2/12/2012 Sunday night @ The Dublin Castle

Subject	Sunday night @ The Dublin Castle
DateCreated	12/12/2012 3:31:00 PM
	Sunday night finds me at the Dublin Castle. Three of the four bands on the bill are new to me, but all are worth seeing. First up is The Hellfire Preachers.  I've never heard of this punky bunch of fired up rock 'n' rollers, but they turn out to be quite good with better than average songs. There's plenty of energy in their performance and they really look like they mean it. An odd mix of styles visually - probably fair to say one of the guitarists is a fan of Dregen from Backyard Babies though. Next up is another band that is new to me, although I hear they were very good supporting Peckham Cowboys at Surya last week. This is Jelly and they have less of a punk and more of a 1970's New Wave or alt/rock vibe. The frontman is very good. They are all quality musicians and seem to really know what they are doing. If the bass player looks looks familiar it might be because she also plays in Tango Pirates who I also saw at this venue a few weeks ago. Jelly turn in a well played and entertaining set and like tonight's first band I'll be keeping an eye open for them in future. The next band is much more familiar. The Gasoline Queens seem to be popping up all over London at the moment. This lot have been plying their Dogs D'Amour influenced wares around town for a while now and have a bit of a following. Their original material is tuneful and catchy, probably the best set of songs of the night. They always play well, and are starting to throw in the odd new song or two along with old favourites like 'Baby Moonrider' and 'Tip Of My Tongue' and their ever popular Dogs D'Amour cover 'Last Bandit'. The Gasoline Queens turn in their usual solid performance of gritty rock 'n' roll played with a genuine passion. And the added bonus of Texas Terri joining the band for the final song. Tonight's headliners to me turn in the least convincing performance of the night. They play well enough and look the part, but The Escape House don't really have the songs to back it all up. They aren't a bad band or anything, but musically there is nothing memorable about them and it all seems very generic 80's style street rock 'n' roll. The Escape House are worth sticking around for to check out, but they are the only band of the night that I wouldn't be particularly bothered if I never saw again. I'm not too bothered if a band isn't very original - none of the bands tonight have been, but they need to have some spark which sets them apart and also some memorable songs and I find this lot a bit lacking. Still, it's cheap on the door and the Dublin Castle has a better stocked and more reasonably priced bar than most London music venues. I've enjoyed all the bands on tonight's great value for money bill and even the band I liked least was OK.