Jack Penate - Astoria, London - Wednesday 26th September 2007

First gig for a while, although there has been lots of (very successful) football to pass the time instead. On a bitterly cold day, it was off to the Astoria to see Jack Penate, for the millionth time this year (seriously, I make it the sixth). Nowadays, he seems to be pretty famous, so this could be the last time for a while that he plays a "proper" (as opposed to "secret") gig in a venue this small.

I got there too late to really see much of the support bands, although from what I heard of the main support act (which admittedly wasn't very much), it didn't sound like I missed out too badly. The kids (of whom there were loads - the audience was again VERY young for this one) lapped it up, but I wasn't really in the mood. Whilst standing at the bar with a can of Red Stripe, I noticed that Penate was due to be on stage from 9:30 until 11 - surely a bit of a stretch for somebody that has 3 singles, and whose album isn't even out yet.

So it was something of a surprise when he arrived, bang on time, at 9:30, and immediately blew one of his singles by playing Spit At Stars first off. He then followed up with live staple Got My Favourite, which ensured that the whole crowd was immediately on his side. It was a quickfire set, with each song received with rapturous applause and cheering (and some screaming). Forty minutes after he came on, he was saying goodbye, saying that the gig had made it the best day of his life, and ending the set with a crazy version of Torn On The Platform.

There was of course time for an encore, with a slow solo acoustic number that sounded pretty good. This was followed by Jack's cover version of Dub Be Good To Me - last time I heard this, I didn't really like it, and certainly didn't understand the point of slaughtering that particular song. This time though, with a large crowd joining in, it was a real highlight of the set. I'm still not a huge fan of covering songs just so that you have a cover in your repertiore (which I think this was a classic case of), but this isn't bad - and it certainly knocks spots off Hard Fi's appalling and pointless cover of Seven Nation Army.

Final song was a frantic rendition of Second, Minute Or Hour, the re-released single which looks set to hit the Top 20 this week. On the main floor, there seemed to be bodies flying around all over the place, which reflects pretty well the hardcore of super-fans that Jack Penate seems to have amassed now. The band do get better every time I see them, and they weren't too shabby to start with. I suspect that people may tire of them before too long (they only seem to have 2 "types" of song), but I think they'll get significantly more successful before that starts to happen.