Following the postponement of BARE In The Woods festival, erstwhile headliners Helmet will play Whelan’s next Saturday, June 10. The band formed in New York City in 1989 by founding members Page Hamilton (guitar/vocals), Henry Bogdan (bass), Peter Mengede (guitar) and John Stanier (drums). They are known for their frequent use of drop-D tuning. The group signed to Ampthetamine Reptile Records, and released their first full-length album, Strap It On, in 1990. Interscope Records soon came calling and signed the band in 1992.

The band found mainstream success with their Interscope debut Meantime which debuted at number 68 on the Billboard 200 and spawned the hits ‘Unsung’ and ‘In the Meantime’. After releasing two more albums, Helmet broke up in 1998. Leader Page Hamilton later put together a new lineup in 2004, with Aftertaste-era guitarist Chris Traynor, Anthrax bassist Frank Bello and drummer John Tempesta. The band released their first post-reunion album, Size Matters, later that year and it was their last release on their longtime label Interscope Records.

Following more lineup changes, they licensed the following album Monochrome to Warcon Records in 2006, the rights to which have since reverted back to Helmet. On September 7th, 2010, the band self-released a new album Seeing Eye Dog via a marketing and distribution deal with Work Song. The album is also available in exclusive formats and multiple options direct from the band’s website [www.helmetmusic.com].

Support comes from local band, CPNHGN. Consisting of Conor Wilkins, Donal Fleming, Steven Devine, and Kevin Brew, CPNHGN have a sound that is at once emotionally involving and moving, whilst simultaneously completely accessible, every song a sugared pill to get their message across.

Originally from Kildare, the band quote various touchstones like Joy Division, Sonic Youth, Wire, and Magazine, taking their sound, and pulling off that gift of managing to kick the darkness until it bleeds light.

TICKETS; €20 available online from WAV Tickets or Lo-Call 1890 200 078 (1-7pm M-F)

– 50c per ticket service charge applies on phone, internet or creditcard bookings. Final ticket price may be higher from other outlets.

Strictly over 18′s, I.D. may be required.

AFTER THE GIG

Whelan’s Indie Club w/ Late Bar from 10:30pm or check out the bands playing The Midnight Hour in the upstairs venue – Free Entry via front door until 10:30pm | Drinks Promos

Doors: 8pm 

What’s in a name these days? Not much but then is naming yourself after a country any more or less lazy than doing so after your favourite TV show or a book about the expansion of human consciousness? Once you get past that it’s the music that has to stand up and be counted.

Dublin’s Switzerland’s four members certainly have a lengthy musical apprenticeship between them, having variously been in at least five bands before this one, which affords the songs of Long Gone a satisfying level of professionalism. They’ve an Eighties element running through their work along the lines of Orange Juice and Lloyd Cole, which is periodically shot through with the sunshiny sounds of The Thrills.

The near two year gestation period for the songs that comprise Long Gone has also of course contributed to the overall lack of flab on their bones. Nothing on these tracks “about people (real and imaginary) who have made a change in their lives and faced the consequences” feels surplus to requirements.

Whether they’ll all have people jumping about the place, as singer Brian Walsh has indicated he’d like, is debateable – ‘Lay Me Down’, for example, is one to shuffle your feet to at best. Then again in a live setting they may all be as charged up as ‘Papaya’ or the almost-epic ‘Coming Back Strong’. Opener ‘Starting Out’ and closing track ‘You Know Me Better’ ably bracket an assured collection of songs that the quartet and label Popical Island can be rightly proud of.   

Long Gone is a fine debut album from a band that come across through their works as a good bunch of lads, enjoying what they’re doing and with the considerable ability to continue to do it well. Fans of well-considered, played & produced jangly indie-pop should look towards Switzerland when contemplating their first purchase of 2017 in that vein.

The album release show takes place at Whelan’s in Dublin on January 27.

Long Gone is available via bandcamp.