Face Of Cheam

Last Friday saw my first ever visit to the Brighton Dome. Travelling down to Brighton early afternoon with my brother we met at East Croydon station and had time for a quick pint at the nearby Porter & Sorter pub, an establishment I hadn't known existed until that day. It is rather hidden away behind the station despite being less than two minutes walk from it! Arriving in Brighton at around two thirty we went to collect the tickets from the venue and start a crawl towards Kemptown. 10 pubs were done (halves done in all) with the highlights being the first pub, the King & Queen which is a huge establishment where you would expect Zorro fighting on the stairs! Pool was played and the gents being interestingly placed beneath the bar where you could enter to the right of the bar and emerge fourty feet to the left hand side. The fifth pub was the Raneleigh was good alllbeit a bit smoky. Some Blues memobillia was plastered on the walls including a Muddy Waters poster! The Oak was good for a memorable game of pool at 50p per frame where a watching punter could not help be impressed by the standerd, and the following Hand In Hand was a small place with an interesting selection of beers, including a german pilsner we had not seen before.
On to the actual gig. The Brighton Dome was a mini Brixton Academy / Albert Hall really. A small circle in from of the stage where we could stand with raised seats at the back and a blacony. Unfortuantely lager was only availiable by the £3.20 bottle giving about half a pint in volume when poured into the plastic glass. Better value was the 5% House Bitter at £2.80 a pint. However it was not that drinkanble.
We managed to get down the front and Toby Jepson came on for a forty five minute set which included eight Little Angels songs. Boneyard, All Roads Lead To You, Young Gods and Radical Your Lover all sounded as good as they were many years ago. The only downside were a couple of prats behind us trying to bounce into people at random (instead of the normal mosshing to the front) and that Toby's guitarest fancied himself too much. A bloke over forty with a pierced nipple! Toby ended the set with Too Much Too Young and promised a tour in the next few months which will be worth checking out.
Normally you know what you're getting with Thunder. However their set was slightly disappointing with no She's So Fine, Backstreet Symphony or River Of Pain that had been played on previous night of the tour according to an unofficial website. However we did get Englishman On Holiday and a Better Man in a medley and classics such as Higher Ground and Loved Walked In sounded as good as ever. Not sure whether Luke Morley's new flying V had anything to do with the sound but didn't think this performance was as good as some in recent times (like Shepherds Bush last year). However am off to Hammersmith on Saturday and hopefully a London venue will raise the performance. Alas we had to leave to get the last train at 11.02 meaning we only got half of what could be a 12 minute plus version of Dirty Love. Still a good afternoon and evening out!