Review of a Concert by The Priests

Last night Puff and I went to see The Priests in concert at St Paul's Basilica. Here's a link to them singing there earlier on in the year. The singing was good, Puff and I enjoyed ourselves for the most part, but I have three little negatives to say about the show.

First, the sound system was terrible.

Second, while the singing was good, as I said, there was hardly any singing. The show was supposed to be an hour and a half according to the ticket, but it was barely an hour, including the encore. This situation was exacerbated by the MC asking questions in between the songs, and since he was questioning three men together, the answers went on for some time. By my most generous calculation, that means we heard about a half hour of music. Every time that MC stepped up with his blasted microphone I found myself longing for a Kanye West* to jump up on stage and rip the microphone from his hands. "Yo, yo, yo, you got your own radio show, you can speak your piece tomorrow, but for tonight, I just wanna say we wanna hear the priests way more than you."

Third, related to the second point, two songs were sung by some local 'talent' who were in the backup choir. Their voices often disappeared into the background of the wretched sound system, which was actually a blessing, because when we could hear them, they stank. And the Priests were asked questions by the MC both before and after the backup singers were given a chance to sing their overwrought ditties. So now we're looking at, generously, twenty minutes of music I wanted to hear. Now when you factor in that I forked out seventy bucks for my two tickets...

On the plus side, I love going to St Paul's, it is our most beautiful church (here's a link to some photos). Also, the crowd contained the largest collection of Irish expats I have ever run into. I regret that I neglected to ask any of them how they felt about the recent France Ireland World Cup Qualifying game, which ended in a result so corrupt even Hitler himself is ranting about it. (Language alert on that link) I ended up speaking to my neighbour in the pew about where our families came from. And the Priests themselves sounded very good together. Their best piece, in my humble opinion was the encore when they sang Panis Angelicus a capella- and no, not that version.

This one.




This kind of singing is their real strength. As soloists they are alright, but as a trio the blend of their voices is truly beautiful. I wish they would release an a capella album of such music.

On the whole, Puff and I don't get out often, and we enjoyed ourselves, I only wish we had been given more. I felt like I had paid for supper and was tossed an hors d'oevre. Tasty, but not very satisfying.

*by the way, Hitler rants about Kanye West as well. Language alert there, too.