Well it was a strange mix of people in the Rosetta for this. It was like the 1977 punk scene meets the 1987 glam scene with a strange but rather dandy gentleman in a suit there to! The crowd however was a good representation of the line-up, as we had Numbskull and the Lobotomies catering for the punk crowd, Twisted Rose dealing with the glam crowd and The Betes Noir and headliners Plan A for everyone else.
Well here are HMI individual reviews for each band (I am sure the punks will be thrilled to be on a 'glam' website but tuff).


Numbskull - These guys were fortunate to be the only band of the evening who did not suffer from some sort of sound problem or 'technical' difficulty. They played an incredibly tight and fast based set. Their short, upbeat, Green Day-esque songs went down well with the crowd and they raced through them flawlessly. These three guys from Newtownards were great fun to watch.

The Lobotomies - These guys brought us a more old-skool style of punk but unfortunately suffered a few guitar problems. However once they sorted things out they made up for it by playing with even more exuberance and energy. Fantastic drummer who didn't miss a beat.

The Betes Noir - This kind of alt-rock is not HMI's thing, therefore we do not feel we can comment on this band, we will say that the sound was very poor during their set.

Twisted Rose - Things appeared to be getting a bit rushed by the time Twisted Rose came on and it was a shame this appeared to have a knock on affect on the band as they played a disappointingly short set. They also suffered from some problems with their bass guitar but they did rectify this quickly. Apart from this they sounded fantastic, looked the part and frontman Brian's vocals were as powerful as ever. 'Ballroom Blitz' went down well with the crowd but two notable exclusions from their set were 'Black Magic Woman' and their cover of Slash's Snakepit's 'Mean Bone'.

Plan A - Again things appeared rushed before the headlining band came on and as a result they only played for around 35 minutes. We had heard reports throughout the week that Plan A had played some excellent shows in the South of Ireland earlier in the week. However, the crowd tonight in the Rosetta seem unenthusiastic towards the band and perhaps this had an impact on their performance. They initially hit the stage as though they were going to tear the place apart but this gradually dispersed as the set progressed. At times the lack of response from the crowd was cringe worthy and the band themselves looked as though they may walk out at any minute. We could tell that the songs were well constructed and clearly these guys were excellent musicians but it just didn't come across well tonight. Poor sound again put a further dampener on the show. Gary Mills the drummer deserves a particular mention as he appeared to be enjoying himself and his playing was perfect. I don't know whether it was the mix of people there that had came to see the support bands but they didn't seem to enjoy the gig (or if they did they didn't show it). We ended up embarrassed for the band and hope that their other shows in Ireland made up for tonight's disappointing result.
Due to the different types of music we decided we would not give marks out of ten as they can not be judged against one another. Kerri