HP sharpshooter Natalia Marzec was front and centre to catch all the action; check out the gallery here.
The first surprise of the night is a welcome appearance from Dublin’s own Jape. Their two man keyboard and MPC set up, dwarfed by the surrounding instrumentation of the house band, makes for a wonderfully intimate performance of one of Purple Rain’s most gorgeous songs, ‘The Beautiful Ones’. Before they begin Richie Egan quips that they have adjusted the arrangement to include a tribute to the sad loss last weekend of Suicide’s Alan Vega, but also, because Egan was hesitant to attempt the vocal gymnastics of the songs outro. Their beat heavy, lushly orchestrated interpretation is an early highlight.
As the night’s house band, The True Funk Soldiers, prepare to take to the stage the lights dim and we hear the purple one himself intoning the famous “Dearly beloved…” spoken word intro from ‘Let’s Go Crazy’. Since his sad passing this past April, the line “I'm here to tell you, there's something else: The after world” has definitely gained an extra significance. Tonight, it’s as if Prince has made a surprise appearance at his own wake – you certainly wouldn’t put it past the man. As the band launch into a frenetic, tight as a drum rendition of the aforementioned, CC Brez and the 11 other consummate musicians on stage (including Hozier/Bell X1 drummer Rory Doyle) have the crowd dancing and singing along in no time.
As that song comes to a climax in a flurry of funky riffs and impressive guitar solos, whispers begin to circulate the crowd. It’s a wonder that the identity of one of the evening’s biggest surprise guests hadn’t leaked before tonight, but there he is waiting in the wings – none other than Bray’s favourite son, Andrew Hozier-Byrne. The crowd go understandably crazy as the superstar looms out on stage and takes the mic for a high-energy and supremely funky version of ‘I Wanna Be Your Lover’. Well known for the soulful growl that marks hits of his own like ‘Take Me To Church’ and ‘From Eden’, Hozier impresses with a powerful falsetto and is clearly loving getting a chance to perform some of the Minneapolis-maestro’s music.
The House band continue to impress with versions of ‘Pop’ Life’, ‘Sign O’ The Times’ and ‘Controversy’ dispatched in quick succession - the latter particularly impressive, with backing singers Orla and Keith stepping forward to share lead vocals.
Gavin Glass announces himself as “14-stone of salty Irish cream fresh from Stillorgan”, before he turns up the style factor with a suitably sexually charged run through of 1991’s ‘Cream’. From here on out the star-turns come quick and fast, with appearances from Bell X1’s Dave Geraghty for ‘Uptown’; Steve Wall of The Stunning and The Walls for a sultry, smokey ‘Money Don’t Matter’; and Roisin O, who takes on ‘Little red Corvette’ and leads the crowd through a mass sing-a-long of ‘Nothing Compares 2 U’ - her powerful vocals on the latter impressed all in attendance, and it was the first sign that there might be some tears shed on the dance-floor tonight!
Perhaps the biggest surprise of the night was the entrance of the legendary Paul Brady, not a name that one would traditionally associate with the kind of filthy-funk favoured by His Purple-ness. Shockingly the iconic Tyrone singer-songwriter, and former Planxty member, skilfully makes a song famously written about a threesome his own, his take on ‘When You Were Mine’ sounding like something he could have released himself in the late 80s or early 90s.
There’s definitely something in the water down Wicklow-way, because in addition to Hozier one of the night’s clear highlights was Bray trio Wyvern Lingo. Bathed in blue light and crowded around a single microphone, they begin ‘When Doves Cry’ as a chilling acapella that immediately draws gasps from the audience. They follow this up with a 60s girl-group inspired version of ‘1999’ B-side ‘How Come U Don’t Call Me Anymore?’ and deservedly receive one of the biggest ovations of the night.
There are almost too many highlights to mention from a night that was a very worthy tribute to one of music’s most ambitious innovators, but we’ll do our damnedest. The show continued with a lovely, stripped down, camp-fire style sing-a-long of ‘Manic Monday’ by Bell X1; ‘Boys & Girls’ by Ireland’s own ringmaster himself, Jerry Fish; a swinging version of ‘Take Me With You’ by Paul Noonan; and Hozier’s return to the stage for ‘Raspberry Beret’.
Then it all got very emotional.
Cork singer-songwriter Brian Deady blew away all in attendance with a beautiful, spine-tingling performance of ‘Sometimes It Snows In April’, which marked him out as one to watch, for sure. His soulful voice and the perfectly sparse piano accompaniment saw more than a few eyes well up and punters sheepishly sipping from pints to ease the lumps in throats - which only got worse when the musicians left the stage and Prince’s own performance of ‘Purple Rain’ from the film of the same name was projected behind the stage. The crowd all joining together, arm in arm, to sing the “Woohoo ooh ooh” of the outro was a suitably cathartic moment for those still in mourning and a wonderful way to pay tribute by the organisers.
Luckily, The True Funk Soldiers quickly returned for an uptempo encore that again had the dancefloor heaving. Hozier was back onstage to take lead vocals on Maurice Day and The Time’s ‘Jungle Love’, clearly having a blast during one of the most outrageously fun moments of the night. And then the stage filled up, with all of the special guests and the 12 piece band having the time of their lives dancing and singing along to ‘1999’.
As the man himself famously said in that song “life is just a party, and parties weren't meant 2 last”, and sadly with that the night came to an end. All in all it was a fitting tribute to the great man, all for an extremely worthy cause and a night full of surprises and magical moments that will stay long in the memory of the Dearly Beloved in attendance.