The Frank And Walters 25th Anniversary Concert At Cork's Opera House. October 25th 2014.

Paul Linehan lead vocals and bass.

                                         

One of Ireland's truly greatest bands The Frank And Walters were celebrating in style last Saturday night at home in their native Cork city. It was the band's 25th anniversary and the venue was a packed, sold out show in The Opera House located in the heart of town.

Preceding their performance tonight all four band members along with several hundred fans assembled at Grand Parade and marched to the concert venue to the sound of  The Barrack Street Band. Support onstage came from The Minutes and Rubyhorse but it was clear that everyone there just wanted to see their heroes The Franks.

Twenty five years is a long time in one's life and for many including myself there are a lot of great memories of The Frank And Walters music. I was lucky enough back in the 1990's to get promo cassette tapes of bands from record labels such as Setanta Records. I remember one time in particular receiving a floppy vinyl promo of the band back in the very early days. I also remember seeing them play support to The Wedding Present in Limerick's Savoy Theater over 20 years ago. 

Tonight was more of a reassurance of their brilliance than a trip through nostalgia as they kicked off their set with 'Tony Corcoran' and delighted the crowd again and again by playing almost everything important from their back catalogue. 'After All', 'Fashion Crisis Hit's New York', 'Colours', 'Michael', 'How Can I Exist' were just some of the highlights.  Between each song the chanting from the crowd 'we are, we are the frank and walters......' could be heard throughout the venue.

It was evident tonight that there is a huge loyal following to The Frank And Walters and probably most people assembled there have been fans from the beginning. Their music has an honesty and as much relevance to me and many others of our generation as The Smiths or The Cure or Joy Division ever had. This is a band who has survived and that's what is the most important, they never sold out to become obnoxiously overpaid rockstars but they have provided many of us with the soundtrack of our lives. May they continue to do so and we will look forward to their next album which will be a welcome release in 2015. It was a delight to see them being appreciated and celebrated in such a fine way last weekend and I will stand by my opinion that they are Ireland's greatest band.

New Single From The Frank And Walters.

This week saw the release of the second single from The Frank And Walter's excellent 6th studio album 'Greenwich Mean Time'. The song is called 'Loneliness And Sweet Romance'.
Forever producing some of the finest pop songs, this band will have you humming their tunes after one listen. Here is the video....
                                    


                                  

                         

The Frank And Walters Live @ Dolans Warehouse Limerick. April 28th 2012.

    

The ever loveable Frank And Walters thankfully stopped  by at Dolan's Warehouse Limerick on April 28th last as part of their Greenwich Mean Time tour.This is a band very close to my heart since their beginnings in the early 1990's. Their perfect blend of Indie Rock and uplifting Pop has for years steadily reinforced their position as truly one of Ireland's finest bands of all time.
With a late entrance onstage at Dolans on the night this wonderful 4 piece treated us to a 90 minute set of familiar treasures like 'Fashion Crisis Hits New York', 'Colours' and 'After All'.
There was also a generous array of tracks from the latest album 'Greenwich Mean Time' provided; most  notably their latest single 'Indie Love Song' which is up there as one of their finest ever releases.
One happy punter quite rightly  pointed out on the night, that every song of theirs could very well be a hit single, I could not argue with such a statement.
Front man, vocalist and bassist Paul Linehan forever delights with his faultless singing and good humoured jibes between songs. The hour and a half set seemed like a far lesser measure of time altogether, in fact I was so hooked, I could have watched them play for at least double the distance. Time has done nothing to this precious band from Cork, only make them sound better and better.

                                    

                                         

                                               

                                                  The Frank And Walters 'Indie Love Song'