17/3/2007 St Patrick's day @ the Purple Turtle

Subject	St Patrick's day @ the Purple Turtle
PostedDate	3/17/2007
	This show at the Purple Turple is billed as a St Patrick's Day gig and all the bands are supposed to be playing at least one Thin Lizzy song. Zen Motel are on first - it's good to be able to see them for the third time recently after they've been away getting their second album finished. They rock the place pretty hard in their usual dirty sleazy style.  The band have had to learn a Thin Lizzy song for this gig - frontman Lee says it might all go a bit wrong as the band members all went away seperately to learn the song - and came back to find they had all been learning different versions of it! Lee looks up to the sky and says "Sorry Phil!" before the band launch into 'Rocker', but they get through the song OK and Lee says he thinks Phil is happy now. Next up are Big Num. I saw this band at Lark In The Park recently and was impressed even though I'd never heard of them before. They were good that night, but tonight they are at least twice as good again! I think there are two reasons for them being so good tonight: The venue is larger and much less cramped on stage, and they are playing to their sort of ROCK loving crowd as opposed to an indie/pop audience. They play their AC/DC, Thin Lizzy & tongue in cheek Darkness influenced hard rock very tightly and with amazing energy - they also have some pretty decent songs. In fact their songs sounded good enough to make me buy a CD from their very comprehensively stocked merch stall afterwards. They include the required Thin Lizzy cover in their set and play as if they wrote it themselves. A very impressive performance! The Ruby Shoes are up next. They have certainly improved since the last time I saw them, but their songs don't really make much of an impression and they look a bit mismatched visually. They didn't manage to learn a Thin Lizzy cover either. The final band is billed as an 'All star Thin Lizzy tribute band' - supposedly featuring members of the Datsuns and the Glitteratti among others. No members of either of the above mentioned bands make an appearance. Big Num take to the stage once more - they are the 'Thin Lizzy tribute band' and the only other musician who bothers to join them for a few songs is a guitarist from Voodoo 6/Metalworkz. He is very good though and his Lizzy style harmonised twin lead work with the guy from Big Num sounds great. As it turns out, Big Num make a very good Thin Lizzy tribute band in their own right and carry it off extremely well, although there is quite a bit of AC/DC's style and energy mixed in too. I suspect this band could also pull off a very good AC/DC tribute set if they wanted to. Although the final band wasn't 'as advertised' they really did finish off this event in fine style - certainly a good night's entertainment!