May I can confidently say that possibly the only thing to top the brilliance of the Montreal based band's debut album "Funeral" is the magnificence of their live show.

A word of warning for those at the front though. Houston born frontman Win Butler is appropriately Texas sized and, as you can see, he likes a bit of an auld stagedive.

Who?

Now fully reunited for the first time since Lou Barlow left the group in 1989 Dinosaur Jr. are on the reunion trail that's already been blazed here in recent months by other seminal 80's bands like Slint and of course The Pixies.

Who?

It rains a lot in Washington State. And thank God for the U.S. Pacific Northwest's crappy climate as the weather there has meant that the area's youth has had to spend a great deal of time indoors. In the absence of anything else to do many of them have picked up a guitar and made some brilliant music.

However up until the early 90s if you were to chart the history of Washington's music from Jimi Hendrix through to grunge you'd find it to be very male dominated. Then in 1992 along came Sleater Kinney. One of the original riot grrl bands and certainly the most successful one to emerge from that movement Sleater Kinney started out away from the Seattle scene, which was on the verge of consuming itself as A&R men from major labels descended on the city in search of the next Nirvana, in the state capital of Olympia and over the course of the last decade have released 7 albums.

Who?

After the New York band released their debut 'High/Low' in 1996 their label declined to release the follow up 'The Proximity Effect' and they were dropped when they refused to re-record it. The record was released in Europe however to much acclaim from fans and critics alike and it did eventually see the light of day stateside in 1998. 4 years later they returned with their most acclaimed album to date in 'Let Go' (though personally I'm more of a Proximity Effect man) and they released 'The weight is a gift' earlier this year.

This will be Nada Surf's first Irish gig since they played Whelan's a couple of years ago.