When I had a look at the GoldenPlec roster and saw that The Devlins gig at Vicar Street was still available a smile beamed across my face. I’ve been a fan for a while now and have never seen them live, so when the opportunity came for me to finally see them I snatched it up quick. Looking forward to the gig I was thinking of different ways to review the night. I was going to shower them with praise in this article with the word ‘epic’ featuring quite a few times. It’s a real shame that I can’t.
The night they played was probably the worst rain we’ve had this year, so deciding that the gig would be less enjoyable if my clothes were dripping wet I opted for a taxi to the venue. This is where things started to go very bad. One A4 sheet of paper was stuck on the window of the deserted Vicar Street venue saying the gig has been moved to The Button Factory. So alas I was forced to walk and was inevitably dripping wet by the time I’d made the trek.
Having missed the opening act due to the venue fiasco I was feeling a bit annoyed, made even worse by what I have say was the longest ever set up by a band I’ve witnessed. It reminded me of when The Killers were setting up after Bloc Party in Marlay Park a few years ago. If you were there then you know what I mean. But they’re allowed to take a while – they have a massive audience with massive sound systems and massive egos all to tend to. The Devlins had none of that to deal with, so they have no excuse.
When the band did finally grace us with their presence they jumped straight into their set and began one of the dullest gigs I’ve been to in a very long time. When I looked at the people around me they seemed more into their conversations than the music. Now let me tell you why.
I know The Devlins aren’t a loud band and I know they haven’t got many, or any, fast songs. That’s okay because that’s the music they like to play and they have an audience, me included. But when they played live that night it was like they just didn’t care. In my eyes if a band doesn’t give 100% then you have to ask why. So now here I am am, asking why?
As I mentioned earlier I like The Devlins. I think they’re a good band and they produce good music. But they just weren’t doing it for me live. Dreary is the word I’d use, or maybe half-arsed. The tempo started desperately low and they never raised it throughout the course of the night. They were lacking in charisma from the word go. It was background music. And with tickets priced at nearly €30 that simply isn’t good enough.
I’ve been listening to The Devlins while writing this review and to this minute I can’t understand what happened to them on the night. If this is how they go about live performances all the time then they need a serious wake up call. I’m just hoping it was an off night, because having wrote all this, it doesn’t change the fact that they’re all very talented musicians.
Photos: Abraham Tarrush