The Blades Take The Academy

Despite the technological marvels that surround us, there are still mysteries in our world that should both make us giddy with wonder, and slightly fearful. What rough beast is chained beneath the ancient floorboards of Rome? Are cats plotting to kill us in our sleep? How does James Corden keep getting work? The figs into the fig rolls conundrum remains a head scratcher.

All of these are mere 2 + 2 computations when compared to the failure of The Blades to make any kind of significant break through back in the day. A series of perfect, perfect singles released between 1980 and 1985, which include in ‘Downmarket’, a serious contender, alongside Phil Lynott’s ‘Old Town’, for greatest Irish single of them all, and the Last Man In Europe album should have been more than enough to guarantee world domination, but it wasn’t to be. There’s an alternative universe somewhere that sees Paul Hewson getting together with his mates every Christmas to play a few dates, while Paul Cleary swans around the South Of France, boozing it up with George Clooney.

Back in this reality, The Blades' December gig has become a welcome annual event, since they first got back together to play two sold out Olympia shows in 2013. The appeal has perhaps become slightly more selective, but there’s a good gang in the Academy on this cold night. As soon as the brass kicks in for the opening blast of ‘Last Man In Europe’, you can see it in the smile on every face – where others might be admired, Paul Cleary is loved. There are decades between the stop-start opening of ‘The Reunion’ and ‘On The Town’ from 2016’s Modernised, but you can’t see the join. ‘Then Came You’ is heralded, literally, by Frank Duff’s trumpet and is a love song that McCartney wouldn’t turn his nose up at, and show me a band who wouldn’t kill for songs like ‘Those Were The Days’, ‘Boy One’, and ‘Pride’, and I’ll show you a bunch of liars.

The brand new song ‘Everlasting Love Affair’ continues this high strike rate; Cleary lists the records that have meant the most to him, over the brass stomp. He was never going to be able to recreate the Pet Sounds/Penny Lane style middle eight on stage, but it doesn’t matter. That he can still write songs this good is a testament to the great talent he has always been. That he dedicates it to "all the mods in Ringsend" only charms further an already fawning throng.

We go back to near the start for early b-side ‘Real Emotion’ before ‘The Magnets’, which may or may not be a nod back to teds and mods throwing shapes to Stompin’ George on a Monday night in The Magnet on Pearse Street in the early eighties – I may be reading too much into it. ‘Smalltime’, from 2015, is just beautiful; you’d have to presume that Cleary knocks these things out in his sleep, leaving other songwriters banging their heads against the table, in the manner of a Salieri.

The nagging riff in ‘The Bride Wore White’ engenders an outbreak of middle aged frugging, your correspondent included, that would shame any wedding, and it’s kept going for ‘I Won’t Back Down’, the Tom Petty song played in tribute, complete with blistering slide solo from Conor Brady, a guitarist who more than warrants an article of his own. What’s really, really annoying about him is how easy he makes it look, whether he’s here, or smiling though a gig with Square Pegs, or backing up Bronagh Gallagher. Bastard.

As if to again prove how good the songwriting is, Cleary performs ‘Animation’ and ‘Some People Smile’ solo, allowing the crowd to take over the singing. You could knock these tunes out on a broken Fisher-Price piano and they’d still sound great.

The run to the end includes ‘Revelations’, ‘Not So Blue’, and a go at Bob & Marcia’s ‘Young, Gifted & Black’ before the aforementioned ‘Downmarket’ has everyone shouting and roaring. There’s no time for an encore as there’s a club night on afterwards, but we get one anyway in ‘Ghost Of A Chance’, and you couldn’t ask for a better send off. Put my name down for next year.

https://open.spotify.com/artist/6f48VZV0A7Qmujauc1NMGQ?si=Bx0lJAGORZCMB51eRiI5Xw