Paul Heaton-The Point-March

Enjoyable gig though Heaton was quite fidgety for the first half or so. He kept messing with his mic stand, culminating with him handing it off to a stage hand to sort out. He eventually got into it and was in flying form for the last 8 or so songs. I hadn't done standing 3Arena in a while and I wouldn't be a hurry back after an evening of shouted chatting around me - from one group of apparently coked up lads who seemed to be on a work do (overheard during one song - "no, its a statement of work, you just cut and paste from the other document"!) to two lads who looked like they were straight out of the wolf tones, if the wolf tones were heroin addicts and very chatty. Thankfully they all knew the last few hits and so sang along instead of talking through them.

I'm tempted to actually follow him to a smaller venue in his quest to play the 32 counties just to get over tonight's gig.

Would be very controversial. You obviously do not know the history between Ireland and England. Three lions on the shirt represents the emblem of the England football team. Whilst it may mean something patriotic to English people, it would be like a red rag to a bull for many other nationalities. The booing would drown out the sound. Would be funny if you had Lightening Seeds and Kneecap on tour. And if they did play that song. The 3 nordie lads would be storming the stage.

If TLS were to play 3 lions, they would need to lead into it ion some jokey manner with the crowd. Probably would need to change the lyrics from 3 Lions to something else. And maybe wave a tricolour around as a tongue in cheek gesture.

equivalent to new order not playing world in motion here. World in motion a fair better tune than 3 lions

At least when you're standing you can move away from people.

I'll never forgetting seeing Sufjan Stevens in the Olympia, up in the circle and the 2 women sitting beside us were babbling about how much they hated the new woman in accounts. They didn't stop nattering until one of them went to the bog half way through and didn't come back, the other one was left in her own.

I'd say with my coked up lads that yes they were free tickets - one lad knew all the songs and the others were just chatting away. I assume the lad who knew all the songs was the owner/manager of wherever they were from and was paying for everything. As for the heroin wolf tones duo - I actually can't picture a scenario to explain their attendance, short of bunking in at the door for a bit of a craic. I see it got a 4 star review from the Irish Times, which is fair enough. Also love the idea of an hour long acoustic set in a smaller venue, must follow up on that.

Did this gig sell-out or were sections of the Arena cordoned off? Amazing that he can play this type of venue when 15 years ago, he wasn't playing small Irish 300 seaters out of choice.

His devotion to the cheap gigs, money behind the bars near venues over last decade have helped his profile enormously. The Everyman nature of him and his back catalogue as well is why he is doing so well now

Hot Press review of the concert ... Yes it was good !

Yeah, a good read alright. He's a good guy but certainly has a few quirks. There's no way he's making a massive profit on that last tour and I'm not sure if it helps small acts playing those sort of gigs to come out with quotes like that but he clearly enjoys what he's doing and it's great to have a few out there giving that sort of perspective.