Live Review

The Virgins – The Academy, Dublin

• 29th Apr 2009

Uber style and New York pop was the order of the night as Manhattan four piece ‘The Virgins’ made their debut in the compact surroundings of the Academy last Saturday night.

A fairly eclectic and surprisingly large crowd, considering the bands somewhat low profile over here, turned out to bask in what was 40 minutes of happy indie-tinged pop were any comparison to credible bands such as the Strokes were lost on this observer.

Opening the night were fellow New Yorkers ‘Amazing Baby’ and like the main act they hammered out a contrived sugar coated set which appealed to the (largely female) audience. In fact it was the support act who probably garnered more attention from the more musically minded as they seemed comparable to a somewhat poppier ‘Killers’ thus garnering a small sliver of respect.

However it did feel like an episode of ‘The OC’ or ‘One Tree Hill’ as it was hard to warm to the musicians on stage who seemed more interested in how they looked as opposed to how they sounded. But of course the main furore was reserved for the main act, who were greeted with screams of adulation as they stepped on the stage they would vacate a mere 40 minutes later, which was for me 40 minutes too long.

The Virgins’ main claim to fame I found out from some exuberant fan is that their music provided the score for an entire episode of Gossip Girl, seriously, and also their front man is dating the infamous Peaches Geldof.

As I imagined, they lived up to the entirely low expectations I had as their lead singer, a one Donald Cumming (remember the name, he’s sure to be big) serenaded the overly hyper crowd with odes from their debut (and hopefully only) album inspirationally titled ‘The Virgins’.

Songs such as ‘Rich Girl’, ‘Hey Hey Girl’ and ‘Love Is Colder Than Death’ seemed to enthral their fans, but for me it was one long monotonous track which was broken up intermittently by the aforementioned front man stating his joy at being in Dublin. For many this joy was reciprocated, for me it wasn’t.

Overall The Virgins did seem to go down well with their fans, those of a more on the fence persuasion may or may not have been impressed. If you like happy go lucky pop this was the gig for you, if not then all you can do is laugh at the fact that this time next year the pop machine will have churned out another perfect band and the Virgins, like Peaches Geldof’s virginity, will probably be a distant memory.