January 5th - 10th

Whoah back to the normal routine I guess - don't know about anyone else but I'm knackered - actually managed to sleep in this morning (couldn't face the cold when i woke and didn't reset my alarm right, oops!). I would've had an earlier night last night but I went to hear the first-ever performance by Trio Nuevo who gave a gorgeous performance of some of Astor Piazzolla's music in Meade's wine bar. Definitely a good place for it ... Colm the owner tells me they are planning weekly Thursday gigs there from February.

I think we can expect a bit of a lull around town in general but there's a bit to keep those of us with a bit of juice in the batteries occupied....



Sat 5th Jan

5-7.30pm Corner House The Lee Delta Blues Club who do a regular night in here on a Thursday are holding a "Family Blues Session" with the Dizzy Blues Band to bring their stuff to a different crowd - they're lookin to hook in some young ones. There'll be an acoustic part (yippee) and then an electric bit and the plan is to chart the history of the blues. It's a nice idea if you're looking for somewhere for an early evening pint...


Tuesday 8th

9pm - Cyprus Avenue - Headlining the Melting Pot gig is Kilkenny drummer(&singer) Rarely Seen Above Ground who sounds like he has an interesting enough set-up, playing solo with a backing track but with the non-attendant band projected behind him. Which is a pretty good idea if you have to use a backing track. And the last time we saw a solo drummer(&singer) with a backing track it was a bloody great gig (the dude that was in the Liquid Lounge in November, remember? Charles Hayward, though he was probably further along in his game). See how I'm making up for lack of content with blather? People do that all the time - why should I be different?



Thursday 10th

8pm Bodega White Room - This'll be the third STeTLab gig in as many months and I gotta say they are becoming a highlight for me. To recap, it's a night of curated improv - to expand, that means that there are certain rules being applied to keep things under control but the course of the music is anyone's guess. So in the last gig there was only allowed to be 4 people playing at a time and whenever someone wanted to join in or come back Tony (curator for the night) would choose someone playing, tap them on the shoulder and they'd leave for a while and the new person joined in. It worked really well and there was some interesting instruments, like a hammered dulcimer (which Niwel had a great time on). If you think you might want to join in bring an instrument, otherwise put your ears in the lap of the gods - this one will see a group of, er Cork improv superstars (hur, hur) forming the core of the night - Mick O'Shea (Quiet Club), John Godfrey (Crash Ensemble), Paul Hegarty (Safe), Jesse Ronneau and Tony Langlois (Missioncreep).


9pm The Roundy - Led by the rather wonderful violinist Marja Tukhanen, the Polskadots are a talented bunch of musicians who play a range of European folk music, focusing especially on Eastern Europe and Scandinavia - they're particularly into gypsy music (which I am all about at the moment) - there's some lovely voices in the band with great harmonising and frankly, they're a really safe bet for a good night's music!
I can't find it mentioned on any listing sites or on their myspace, but Nora of Mai World Music also mentioned in a mail to me today that they would have special guests "Mekach from Brittany, France, who play rockin' gypsy tunes, singer Beth from Brazil and superb saxophonist Gary Baus" and Nora does tend to know what's what. Either way it'll be alot of fun!

That's kind of it for the moment really - boy did ye miss alot of craic with the Critters last Saturday in Charlie's (or were ye there? Ahem, I can't remember who was there, it sure was a helluvalot of fun...)

Nicki