The Certain Three Tour 2012, Bourkes Bar 19/01/2012 Review

Tonight I finally got down to Bourkes bar to witness the place in full gig mode, The bar has been hand picking some great acts of late and their Thursday night gigs are now firmly on the local gigging map.

Tonight saw the third annual instalment of The Certain Three Tour come to town, The last two occasions took place in dolans and each year brings some great unheard music to limerick and all around Ireland thanks to the booking agency "Word of Mouth".

This would be my first live listen to all three acts tonight, The bar was packed from early on as they had transformed the back bar into a gig cave, complete with black curtain covering the walls and a make shift wooden stage. The seating plan could have been better as they need to change from high stools to low seating all round, well for these acoustic gigs anyways to give people a chance to view the acts. Swiping a small stool from the bar below helped me out anyways.
First up on the bill was Puzzle Muteson, This is the alter ego of singer songwriter Terry Magson. The isle of Wight native accompanied by his guitar played a nice set of dreamy thom yorke esque songs. His haunting vocals filled the room now with bodies strewn about the place all at weird angles trying to catch a look at the stage. Terry has just brought out his debut album En Garde on the Bedroom Community label, you can hear more over at his bandcamp page here www.puzzlemuteson.com

Next up were The Lost Brothers, The duo Oisín from Navan and Mark from Omagh played a super set to a much enthralled crowd. They offer effortless guitar playing and super tales of their travels intertwined with superb harmonies with a hark back to alt county American style genre. They probably get this a lot but they compare a lot to the Everly Brothers, it was quite funny to hear them play "All I have to do is Dream" in a tribute to Phil Everlys 73rd birthday that night. Having said that you could draw comparisons with alot of acts from that era including hints of Simon & Garfunkel, Bob Dylan and also a comparison to an indielimerick favourite The Guggenheim Grotto They certainly look the folk part with eschewed hat and buddy holly glasses and tailored suits among them. It was great to witness them live and I can see why in this months Hotpress they were tipped as one of “The 50 Irish Acts You Have To Hear”, I managed to pick up their two studio albums including their latest release "So Long John Fante". Looking forward to delving into their sound a bit
more.


Last up was Katie Kim, I had heard a lot about this girl and all good things let me tell you. Her last outing in Limerick was at the now not in use St.Johns Church (Daghda Dance Space). By all accounts Katie Kim stole the show that night in the church with Donal Dineen providing a superb plethora of visuals as a backdrop to her vocals. Tonight saw Katie minus band and visuals. Just a chair, Guitar , loop pedals and a glass of wine. It was nice to see such an intimate performance, She has a very haunting quality to her voice or should I say the microphone effect pedal has. I could see a duet with the first act working out really well as the comparisons were quite similar. I like that she throws in the odd quirky tone into her vocals and she has a super talent on the guitar. She informed us that she had special cassette versions of her album on sale, but being someone who as crossed into 2012 I didn't see any point in purchasing. I Really enjoyed her experimentation with the looping vocals, look forward to catching her again with a full band on tow.

The night was a great success, For me the Lost Brothers made the night. It was great to witness these great acts in a bar in town for free. Thanks very much to Bourkes, Looking forward to the next gig!