Arthur:-

How can I describe tonights gig? Well how about an incredibly large marquee with tables and a bar. The whole event had the feel of a German Beer Festival. Don't get me wrong, I'm from Belfast, it's a drinking town so I know what to expect. And what I expect is one of the best groups in the world working their beautiful music, winning over a crowd, at least half of whom were indifferent, to the whole range of tragi-comic, angst ridden, classic tunes that encompass the Undertones. Well that's what I expected. What I got was a band who were clearly under-rehearsed (at least 4 false starts) , with a muddled sound (and I mean bad) who went for the easy cop out of Teenage Kicks (of course the crowd loved it) but who overall got a 5 out of 10.

So come on boys, you are so much better than you showed tonight. Give it a bit more preparation. You and the music you produce deserve better than you showed tonight.

Cliff :-

We attended the sound check and I thought it sounded excellent, crisp and clear with the backing vocals on "get over you" particularly good from Damian and Mickey. This was a great set up, a large stage with Billy's sparkling drum kit there for all to see, in all its glory on its own platform. The large marquee meant the sound should be excellent, a decent area for dancing at the front for a couple of hundred at least with seating behind. After the sound check I couldn't wait until 11:30 for the real thing.

It was very much as Arthur described, like a beer festival and the vast majority would have been there irrelevant of who was on stage, they were there for the night out and to get pissed, not to see The Undertones. The big moment arrived and the dance floor was empty, I decided to stand alone at the front in the hope that hundreds would join me but only George and Malochey (I doubt if thats the correct spelling!) did so.

On came the band and "Get over you" was the opener, it was good enough but not as good as the sound check version. During GOY approx 30 had entered the dance floor and it got busier fairly quickly. I'm not sure what followed but the next song (Family Entertainment?) lasted approx 20 seconds before being aborted as there was a misunderstanding as to which song they were playing. Hey, we all make mistakes, no big deal so we laughed it off. When it was finally straightened out it did not sound good at all, almost as if guitars were out of time with each other and the drumming. No problem. . . it'll get rectified.

But unfortunately it wasn't and we stumbled from one cock up to another, the start of most of the songs just seemed a jumbled mess and it was sometimes difficult to know which song it was until Paul started to sing. At the end of one song the comment was made, "Well we got there in the end" and that really summed up much of the show. "Teenage Kicks" came to the rescue half way through the set, it sounded great and the dance floor filled to breaking point, it was followed by "True confessions" which was good also, so I thought we were back on track and the night had been saved.

But unfortunately it was not the case and we went back to the previous hit and miss stuff, some good, some not so good. "There goes Norman" was a messy intro, "You're Welcome" was good, "Julie Ocean" had some off key guitar, but "Wed Week" was good, and so it went on. Paul tried in vain to get those at the back going, "You can stand up if you like", "Are you still here?" (or words to that effect) , but frankly if they were not fans of The Undertones before then they were certainly not going to be after.

The dissapointment for me was that the set up was good, good sized venue and big crowd (1, 500?) . Those that came along for the beer and to see the band perform "Teenage Kicks" and "Jimmy Jimmy" probably went home happy enough, as did the hundred plus on the dance floor who pogoed aggressively for most of the songs. What they DID NOT see was the band that, as fans we know and love, playing a full set of songs equally as good as those mentioned above. I would have liked those casual observers to have left thinking "I didn't realise they had such a vast range of great songs, they were class" but I doubt if they did.

see also [Cliff].